According to Deadline, American Idol and Glee alum Adam Lambert will co-star in Fox’s The Rocky Horror Picture Show remake, the network’s bid to remind everyone that, hey, Fox was putting on musicals way before NBC dressed Carrie Underwood like a nun and called her an actress. Lambert will play Eddie, the leather-clad, hog-riding rock ’n’ roller portrayed by Meat Loaf in the 1975 cult classic. Lambert joins Laverne Cox as Dr. Frank-N-Furter, Victoria Justice and Ryan McCartan as Janet and Brad, Reeve Carney as Riff Raff, and walking six-pack Staz Nair as Rocky Horror.
The remake is being billed as a two-hour “reimagining” of the original film. It’s only natural to wonder if that’s code for “watering down,” since Fox probably won’t let things get too scandalous on primetime. Instead of Cox seducing both Justice and McCartan in their rooms—which surely would throw Middle America into a conniption—maybe all the characters will just do the time warp again, again. Still, Lambert is optimistic, saying, “Rocky Horror always made me feel like it was okay to celebrate my weirdness. [I] could never imagine that I would be part of this new vision.”