“I didn’t revel in the role”: The iconic character Tim Curry doesn’t love as much as you do
Tim Curry has played more than his fair share of truly iconic roles.
After being a star of the stage, he stormed the screen in an instant with his performance as Dr Frank-N-Furter in The Rocky Horror Picture Show, immediately becoming a cult treasure. But it was later, in the 1990s, when he’d become a face that haunted people’s nightmares.
Curry seems to just have one of those instantly recognisable faces, the smile that stretched across Frank-N-Furter’s face now feels like one of the most iconic cinematic images in history as he smouldered like no one else. Throughout his powerful run across films, TV and stage, he’s made himself one of the most well-known and respected men in the industry, but he’s also one of the scariest.
When an actor takes on a horror movie, they have to face up to a tricky dilemma. The issue with playing a bad guy is that if you do it too well, there is truly no escaping it; if you successfully terrify your audience, they may never be able to look at you the same ever again, and while that is a career blessing, it’s also a curse, of which there have been several examples.
It’s tough to look at Anthony Hopkins and not simply see Hannibal, Jack Nicholson always looks like the crazed Jack Torrance, anyone who takes on the role of the Joker seems to end up stuck there as both Heath Ledger and Joaquin Phoenix are always associated with the painted-on smile, and even in less clear cut scary roles, a performance like Rosamund Pike’s Amy Dunne in Gone Girl cannot be escaped as she was almost too good.
In 1990, Curry fell into that category, too, from the very first second he hit TV screens in a two-part adaptation of It. From the first moment Pennywise the Clown appears, Curry’s face was locked into nightmares for a long time to come. Pennywise is such a classic horror figure already as the ultimate creepy clown, but with that smile and that sinister glint in his eyes, Curry made it even scarier; however, that’s exactly why he didn’t relish in the role.
“The thought of embodying this killer clown made me feel simultaneously uncomfortable and like I would be pushing myself to take it on,” he told People. The actor himself was already creeped out by the character in the Stephen King story, so to take it on himself even made him shiver a little.
While it quickly became another cultishly beloved role for the actor that horror fans especially hold dear, he wouldn’t say it was one of his favourite projects. He “loathes” clowns, so basically spent the whole project scaring himself in the mirror and continuing to be freaked out by always having to revisit the character.
It’s not that he hated it, but it just wasn’t a role he loved as much as his fans do, stating, “I haven’t had much to say about it publicly for many years, which many people misread as my carrying some sort of deep conflict about the role. That’s really not the case, but I didn’t revel in the role, either.”
