Last of our species: the community of the cult classic (and why it's more important than ever)

Tucked into a quiet corner on Spring Garden Street, PhilaMOCA is a mausoleum showroom turned intimate concert venue—it’s a fitting setting for the event my best friend and I are there to see. A lot off-kilter, with a strange sense of comfort. Cool without being edgy or uninviting. Printed on a sheet of standard printer paper with black block lettering, an unassuming sign on the door reads:

TONIGHT

THE ROOM

20th anniversary screening w/ Greg Sestero

The sign further indicates that the event is sold out.

If you’ve never seen The Room, a film that cost millions of dollars to make but grossed just $1,800 on its opening weekend in Los Angeles, widely considered to be the worst movie ever made, then you’d have a hard time wrapping your head around the palpable excitement that filled the room. The small crowd couldn't have been more than 50 people, but they exuded energy that matched that of the BB&T Pavilion across the Delaware in Camden, NJ. And this is just one of many stops on an international tour—people all over the world are this excited to watch a terrible movie that came out 20 years ago?

“I think I need an ‘oh hi Mark’ shirt,” my friend says, scanning the table we’re on line for—we’re on the same page. When we approach, Greg Sestero (Mark, of the tee shirt—supporting star of The Room) is cool, and just as excited to be there as we are. He signs my copy of The Disaster Artist—the memoir he penned documenting his time in The Room that went on to become an award winning Franco Brothers movie, maybe my favorite book of all time—with an “oh, hi Rae!” He compliments my friend’s Empire Strikes Back tee shirt. Throughout the maybe 3 minute exchange there’s a clear truth: he is very grateful for every person here.

Maybe it goes without saying, but what follows is not a reverent screening. The Room, which opened in June of 2003, is completely incomprehensible. The dialogue is nonsensical, the acting (the few times you can call it that) is either 0 or 100 in terms of energy, and entire plot lines are mentioned and forgotten in the span of a conversation. The Room tells the story of a man named Johnny whose life is torn apart when he is betrayed (his words, many times) by his fiancé Lisa, when she begins an affair with his best friend Mark. Johnny is played by the mystery man Tommy Wiseau, the director and writer of The Room, whose age, place of birth, unidentifiable accent, and source of the never-ending supply of money he used to single-handedly finance The Room is still debated to this day.

Akin to a midnight Rocky Horror Picture Show viewing, a screening of The Room involves props, insults hurled at the actors on screen, and lines spoken and screamed in sync. In fact, Greg gives us two to try out before the movie starts—advice from the many, many of these showings he’s done in the past 20 years.

In an inexplicable oversight of set design, a framed photo of a silver spoon sits on a side table in Johnny and Lisa’s living room. You can imagine our surprise when, the first time it appears, we hear a unison cheer of “SPOONS!” and watch as a storm of plastic spoons are thrown at the screen. It happens every single time the spoon is visible. By the end of the screening, we’d picked up a few of our own and joined in. During Johnny’s meltdown at the end of the movie right before he commits an incredibly melodramatic suicide, he pulls open the drawers of a dresser before knocking it over. During this stretch we’ve been instructed by Greg to shout “ONE” on the first drawer, “TWO” on the second, and “FUCK IT” when the dresser comes crashing down. Everyone obliges.

Some rituals are more obvious: the crowd chanting Johnny’s famous “I did not hit her! It’s not true! It’s bullshit! I did not hit her! I did not. Oh, hi Mark,” or screaming in sync with Johnny’s meltdown, “YOU’RE TEARING ME APART LISA,” an homage/direct rip-off of James Dean in Rebel Without a Cause.

People interject their own commentary—one man stands and says “Tommy! I’m right here!” and positions himself in such a way that in the next shot, when Tommy Wiseau looks at the bottom right corner of the screen and waves to seemingly no one, he appears to be waving to the audience member.

Mausoleum element aside, the whole experience is vaguely religious: the ritual, the garb, the script as the holy text, as it were. It’s the nexus of passion and kinship: it’s community. Call me a Luddite, but it’s a feeling that is getting more and more impossible to replicate in the streaming age. I will always value the convenience that online spaces lend to niche groups such as this—after all, I only even found the screening from an Instagram ad. But this is beyond connecting and messaging with a few fans, this is a brick and mortar trip to the movies.

The people here had to seek the event out and get themselves there—a process that, when you can watch most things in the comfort of your home without spending additional money, has become arduous to most people. But there are no casual fans here, they came from who-knows-where to engage with a man who was in a genuinely terrible film that they love deeply, who appreciates them surely just as much—and I think that means something.

All that to give 2 pieces of advice:

1) If you’re passionate about something there is a good shot there are other people who are passionate about it too—find them. We have enough passive observers of the world, be an active one.

2) When attending a screening of The Room, be sure to come prepared with a value pack of plastic spoons—that picture shows up far more than you'd expect.