Duncan James
As Duncan James takes on the iconic camp role of Dr Frank N. Furter in The Rocky Horror Show, he talks to Jess O Sullivan about why this is his most liberating role to date and why he finally feels at home running in heels
The former Blue star is about to go all Rocky Horror for the Dublin stage. Jess O Sullivan met him backstage
The Rocky Horror Show is renowned for its fanatical following of loyal fans, who love nothing more than to dress up as their favourite camp characters, dance along to the Time Warp and heckle the cast with the well-established call-and-response gags. But of all the fans that he has met to date, one in particular stands out for Duncan James, the former Blue boyband member, who is playing the part of charismatic transvestite, Dr Frank N. Furter, in the musical which is coming to Dublin in July. “In Birmingham, an 80-year-old man came backstage to meet me, and he was dressed as Frank. He had the suspenders, heels and a little corset. I told him he looked fantastic – he was living his best life. But he said to me, ‘I didn’t come out until recently. I’m in my eighties, and in my day, I would have been killed for being gay or for living this life. Now I’m the happiest I’ve ever been.’ It was just wonderful. He lived his whole life being suppressed and probably lived a really fake life of being quite desperately unhappy inside because he wasn’t allowed to be who he wanted to be.”
e reason that this particular man’s story resonated with Duncan, was because he too struggled with his sexuality before nally coming out as gay in 2012 at the age of 34, something he attributes to his strict Catholic upbringing. In a way, Duncan says he too has found his true self in dressing up as Frank. “For me, this is the most fun role I’ve ever played and actually the best role I’ve ever done. I feel more comfortable doing this than anything else.
I think I suppressed a lot in my sexuality growing up. Being a closeted homosexual
for many years was something I didn’t deal with very well.” Indeed Duncan’s most notable roles on stage to date have been a very far cry from Frank. “It was easier for me to go and play the parts like Warner in Legally Blonde or Billy Flynn in Chicago, the straight alpha male. But obviously I knew that I had another side to me that I never showed the world or never let out because I was too frightened. So for me, bringing out this side is where I feel most comfortable.”
ough Duncan came from a loving family, his upbringing was not one that embraced di erence. His mother was a single parent and a nurse and so worked night shifts and overtime to support them. As a result, he spent a lot of time being raised by his maternal grandparents, both of whom had a military background – his grandfather was a Colonel in the army and his grandmother was in the RAF. “It was very di cult growing up in such a strict Catholic upbringing. We weren’t allowed things like e Sun newspaper, they were very much Telegraph readers. My grandpa was a music teacher in my school and he played the organ every Sunday at church. My grandmother didn’t like too much music, so I wasn’t allowed to play any pop music in the house, but I could play piano music. Anything that was homosexual or gay was almost, not looked down upon, but just not understood.” He remembers his grandparents feeling uncomfortable when e Kenny Everett Show came on the television. “My uncle used to watch it and think it was brilliant. Kenny Everett was extremely camp, my grandparents tolerated it, but I knew they felt uncomfortable watching it, because they’re from a generation where it wasn’t around like that. In the ’80s a lot of these guys were getting AIDS and dying, so it was more of a ‘Well they shouldn’t be sleeping with each other in the rst place’. It’s disgusting that kind of attitude, but thankfully times have changed, and things are very di erent now.”
However, this kind of upbringing made Duncan want to shut down the part of himself that he saw as unacceptable. “For me as a little boy, not really understanding what my sexuality was but just knowing that I was di erent, you just kind of suppress everything. So it’s very easy to put on a mask and become what people expect you to be. When I was in Blue I played the straight role of being ‘Duncan from Blue’ very well. I was linked to people like Geri Halliwell and Martine McCutcheon, but I knew that it was all b***ocks. For me I was just playing a role.”
ough Duncan’s grandparents are both dead, he smiles at the thought of how his grandmother might react if she found herself in the front row at the show. “I think she’d be very proud, but she’d also be turning in her grave at some of the stu . I don’t think this would be a show for her. Watching me as a transvestite in bed with Janet and then in bed with Brad doing a sex scene? I think she’d walk out.”
Duncan feels that acceptance of the LGBTQ+ community comes through education. “When you don’t understand something or it’s not talked about or it’s not on your radar in that way, it’s very easy to shut things o and just say, ‘Oh no we don’t talk about that.’ at’s why I think that it’s really important that we have shows like Rocky Horror, or RuPaul’s Drag Race or Priscilla Queen of the Desert. It puts it out there at the forefront for people to see. It’s also a place where people can come and be free. ey get to dress up as they want and interpret their sexuality whatever way they want to. at’s why Rocky has been a cult show for so many years, because it was a show where people could escape. If you wanted to dress up as a transvestite, you could. It was one show where people could turn up to the theatre dressed and feel liberated. It was, and is, a safe place.”
e Rocky Horror Show is at the Bord Gáis Energy eatre, Dublin from
July 1-6. For more information, see bordgaisenergytheatre.ie