Jim Sharman
James David "Jim" Sharman (born 12 March 1945), the son of boxing tent entrepreneur Jimmy Sharman, is an Australian director and writer for film and stage with more than 70 productions to his credit. He is renowned in Australia for his work as a theatre director from the 1960s to the present, and is best known internationally as the director of the 1973 theatrical hit The Rocky Horror Show, its film adaptation The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975) and the film's follow-up Shock Treatment (1981).
Biography
Sharman was born to James Michael Sharman (1912–2006) and Christina McAndleish Sharman (1914–2003). He was educated in Sydney, though his upbringing included time spent on Australian showgrounds where his father and grandfather ran a travelling sideshow of popular legend: Jimmy Sharman's Boxing Troupe. This brought him into contact with the world of circus and travelling vaudeville. Developing an interest in theatre, he graduated from the production course at the National Institute of Dramatic Art in Sydney in 1966.