Nell Campbell, The Rocky Horror Picture Show Star, to Host Screening of the Cult Classic in Little Rock

This October, Little Rock is going to get a little rockier when the actress who originated the character of Columbia in The Rocky Horror Picture Show comes to visit.

 

Actress Nell Campbell will host a screening of the movie version of the musical, The Rocky Horror Picture Show, Oct. 20 at The Robinson Center in Little Rock.

 

Campbell said she never expected the film to become the lasting phenomenon it is.

 

“[The film] opened and totally fell flat,” Campbell said during an interview with AY About You. “It wasn’t well received, but then, about nine months later, thanks to a guy having a brilliant idea of showing it at midnight in New York, the rest is history.”

 

The Rocky Horror Picture Show has been captivating audiences around the world since then through late-night showings complete with props, costumes and lines for the audience to yell throughout the movie.

 

Now, more than 50 years after its theatrical release, Campbell, along with her costars Patricia Quinn (Magenta) and Barry Bostwick (Brad Majors), are on The Rocky Horror Picture Show Spooktacular Tour, bringing the experience to thousands of fans throughout the country. This tour will feature a screening of the film in 4K, shadows casts who act out the show on stage in front of the movie and appearances by the stars.

 

 

Campbell, alongside other members of the movie cast, attended her first midnight showing at The Waverly Theater a year after the midnight showings there had started.

 

“We did not know at all what to expect,” she said. “There were all these people dressed in our costumes and performing. It was just fabulous, but it was a real surprise.”

 

Campbell was amused by the jokes audiences were yelling at the screen throughout the movie that night. To this day, her favorite callback is the one that, according to legend, started the whole practice of callbacks. It occurs when the character of Janet, played by Susan Sarandon, steps out of a broken-down vehicle into the rain.

 

“She is holding a newspaper over her head, and someone called out ‘Buy an umbrella, you cheap [expletive],’” Campbell said. “That was just funny in a simple way.

 

“The callbacks were much funnier to start with. There were less of them, and they were wittier. Also, they’ve gotten quite crude.”

 

 

While Rocky Horror showings have garnered a reputation for being R-rated events and the film itself has an R designation, Campbell noted that, “The great thing about [the movie] is it’s never crude.”

 

“That’s part of its charm,” she said. “It’s all about the innuendo.”

 

She said she believes there is no such thing as being too young to see Rocky and enjoy it.

 

“I think around 6, 9 months is a good time,” she said. “They will just love all the colors and the dance numbers. Anything else just goes over their heads, and you can explain that later.”

 

Campbell said while on tour, she has met families with multiple generations of Rocky Horror fans. Even though there are loyal fans who watch the movie in theaters multiple times a year, Campbell said she herself does not rewatch the film very often.

 

“Once I started touring, the opportunity came up more,” she said. “I don’t usually sit and watch the whole movie. I’ll just see bits of it. I’m always drawn right back into it.”

 

One of her favorite musical numbers in the movie is when the late Tim Curry makes his big entrance as Dr. Frank-N-Furter. Another part of the movie she likes to see is the end sequence. In those scenes, Campbell and her co-stars are done up in white face paint, corsets and fishnets. At one point, they jump into a pool and later have to dance again.

 

“It’s funny to see us do that because it was so hard to dance wet, on a slippery floor, cold, in 6-inch heels and underwear,” she said. “There we are, all cheery and having fun, but, in fact, we were like, ‘Oh my god! I don’t want to be the one that falls over.’”

 

 

Campbell was drawn to performing from a young age despite no one else in her family being in show business. She started dance classes at 10 years old after a bout of health problems.

 

“I’d been misdiagnosed with appendicitis, and they removed my appendix, but I actually had hepatitis,” she said. “I was home from school for three months.”

 

To help her gain strength once she recovered, a doctor recommended dance classes, and she took to them quickly. At age 18, Campbell moved to London, where she would often busk and tap dance in the streets. That was where Jim Sharman, The Rocky Horror Picture Show’s director, first met her and cast her as the original Columbia for the stage production.

 

Campbell said she found taking on the sparkly and boisterous character came naturally.

 

“[Columbia] really is an extension of myself,” she said. “She’s me with more makeup and more dramatic expressions.”

 

While best known for her role in the cult classic, Campbell has made a full career for herself in film and music. She even opened and ran a nightclub in New York called Nell’s for a while.

 

Despite being busy with the Spooktacular Tour, Campbell is also working on getting her one-woman show, All’s Nell That Ends Nell, ready for audiences, as well as writing a book.

 

Throughout tours and years of screenings, she has had a chance to meet many fans of the movie. She said the most powerful interactions she remembers are when fans have told her the film “saved their life.”

 

She said she loves to hear how much the film means to so many people and the community it builds.

 

“[The film] gets people together,” she said. “It helps people find their people. These people might just be hanging out in their room on a computer or playing a video game. I love that this gets them away from the screen into a theater to a showing of Rocky Horror, and they meet all these people that have the same interest.”

 

Photos courtesy of The Rocky Horror Picture Show Spooktacular Tour

 

 

SEE THE FEATURE BELOW AND IN OUR OCTOBER 2026 ISSUE OF AY MAGAZINE