When I tell people I worked in the entertainment industry, I think they assume I rubbed elbows with a lot of famous people. I did. But not the way you, or they, might think. I was a computer programmer for most of my career. The “talent” – which was the way we referred to people the general public would call “stars” – was always around: you might run into them getting a coffee or pass them in the hall. The thing to keep in mind is a studio is a workplace and they were working. As was I – it’s just they were portraying characters on television or film, I was a tech nerd writing computer code for accounting software.
And I was a smoker.
Sometime around 1991, I had just seen The Hunt for Red October, based on the Tom Clancy novel, starring Sean Connery and Alec Baldwin.
Tim Curry, who died Tuesday at the age of 80, had a supporting role in the film. He played Dr. Petrov, the Russian submarine’s doctor.
In the story, he is the only senior officer not in on the plan to defect to the United States and turn over the state-of-the-art nuclear submarine to the Americans.
His most important scene is when Captain Marko Ramius (played by Sean Connery) needs to convince the Soviet authorities that the submarine has been destroyed. Dr. Petrov has been kept in the dark for just this reason; he is pivotal to the deception that Ramius perpetrates surrounding the apparent loss of the crew and vessel.
Tim Curry was also a smoker. I don’t believe Dr. Petrov smoked in the film.
Tim Curry is best known for playing another doctor: the cross-dressing, homosexual Dr. Frank N. Furter in The Rocky Horror Picture Show. His flamboyant, camp performance in the cult classic made him – Curry and Frank N. Furter – an iconic figure. If you have never been to a screening of The Rocky Horror Picture Show, you have no idea what you’re missing. It’s not about the movie – a third rate plot at best, and I’m being generous – but the interactive audience experience. People:
- Dress up as characters, especially Frank N. Furter, Magenta, Columbia, Riff Raff the Handyman, or Brad and Janet (a wholesome young couple who are lost)
- Shout call-backs: funny responses to lines in the film
- Sing along to the songs (it’s a musical)
- Do the “Time Warp” dance with the characters in the film
It’s just a jump to the left
And then a step to the right
With your hands on your hips
You bring your knees in tight
But it’s the pelvic thrust that really drives you insane,
Let’s do the Time Warp again! - Watch a shadow cast, where audience members in silhouette act out the movie live in front of the screen while it’s playing
The appeal is that everyone is in on the joke. It’s part movie, part costume party, part live comedy show, and part communal ritual. For a first-timer, it can feel chaotic, but that’s largely the point. I have been many times. My first was when a neighbor, while growing up in Glendale, introduced me to the soundtrack, and then took me to a midnight showing (with my parents’ permission) at the famous Rialto Theater in South Pasadena. It was so much fun – It was joyful. It was subversive. I was hooked.
On a day of uncertain weather – I just remember it was overcast, cold, and damp – I stepped out back of the Foley stage into the parking lot to grab a quick ciggie. No sooner had I lit it when a man in a pea coat started walking quite deliberately toward me. He put an unlit cigarette in his mouth, and said, “could I trouble you for a light?”
As I fumbled around in my pocket for my lighter, I looked the man square in the face. There was something familiar about him. He didn’t seem friendly; he actually came across as kindof sketchy and mischievous, like he’d just let the air out of someone’s tires. But I couldn’t shake the feeling I knew him.
The confusion must have shown on my face, because he held out his hand, and said, “Hi, I’m Tim Curry.”
Through the years, I bumped into a lot of talent in that parking lot. You’d be surprised who you meet when your smoking habit has you standing outside sucking nicotine on a pretty regular basis. Dolores Hope (wife of Bob Hope) almost ran me over once, and Louis Gossett Jr. asked me if the bar on the corner served food (I told him yes and to get a Champs Burger because they put A1 Steak Sauce on it). But I was never one to get starstruck or tongue-tied.
But Tim Curry! – Oh. My. God. – Dr. Frank N. Furter!!
I found my lighter, flicked it alight, and moved it toward the end of Mr. Curry’s cigarette. My hands were trembling. He noticed. What was said and what happened next is seared into my memory, and why I was sad, 35 years later, when I heard he passed away this week.
Tim Curry: you alright?
Matt: yah, sorry, it’s just that you’re Tim Curry
Tim Curry: yes I am… how about that light?
Matt: I mean… wow… it’s just… I loved you in…
Tim Curry: oh shit, here we go
At this point there was a noticeable scowl on his face. He looked angry. I was clever enough to understand how actors hate iconic roles because everything they do from that point in their lives on is colored by that one character they played, even if they’d played ten more since the film or show in question came out. Can you ever see Mark Hamill as anyone other than Luke Skywalker or Lisa Kudrow as anyone other than Phoebe Buffay? Or William Shatner as… okay, you get the point.
So, a little voice inside my head said, “okay Wilko, don’t say Dr. Frank N. Furter.”
Matt: I thought you were great as Dr. Petrov
Tim Curry: really?… thanks
His scowl turned into a big toothy grin, with a cigarette clenched between his teeth. I was still shaking like a leaf. I feebly lit his smoke. He inhaled a long, deep drag, removed the cigarette from his mouth, and then exhaled dramatically. Suddenly, he was in character:
So come up to the lab and see what’s on the slab
from “Sweet Transvestite,” Dr. Frank N. Furter, The Rocky Horror Picture Show
I see you shiver with antici………………………………… pation
But maybe the rain isn’t really to blame
So I’ll remove the cause… [evil laugh]
but not the symptom
What an incredibly sweet thing to do for a fan. Rest in peace Mr. Curry. And now…
(yes, that is a very young Barry Bostwick and Susan Sarandon playing Brad & Janet)
