When one thinks of Halloween, the typical activities of trick-or-treating, going to costume parties or carving pumpkins may come to mind. Throwing playing cards at a group of students acting out a movie that is playing on the screen behind them or making fun of the narrator’s lack of a visible neck may seem abnormal, but it is exactly what dozens of students packed into Little Nourse Theater to do on Oct. 30, Oct. 31 and Nov. 1. They came to see a screening of “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” in addition to a shadowcast of student actors, complete with eccentric callouts, avant-garde audience games and an abundance of interactive props.
“The Rocky Horror Picture Show” (1975) is an independently produced musical comedy horror film that centers around Brad Majors and Janet Weiss, a newly engaged couple who encounter a strange castle after their car breaks down in the rain. The castle, owned by Frank-n-Furter, a mad scientist who is a transvestite from the planet Transsexual, contains a lab where Frank has created life in the form of a muscular man named Rocky. The film follows the strange and, at times, violent antics that ensue when Rocky resists his newfound role in the house, Frank tries to seduce Brad and Janet, the couple’s old professor pays a visit and the castle’s “staff,” Riff Raff, Magenta and Columbia, stir up trouble.
The movie almost immediately developed a cult following in the years after it was released. According to History.com, fans began calling out during movie screenings within a few months of its first release, showing up in costumes and dancing in the aisles. Fan casts or shadowcasts occurred as more and more theaters screened the movie at midnight showings, where costume-clad fans would engage with the story unfolding on the screen before them.
Carleton’s shadowcast this year performed a 9:00 p.m. show on the night before Halloween, a 10:00 p.m. show on Halloween night, and a 10:00 p.m. show on the day after Halloween. Actors danced, lip-synced and used handmade props on stage in Little Nourse Theater throughout the show’s one-hour-and-forty-minute run time.
“What makes having a shadowcast worthwhile is that it’s a tradition in the queer community and it is a fun way of empowering individuals,” said Felix Allen ’27, who was one of the directors of this year’s shadowcast. “I watched it for the first time as a freshman without a shadowcast so I was excited to watch it with one last year. It’s important for people to try new things and experiment. I had never acted before but I loved the musical but I wanted to get something out of it emotionally so it was a very valuable experience.”
The theater was packed on all three nights of the production, with only the first handful of spectators even getting a seat.
“Before the show there were a lot of lines all the way through Nourse on the first night,” said Rahim Hamid ’26. “I was there 45 minutes early and luckily I got a seat but by the time the doors to the theater were about to open there was a line out the door.”
All of the shadowcast characters were students, who auditioned for various roles early in Fall Term.
“They did a twist where the two main-ish characters who were usually played by men were now played by women, which is an interesting casting decision. Did it impact the story all that much? No, but I still think it puts an interesting spin on it,” Hamid said.
Because of the rich tradition of callouts, a pamphlet of some of the most popular words and phrases was provided under each viewer’s seat, along with some props. The audience was instructed to make fun of the movie narrator’s lack of neck, to snap a pair of provided latex gloves when Frank snaps their gloves in a laboratory scene and to use a provided Carletonian newspaper to cover their heads like Janet does when caught in the rain.
“My favorite part of the movie plus performance is seeing the audience get into the callbacks and participation, it’s fun to see them engaged,” Allen said.
In addition to callouts and prop engagement, many spectators sang along to the musical numbers or stood up and danced at different points in the film. Additionally, after the credits rolled, the crowd was invited up to do the Time Warp dance, one of the most recognizable dance sequences from the movie.
The screening of “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” on Halloween is a holiday tradition, but it also provides a unique event opportunity for students during the weekend, according to Allen.
“I think it was a good addition to the Halloween scene,” he said. “There’s a lot of parties and high energy things, but I like Rocky on Halloween because it’s traditional to show it then but also it’s a fun event where people feel less self conscious about their costumes and how they are being perceived. It’s an event where people feel like there’s nothing expected out of them but they can still have a fun time.”
Viewers of the performance echoed the opportunity for people to have a different dimension of expression while watching and performing with the shadowcast.
“It was nice to see my friends who are usually not very flamboyant and expressive be that way in Rocky. They put a lot of time into this and I think it paid off,” Hamid said.
In future years, Allen and others involved in the production hope to continue screening the movie and putting together a shadowcast.
While Allen said this year was an “amazing production,” he said that “we were quite underfunded. It’s a very involved production with a lot of participation and, in order for it to be a good production, it needs to be accessible. So getting all of our spaces and our props and our scripts was difficult and I hope it’s easier next year.”
