By Emily Isaac
Jambar Contributor
People of all ages filled the Ford Family Recital Hall at the DeYor Performing Arts Center to experience a night of song, dance and horror. “The Rocky Horror Show” ended with a midnight showing Friday night.
The show started off with “virgin sacrifices” where audience members who have never seen the show before were marked with a “V” before entering the theater.
The audience members marked had the ability to volunteer to be a “sacrifice,” where they participate in games of the director’s choosing.
When asked what the inspiration behind the sacrifices was, Director Joe Asente said, “It’s a bit of a Rocky tradition to have virgin sacrifices of some kind. The whole point of it is to try to get people in the spirit.”
Games like “twizzler tongue twister” and many more had audience members laughing, cheering and clapping.
One of the games involved two team members switching their outfits while on stage. The winning team, Chase Picio and Robin Bauman, both said they loved the show.
“I enjoyed it more than I thought I was going to. I wasn’t really sure what I was going into,” Picio said.
Bauman said she would definitely see the show again.
“I’d love to be in it, but I know I’d never be in it,” she said.
The games ended with a classic costume contest where there were first, second and third place winners. First and second received candy as their prizes.
However, the third place winner received a lap dance from the “Whorus.” Once the sacrifices ended, the show began.
From beginning to end, the audience was a part of the show with cue cards and prop bags. Fans were able to interact with the production.
Some interactions were unplanned, as long-time fans of the show would shout things to the actors on stage; the actors would respond without skipping a beat, while remaining in character.
“I’m happy with how the audiences were able to interact with everyone throughout the run of the show,” Asente said.
“Every night was different. Our actors did a really good job of improvising everything that was thrown at them, both literally and figuratively. There’s definitely a stronger cult following to the show than even I anticipated,” Asente said.
Audience members of all ages agreed the show was all they hoped for and much more.
“It was well worth staying up late for — totally fun start to finish I’d do it over,” Deb Geho, an audience member and longtime fan of “The Rocky Horror Show” said.
Not only was the audience’s expectations exceeded, but so were the expectations of the cast and crew.
“Really I dont think theres anything I would’ve changed. I think that this went off just about as flawlessly as it could have,” Asente said.
The cast and directors were sad to see it end as well.
“I’m kind of sad because it was really nice to bond with everyone. It’s such a fun show,” cast member Makayla Robinson said.
“You spend all this time rehearsing it and then you only have the audience for these four shows that we did and the audience is what makes the show come to life. it’s so special,” she continued.
To bring the successful production to a close, both Asente and Savannah Florkowski, the music director for the production, had a few words to say to the audience and fans.
“We really appreciate everyone who came out and embraced the show and all the positive messages and feedback we’ve gotten through our social media accounts,” Asente said.
