<\/p>\n
It\u2019s astounding, time is fleeting: 50 years ago, The Rocky Horror Picture Show <\/em>\u2014 a sci-fi\/horror\/musical-comedy adapted from a stage play by Richard O\u2019Brien that opened on London\u2019s West End in 1973 \u2014 premiered on U.S. movie screens. At first, its box-office gross was flatter than Brad and Janet\u2019s tire on that stormy night. But all flops should bounce back like this one: The Jim Sharman-directed film is still playing in limited theatrical showings around the United States, making it the longest big-screen run for a film in history. To toast a half-century of Horror<\/em>, Billboard<\/em> is doing the time warp, again. It\u2019s just a jump to the left\u2026<\/p>\n Thanks to an investment from Ode Records president (and Carole King producer) Lou Adler, the Rocky Horror Show<\/em> stage production jumped to the left coast to open at Adler\u2019s Roxy in Los Angeles. The April 13, 1974, Billboard<\/em> hailed its \u201coutrageously decadent humor\u201d and recognized Tim Curry as \u201ca major talent discovery\u201d for his campy portrayal of the gender-bending mad scientist: \u201cHow many male performers could go through an entire play costumed in a Marlene Dietrich chorus girl outfit and still come across with Mick Jagger macho?\u201d<\/p>\n More from Billboard<\/strong><\/p>\n The following year, The Rocky Horror Picture Show<\/em> \u2014 starring Curry and Susan Sarandon \u2014 made its big-screen bow, then fizzled, but beamed into the underground movie circuit. The June 3, 1978, Billboard<\/em> predicted that the soundtrack, which had just made its Billboard 200 debut that April, \u201cmay well become the sleeper soundtrack of the year.\u201d \u201cIt\u2019s not a mass item,\u201d one label executive told Billboard<\/em>, \u201cbut it is a mass cult item.\u201d<\/p>\n By 1980, ticket buyers were doing the time warp, again, at call-and-response screenings. An Aug. 2 piece about how rock music could boost a movie\u2019s endurance reported that \u201cthe frenzied Rock \u2018n\u2019 Roll High School<\/em> [and the] laughably ghoulish Rocky Horror Picture Show<\/em>\u201d could still \u201cpack in audiences with the best of them.\u201d Slowly and steadily, it paid off. The film \u201cquietly marked its 10th anniversary last month by topping $60 million,\u201d according to the Nov. 9, 1985, Billboard<\/em>. \u201cBut beyond the numbers, the most important cultural contribution made by Rocky Horror<\/em> may have been establishing the phenomenon of midnight weekend screenings of cult films.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cE.T.<\/em>, Rocky Horror Picture Show<\/em> Top Some Lists,\u201d according to a headline in the Aug. 22, 1987, issue, which described the video titles stores wanted most. Looking at \u201cfeedback on catalog releases from special request sheets in each store,\u201d video merchants were eager to taste Curry\u2019s Dr. Frank-N-Furter. By 1990, their desires were fulfilled. \u201cThe Rocky Horror Picture Show<\/em>, one of the most eagerly awaited titles in industry history, will make its belated debut on video Nov. 8 at $89.98,\u201d reported the Sept. 22 issue. By then, the film had grossed \u201c$150 million at the domestic box office.\u201d At the time, \u201cit still plays midnight shows in at least 200 theaters.\u201d It\u2019s still showing.<\/p>\n This story appears in the Oct. 11, 2025, issue of Billboard.<\/em><\/p>\n Best of Billboard<\/strong><\/p>\n Sign up for Billboard’s Newsletter<\/a>. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook<\/a>, Twitter<\/a>, and Instagram<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.yahoo.com \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" It\u2019s astounding, time is fleeting: 50 years ago, The Rocky Horror Picture Show \u2014 a sci-fi\/horror\/musical-comedy adapted from a stage play by Richard O\u2019Brien that opened on London\u2019s West End in 1973 \u2014 premiered on U.S. movie screens. At first, its box-office gross was flatter than Brad and Janet\u2019s tire on that stormy night. But […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2087917,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25172],"tags":[313169,345127,375876,366020],"class_list":["post-2087916","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entertainment","tag-billboard-200","tag-rocky-horror-picture-show","tag-rocky-horror-show","tag-tim-curry"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/50-Years-of-\u2018Rocky-Horror-Coverage-In-Our-Back-Pages.jpeg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2087916","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2087916"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2087916\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2087918,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2087916\/revisions\/2087918"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2087917"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2087916"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2087916"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2087916"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\u2018Show\u2019 and Hell<\/h2>\n
\u2018Rocky\u2019 Start<\/h2>\n
There\u2019s a Light<\/h2>\n
Rent-a, Rent-a, Rent Me<\/h2>\n