Shock Treatment * (1981, Jessica Harper, Cliff De Young, Richard O’Brien) – Classic Movie Review 8457

Director Jim Sharman’s 1981 British spoof comedy musical Shock Treatment is writer Richard O’Brien’s misfire sequel to his cult hit The Rocky Horror Picture Show, with a disappointing Cliff De Young and Jessica Harper as a new Brad and Janet who are TV quiz show contestants playing out their failed marriage on the Denton USA station.

Indulgent audiences will find that the TV send-up (an easy target that it hits askew), the middling tunes and many of the Rocky Horror cast can raise the odd smile or two, but mostly Shock Treatment just refuses to spark.

It proves, like O’Brien’s Tee-Zee stage spoof of Tarzan, that Rocky was a brilliant one-off. Barry Bostwick and Susan Sarandon are much missed as Brad and Janet, and so of course is Tim Curry as Dr Frank-N-Furter, such essential elements of The Rocky Horror Picture Show.

The very welcome Richard O’Brien as Dr Cosmo McKinley, Patricia Quinn as Dr. Nation McKinley, Charles Gray as Judge Oliver Wright and Nell Campbell (better known as ‘Little Nell’) as Nurse Ansalong are all survivors from The Rocky Horror Picture Show, while Ruby Wax as Betty Hapschatt, Barry Humphries as Bert Schnick and Rik Mayall as ‘Rest Home’ Ricky are also welcome as additions to the cast.

Also in the cast are Darlene Johnson, Manning Redwood, Wendy Raebeck, Jeremy Newson, Betsy Brantley, Perry Bedden, Chris Malcolm, Barry Dennen and Gary Shail.

In September 2017 Patricia Quinn confesses: ‘I watch Shock Treatment with my grand kids now.’ How depressing is that?

© Derek Winnert 2019 Classic Movie Review 8457

Check out more reviews on http://derekwinnert.com