The Horrors Persist but so do we...

RIP Tim Curry

One of the cultural touchstones for queer kids in the United States is The Rocky Horror Picture Show. The campy film from 1975 about a rogue extraterrestrial from Transsexual in the Transylvania galaxy.

As a rural queer kid, though, I did not discover this role until much later in life. An arc which follows similarly to my own path of self-discovery, having denied much of my sexuality and gender to survive in a rural community that was not queer affirming or welcoming.

For queer kids from rural and non supportive families, these queer touchstones are often limited but we often find ourselves attracted to horror stories, especially cheesy old creature features and campy horror flicks. Stories of outcasts, differences and sometimes revenge for transgressions.

My earliest touchstones were more in the macabre, I was much more familiar with Tim Curry as the campy but incredibly creepy horror icon Pennywise in the made-for-TV rendition of Stephen King's IT (1990) or as the campy but sinister Lord of Darkness (1995) attempting to plunge the world into eternal night.

While Tim's roles were few in this sphere, they still had a great impact on me as part of my developing sense of self and interests and as I grew older and moved away from home, his other works were folded into my life, though much less defining than those early exposures from a very different corner of cinema.

Tim's death is not entirely unexpected, having had a stroke and in ailing health in recent years but the loss is still palpable, especially on the tail of the death of Dolly Parton, another big icon of camp and big personality. May we always find camp in the world, even in the darkest places, no matter which stage of life and may it make life brighter for all.