Fox Does The Time Warp Again
It was announced last week that Fox was planning to bring The Rocky Horror Picture Show to the small screen for a two hour remake set to premiere some time in the undetermined future. And people are FREAKING OUT!!
Look Rocky Horror is a rather decisive piece of work. People tend to either love it or hate it and there is really no middle ground. But those who love it tend to try and convince those who don't that the reason they don't is likely because they've never been to the live midnight showings of the movie, where you can really enjoy the movie in full, complete with the audience call and response to the movie that has developed over the years. This is what makes the idea of a remake of the movie that people watch alone and at home so bizarre on the surface. Why would one of the most famous bits of audience interaction be something that people would do alone? Is anybody going to throw rice at their own TV if they have to be the ones to vacuum it up later?
However, this is clearly a response to the the NBC live musical events that have been happening for the past couple of years. In 2013, NBC had a live version of The Sound of Music that starred Cary Underwood, and was a monster success, at least in terms of viewer ratings.(It ended up bringing in the network's highest rated Thursday night since 2004) So obviously it was quickly announced that there would be another live musical next the next year which turned out to be Peter Pan starring Allison Williams and Christopher Walken.
Peter Pan did not pull in the numbers that The Sound of Music had the previous year but was still a very successful night for NBC. It's already been announced that in 2015, NBC will air a live production of The Wiz so it look like for the foreseeable future we're going to get a live musical on NBC around Christmas time every year.
Because of NBC's success, Fox seemly has attempted to copy the musical on TV idea, and Rockey Horror isn't even their first jump into that pool. A few months ago, it had been announced that Fox would be airing a version of Grease staring Vanessa Hudgens as Rizzo, but that won't be out until next January.
This isn't the first time that an attempt to remake Rocky Horror has happened. Back in 2002, Fox announced plans for a remake that was timed to condense with the 30th anniversary of the movie, but that never came to fruition. But here's why this one will most likely succeed where previous attempts have failed.
See, TV is desperately looking for DVR proof programming. That means things that you as an audience member feel you need to watch live as it's airing and won't DVR it for later when you can skip the commercials. Sports is the best example of this as people want to see what's happening as it happens in sporting events, and don't want to go into the game already knowing what the final score is. This is why you see hashtags for shows so heavily promoted now on network television. The goal is to get you to watch something when everyone else in the world is watching and to react to whatever show it may be on twitter.
The two NBC live musical events have already proven to be fairly good examples of DVR proof. People would tune in either A. Because it felt like the musical was a once in a lifetime thing that had to be seen when it was on, when the rest of the world was watching, or B. People wanted to see if somebody was going to mess up.
So you already have a format that has proven twice now to get people to watch television live for a night and sit through the commercials, and then you add in the interaction element of Rocky Horror. People may not throw things at the screen when their at home alone, but you can bet the most famous vocal responses to the movie are going to flood twitter with whatever hashtag fox has watermarked in the corner of the screen.
However, this is clearly a response to the the NBC live musical events that have been happening for the past couple of years. In 2013, NBC had a live version of The Sound of Music that starred Cary Underwood, and was a monster success, at least in terms of viewer ratings.(It ended up bringing in the network's highest rated Thursday night since 2004) So obviously it was quickly announced that there would be another live musical next the next year which turned out to be Peter Pan starring Allison Williams and Christopher Walken.
Because of NBC's success, Fox seemly has attempted to copy the musical on TV idea, and Rockey Horror isn't even their first jump into that pool. A few months ago, it had been announced that Fox would be airing a version of Grease staring Vanessa Hudgens as Rizzo, but that won't be out until next January.
This isn't the first time that an attempt to remake Rocky Horror has happened. Back in 2002, Fox announced plans for a remake that was timed to condense with the 30th anniversary of the movie, but that never came to fruition. But here's why this one will most likely succeed where previous attempts have failed.
See, TV is desperately looking for DVR proof programming. That means things that you as an audience member feel you need to watch live as it's airing and won't DVR it for later when you can skip the commercials. Sports is the best example of this as people want to see what's happening as it happens in sporting events, and don't want to go into the game already knowing what the final score is. This is why you see hashtags for shows so heavily promoted now on network television. The goal is to get you to watch something when everyone else in the world is watching and to react to whatever show it may be on twitter.
The two NBC live musical events have already proven to be fairly good examples of DVR proof. People would tune in either A. Because it felt like the musical was a once in a lifetime thing that had to be seen when it was on, when the rest of the world was watching, or B. People wanted to see if somebody was going to mess up.
So you already have a format that has proven twice now to get people to watch television live for a night and sit through the commercials, and then you add in the interaction element of Rocky Horror. People may not throw things at the screen when their at home alone, but you can bet the most famous vocal responses to the movie are going to flood twitter with whatever hashtag fox has watermarked in the corner of the screen.
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