Last year, I was fortunate enough to spend some time with the veteran record and film producer Lou Adler. The 92-year-old has enjoyed a singular career that included producing Carole King and directing a Cheech & Chong movie, but there was one anecdote he shared that made his face light up more than any of the other major stars he could casually name-drop. In 1972, he recalled, he visited a tiny theatre in London and saw a madcap production that blended schlocky B-movie horror and Fifties rock’n’roll. “Can you imagine,” he asked me, still a little awestruck, “Seeing Tim Curry for the first time?”
The show, of course, was Rocky Horror, which Adler immediately optioned and brought to Hollywood, where it was adapted into The Rocky Horror Picture Show three years later. The film became a runaway hit, grossing over $170 million worldwide (having cost 1/100th of that) and going on to have the longest-running theatrical release in movie history.
It also launched Curry, who has died at the age of 80, to international fame. The success of Rocky Horror meant that many more people around the world got to experience the unfettered joy of laying eyes on the Cheshire-born actor with the Cheshire cat grin for the very first time.
Curry had graduated from the University of Birmingham with a degree in English and drama in 1968, at the age of 22, and landed his first West End role that same year as part of the original London cast of the hit musical Hair. It was there he met Rocky Horror creator Richard O’Brien, who wrote the role of the flamboyant, cross-dressing mad scientist Dr. Frank-N-Furter specifically for him.
Curry embraced the character immediately. “The motto ‘don’t dream it, be it’ is not necessarily limited to your sexuality,” he told Entertainment Weekly last year, referring to one of his character’s most famous lines. “I think it applies to whatever you dream to be, and that’s a good thing. If it gives people permission to behave in a sexual way that they secretly want to, that’s a good thing. As long as it doesn’t hurt them.”
open image in galleryAfter Rocky Horror became a hit, Curry found himself in demand both on Broadway and in Hollywood. On the stage, he was nominated for a Tony Award three times over the course of 24 years, for roles as varied as Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart in 1981’s Amadeus, swashbuckling movie star Alan Swann in 1992’s My Favorite Year and King Arthur in 2005’s Spamalot.
His film and television roles were just as eclectic. Where you remember seeing Tim Curry for the first time will likely depend on your age and tastes. Perhaps it was as the con artist Rooster Hannigan in the 1982 movie version of Annie, or as the supercilious butler Wadsworth in manic 1985 murder mystery comedy Clue. As Cardinal Richelieu in 1993’s The Three Musketeers or as Long John Silver in 1996’s Muppet Treasure Island. Maybe his clown Pennywise, from the 1990 ABC miniseries of Stephen King’s It, has been ruining your sleep for years.
open image in galleryPersonally, I know exactly where I first saw Tim Curry: playing the smug, scheming concierge who becomes Kevin’s nemesis in Home Alone 2. The shot that dissolves from the smirking cartoon Grinch to Curry pulling off the exact same evil grin is indelibly burned into my memory. I’m not alone. On social media today, fans have been admiringly comparing it to Stanley Kubrick’s famous match cut from the prehistoric bone to the orbiting satellite in 2001: A Space Odyssey.
open image in gallery
Watch Apple TV+ free for 7 day
New subscribers only. £9.99/mo. after free trial. Plan auto-renews until cancelled.
ADVERTISEMENT. If you sign up to this service we will earn commission. This revenue helps to fund journalism across The Independent.
The scene also seems to have left an impression on his co-star Rob Schneider, who was among the many paying tribute to him. “I have never known another actor who could say more with a knowing grin or a raised eyebrow than the splendid Tim Curry,” remarked Schneider in a social media post, before offering some insight into Curry’s acting process. “I was astonished as a young actor to witness Tim do a scene 7 completely different ways and ALL OF THEM FANTASTIC!” remembered Schneider. “Tim said, ‘I want to give the director different choices! It’s not my job to decide which one. It’s up to him!’”
A major stroke in 2012 left Curry partially paralyzed and unable to walk, but he continued to work and make public appearances. Last year, he published his wildly entertaining memoir, Vagabond, in which he reflected on the impish delight that he managed to inject into every character he played.
“My own way was to sprinkle a bit of mischief onto even my most villainous roles, just as I brought a little mischief into my encounters with my mother,” he wrote. “Doing whatever I could to make the darkness sparkle.”
Wherever and however you first saw Tim Curry, you never forgot watching him sparkle.