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OREGON S LGBTO NEWSMAGAZINE
Let’s Do The Time Warp Again
The girl in the black lace corset exhales a
cloud of cigarette smoke through her cherry
red lips into the cold April night. I watch her
in the light of the Clinton Street Theater
marquee— The Rocky Horror Picture Show, it
proclaims in bold letters, Saturday, Midnight.
I dig my hands into my pockets, shivering.
“Have you done Rocky before?” my boss
Fred asks, pulling a bag of rice out of the
pocket of his motorcycle jacket. He had sug
gested the outing as a bizarre take on corpo
rate team-building—the cool gay boss’ alter
native to a ropes course.
“Not in years,” I reply. “Since high school,
actually.”
“That means you’re a virgin again!” a fat,
gleeful man in caked makeup shouts from
behind us. This guy is a pro, a lipstick in his
hand deftly smearing a “V” onto my cheek
before I can protest.
“Big turnout for something that happens
every Saturday,” I observe, noting the long
line of attendees snaking around the corner.
“Tonight’s the 33rd anniversary perfor
mance!” the lipstick man exclaims, his eyes
twinkling behind false lashes. “Thirty-three
years! The longest-running showing of Rocky
in the world! Keeping Portland weird, right?”
“Fucking weird is right,” Fred deadpans,
stubbing out his cigarette on the sole of his
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remember to breathe
BY N IC K M A TTO S
I will omit the details of my de-
virginization; however, I will say that
it involved balloons and a terribly
embarrassed young Asian woman.
Paint your own picture.
boot. The line begins to move, my coworkers
and I lurch in single file into the theater as
the fat man behind us giggles with
excitement.
The emcee strolls across the stage with the
requisite campy swagger. “Welcome to the
Clinton Cabaret!” he roars. “I see lots of vir
gins in the audience! Get the hell up here!”
I’m surprised to see a crowd of 35 people,
some marked with the scarlet “V,” join my
coworkers and I moving toward the stage.
Turning around, I scan the audience of
youthful flesh encased in Hot Topic corsets,
mentally listing each theatergoer’s estimated
age: 16, 18, 19, 15. I t’s likely that a third of the
people here tonight were unable to vote in the last
election, I reckon as before me a group of fel
low “virgins” replicates the sounds of the last
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versively racy as it must have been to audiences
in the 70s or ‘80s. Any attendee of a Portland
drag show or watcher of South Park has seen
and heard far raunchier fare than anything in
the film. Still, every new generation of theater
kids latches on, puts on their fishnets and over
sized heels, gets up on the stage and does the
Time Warp again and again. Why?
I turn my head, look across the merry
crowd shouting spiritedly at the screen. A
woman my mother’s age sits stiffly in her cor
set next to the girl with the cherry red lips—
her daughter. “Slut!” they scream in unison at
the screen, then laugh together.
Every unlucky generation relearns the les
sons of the last the hard way, rediscovers the
thrill of rebellion and thinks it is unique to
them, doesn’t see the long chain of subversion
that leads up to them. Rocky may not be the
far end of the shock spectrum now, but it’s
one of the first, an artifact of sexual and artis
tic rebellion curated by those who still hunger
for the crazily campy side of life, regardless of
their age. I pick up my bag of props, glad that
Rocky was there when I was a teenager to
show me how to be insane and glamorous at
the same time, glad that it shares its lessons
so freely with the teenagers here now. I throw
pieces of toast into the air, scream “Asshole!”
at the screen, and smile. ja]
orgasm they gave their partners for their ini
tiation. Shit, I think, unsettled by the realiza
tion—It's wholly possible that the majority of
this audience could have been conceived in the
hazy hours following one of the last 33 years’
worth of Rocky showings at this theater. I will
omit the details of my de-virginization; how
ever, I will say that it involved balloons and a
terribly embarrassed young Asian woman.
Paint your own picture.
The Rocky Horror Picture Show is exactly
what it is—I doubt any queer worth zir salt
requires a synopsis. There is, as always, blood
and corsets, rock opera and garish makeup,
Susan Sarandon and Meat Loaf and a sweet
transvestite from Transexual, Transylvania.
However, the Portland Cabaret brings some
thing else to the table: a live reenactment of
the film as it shows. The effect is jaw-drop-
pingly on point, the actors perfectly lip-sync
ing along with the lines clad in costumes
nearly identical to their film counterparts.
These people are serious about the Picture
Show. But why? I ponder in the darkness.
N ick M attos will probably never do the Time
Why does the tradition continue? As a film Warp again. For more information on Portland's
and as a phenomenon, Rocky is hardly as sub acclaimed Rocky cabaret, check out rockypdx.org.
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