Everybody, of course, remembers the titillating (no pun intended) Rocky Horror Picture Show that premiered in 1975 starring Tim Curry, Susan Sarandon and Meat Loaf that brought the iconic stage piece to the silver screen. And who could forget the infectious soundtrack that peaked at 49 on the Billboard 200, one of the most prestigious charts you’d be lucky enough to be found on. The boisterously indulgent music and the gothic, extra-terrestrial sexiness of the show has always put a campy twist on the rock opera scene because, as one critic put it: “…it plays like a combination of rock opera, The Honeymooners, Frankenstein and a gay cruise.’ No need to be sensitive or politically correct here. The film certainly isn’t and in any case, he’s absolutely right!

In July last year the Fugard Theatre in Cape Town, produced by Eric Abraham, brought the stage version – The Rocky Horror Show (those adding “Picture’ in there when referring to the show will be outcast as heathen) – to our shores with a completely sold out run of 27 consecutive weeks. All good things come to an end, however, but that does not mean they can’t move on to another locale. Finding new audiences up north, the show moved to Pieter Toerien’s Montecasino Theatre in Johannesburg and has been experiencing similar success with all available weekend tickets selling out.

The highlight of this particular incarnation is a new take on how technology is implemented into a 40-year-old show. Needless to say, it’s a far cry from traditional theatre in almost every sense of the word and that includes the tech.

So, without further ado, let’s do the time warp again!

Modern retro

The Rocky Horror Show, according to Director Matthew Wild (fitting name, don’t you think?), aimed to balance: “…a 50s sci-fi feel with high-tech production values.’ This involved metamorphosing the kitschy gothic laboratory come medieval castle set with synchronised lighting, sound effects and interactive projection bringing the risque show to a completely new level; one that acknowledges the past with an appropriate nod and combines a modern aesthetic that thrusts it straight forward into the future.

Johannesburg-based Electronic SA, long time technical collaborators with the Fugard Theatre and their preferred supplier, stepped in to offer lighting and special effects support. Eastern Acoustics supplied the TiMax 2 Soundhub system employed to manage and synchronise the sound effects and spatialisation in conjunction with the video playback.

Lighting

The lighting for The Rocky Horror Show was supplied by Electrosonic and bought by the Fugard specifically for the show. Electrosonic has been the Fugard’s preferred supplier for many years and, according to Daniel Galloway, executive director the Fugard and lighting designer for the show: “The Rocky Horror Show would not have happened if it was not for the involvement of Electrosonic.’

However, as the show was transplanted across provinces, it was not without challenges. Galloway explains: “Moving the show from the Fugard Theatre to Montecasino was a challenge. The Fugard offers far greater height so our set had to be adapted in order to fit into the traditional proscenium arch theatre in Johannesburg. As a result the re-mapping of the video work took some time, as did the re-lighting in the space.’

All lighting was programmed and controlled with a Compulite Vector Violet controller running all four on-board DMX universes. For wash lighting, 14 Martin Mac401 LED fixtures were installed. Four Martin Mac Aura Wash fixtures were deployed to fill in the gaps in the form of top lighting. Six Martin Mac700 profiles handled key lighting and special effects while an Atomic Strobe was engaged for the illustrious Dr Frank-N-Furter’s reveal.

Other lights included various generic fixtures such as ADB F101 1kW and ADB F201 2kW Fresnels. Numerous amounts of Par 16 Birdies, flood lights and generic 1kW par cans and profiles were also deployed. The generic lights were run from ADB Eurorack 50 dimmers along with Electron 12 x 3kW dimmer packs.

For general hazing, a JEM Compact Hazer was installed. However, to supply the creepy mediaeval castle, low-lying fog effects a JEM Glaciator Extreme was the preferred choice.

Departing from more common wired setups, a wireless Versalight LED strip lighting configuration was custom designed and installed by Electrosonic using a battery power source and wireless DMX. Complete wireless control of the LED strip was employed for the reveal of Dr Frank-N-Furter’s lab project, also called the “Rocky Box’.


Audio and video

Audio and video were somewhat interlinked as a TiMax 2 Soundhub system was employed along with QLab3 software run on a Mac, which aided in managing and syncing the sound effects and audio spatialisation in tandem with video playback. The QLab3 workstation was operated by the stage manager at front-of-house.

Because many of the audio cues were score-related such as doorbell noises, wedding bells or video-related such as tyre bursting noises and thunder, they were played back via the QLab Mac, which also fed the video clips out to the projector. The projector of choice was an InFocus 10 000 ANSI lumen projector. This allowed the cues to be cooperatively adjusted during rehearsals with the input of music supervisor Charl-Johan Lingenfelder. The graphic design for the video was handled by James Cooke while video mapping and animation was crafted by Anwar McWhite.
As mentioned, the cues sent out by QLab can also govern panorama and spatialisation. The way this is done is via MIDI notes being sent out directly to the TiMax Soundhub, which assigns sounds across any of the six outputs in the TiMax output matrix: upstage left and right, main left and right, wide surround left and right localisations or dynamic timeline pans.

Another use for the QLab cue triggers was to fade the upstage band fill anchors up and down corresponding to scenography movements as when mid-stage scenery flats were closed in front of the band. This put the microphones capturing the band in an enclosed space with the loud upstage bandfill anchors and muddied the band mix. The cue triggers from QLab remedied this situation.

Various atmospheric sounds were in need of more complex spatialisation and these effects too were created on the TiMax SoundHub timeline environment using Image Definition pan objects. These were played back directly off the internal hard drive housed in the TiMax unit. This resulted in such effects as, in the case of the space ship launch in the finale, samples spinning around the room; slowly at first and then speeding up progressively. The internal hard drive was also the source of the spine-chilling pre-show and interval atmospheric effects such as distant organ music, clanking chains, footsteps and spooky weather phenomena. These were all built on separate tracks and included dynamic panning and level automation on the timeline.

The goal of sound designer Aki Khan, assisted by Dave Haydon from Out Board (TiMax developers), was to create as much impact as possible for band and vocals while keeping the localisation for the performers as precise as possible. The audio system employed at The Rocky Horror Show was a Turbosound TCS612 system with four M1D front-fills, hung three TCS612s a side with a further delay pair hung in the mid-centre of the room to cover the balcony. The system was installed and configured by Dave Claasen from Eastern Acoustics and the show was mixed by Melissa George, who mixed the Cape Town shows as well.

The delay processors employed were a pair of XTA DP448s which were fed with separate stereo band and vocal mixes from the TiMax SoundHub. The two balcony delays and the four M1D front-fills were fed directly as alternative LR pairs from the TiMax SoundHub. Two further stacks of three M1Ds were built into the set under the band’s platform to help gel the band to the main system and front fills and were fed directly from independent TiMax outputs to provide anchors for the band mix, to play back upstage sound effects and to provide a level of foldback for the cast in time-critical sound effects that required dialogue to cease.

Microphones employed for the show were a combination of DPA and Countryman headsets for the performers in order to give a ’mic-free” look. The narrator received a Sanken. These were mixed on a DiGiCo SD9 onto separate stereo vocal and band groups for TiMax. These also contained separate reverb mixes from the on-board effects in the SD9. The inputs from the band were assigned in TiMax to left and right Image Definitions resulting in the composite main system being pushed 45m upstage. This anchored the live drummer to the band riser with all direct inject inputs localised using the upstage band fills. For the vocals, TiMax left and right Image Definitions were localised 17ms from the front of the stage, which eliminated phasing or echo thresholds. A Bricasti M7reverb was also used in conjunction with the separate band and vocal console reverbs. The Bricasti M7 was used on lead and backing vocals and occasionally saxophone.

The wrap

“I have never experienced anything quite like this in my theatre career in Cape Town,’ remarks Daniel Galloway on the production of The Rocky Horror Show. After attending the show myself and being blown away by the fantastic acting, impactful and atmospheric sound, moody lighting and masterful blend of tradition and tech, I would have to say that a milestone has been reached in South African theatre and other productions may find it difficult to follow suit!