Tim Curry played a guardian angel DJ to two baby gays in this underrated coming-of-age tale

Welcome back to our queer film retrospective, “A Gay Old Time.” In this week’s column, in memory of the late, great Tim Curry, we’re revisiting one of his more underrated role in 1980’s subtly queer coming-of-age film Times Square.

Late last month, we lost one of the great silver screen luminaries with the passing of British acting legend Tim Curry at 80 years old. With news breaking the day after we lost Dolly Parton, it’s been a tough few weeks as we mourn these icons who have defined so much of our pop culture sensibilities, embodied the shameless authenticity that inspired us to live our lives openly, and always stood in support behind our community.

How about we take this to the next level?

Subscribe to our newsletter for a refreshing cocktail (or mocktail) of LGBTQ+ entertainment and pop culture, served up with a side of eye-candy.
Subscribe to our Newsletter today

It’s an understatement to say that Tim Curry played many roles throughout his career that have been imprinted in our cultural memory. Dr. Frank-N-Furter from The Rocky Horror Picture Show perhaps stands tallest among them as one of the ultimate icons of the queer film canon. But he also had unforgettable turns in a decades-sprawling menagerie of genres including Clue (1985), Legend (1985), the original It miniseries (1990), Home Alone 2 (1992) and Muppets Treasure Island (1996).

This week we’ll take a lot at a movie that perhaps isn’t the first one that comes to mind when thinking about Curry’s robust filmography, but that nevertheless represents the breadth of the range he could deliver, and that is sprinkled with a winking undercurrent of queerness that always seemed to run through this work.

The Set-Up

Times Square is a 1980 musical drama film directed by Allan Moyle, and starring Trini Alvarado and Robin Johnson as two rebellious and repressed teenage girls who run away to New York City to pursue their dreams of punk rock music, lured by the promises from a charismatic radio DJ played by Curry. Released at the turn of the decade, the film is a product of the nascent youth counterculture that encouraged teens to break away from the strict rules and ideologies of their parents.

The plot follows these two teenage girls each at a crossroads of their lives. Pamela Pearl (Alvarado) is the daughter of a prominent commissioner determined to “clean up Times Square,” who forces and exploits an image of a perfect, pristine teen daughter onto Pamela for his political gains.

After trying to break out of this public persona, she’s sent to a neurological hospital for a “behavioral evaluation,” where she meets Nicky Marotta (Johnson). Nicky is a street kid with no family or prospects, who’s sent to the hospital for a similar evaluation in the hopes of keeping her out from behind bars after a public fight.

The two form an unlikely friendship and bond over their love of music, as they listen to a radio DJ in a local radio station, Johnny LaGuardia (Curry), whose philosophical outlook on life inspires them to break out of the hospital and pursue their dreams of music and stardom in the big city. Nicky also starts sending letters to the radio station addressed to LaGuardia as a form of therapeutic catharsis.

The two girls hide out in an abandoned warehouse, as a state-wide search begins for Pamela, spearheaded by her father’s political campaign. The girls take odd jobs working at a vaudeville club, and often turn to small crimes like shoplifting to survive, as LaGuardia slowly discovers that the girl sending the letters may be on the run with the girl everyone is looking for.

And like every other ’80s musical movie, Times Square ramps up to a climactic public concert in which the girls disavow their responsibilities and fight for their own agency in the world.

Rebel, Rebel

The film was not a commercial or critical success at the time of release, but it has become a secret classic, particularly among queer film fanatics. Although the premise is a heightened coming-of-age story that defies plausibility if you stop to think about it too long (like a cool, punk-rock older sibling to Ferris Bueller’s Day Off), the emotional center is actually quite powerful and encompasses a lot of the core elements of growing up a misunderstood teen: the feelings of constant isolation from your family and peers, gravitating to interests that shape your personality but are outside the norm, and a yearning to find your own voice separate from what you have known your entire life.

There’s a queer reading of the movie that feels so evident in some places that’s not quite right to call it “subtext” Nicky and Pamela meet in a medical center with the sole purpose of changing their natural behaviors that feels almost interchangeable with a conversion camp. Their parents and authority figures are displeased with the way the present themselves to the world and are determined to change them.

Pamela and Nicky also form a deep friendship that feels both platonic and romantic at points. It’s the first time they each have found someone else that truly understands and sees them for who they are. Their relationship is the anchor of the film, and they both lack a male love interest, so all emotional stakes fall on their dynamic.

So it’s perhaps unsurprising that writer/director Allan Moyle would later reveal that the film’s more overt references to queerness were unfortunately removed during the edit at the behest of one of the producers, causing him to step away from the project before it was finished. It’s a bummer thinking about how even more special the film could’ve been.

Tim Curry, Our Guardian Angel

There’s also something quite lovely and telling about having Tim Curry as metaphorical voice of God who lures these girls to a place where they can become who they really are; something Curry himself has done to generations of queer people through his various movie roles, particularly Rocky Horror.

This is one of Curry’s more understated and grounded performances in his career, but he still carries the gravitas and thematic resonance that he was known for. LaGuardia is someone that simultaneously feels dangerous and alluring; transgressive and magnetic. And nobody could play that balance quite like him.

Tim Curry leaves behind a treasure trove of movies in his filmography, always embodying people with an unapologetic grandeur and emotional truth regardless of the circumstances. The head of a haunted gender-bending castle, or the butler of a mystery mansion. A pirate in a world of puppets or the literal devil. A concierge in a five-star hotel or a radio DJ in punk rock New York City.

All of them had an equal amount of humor, pathos, and heart. There will never be another one like him.

Times Square is currently available to stream on Tubi & Plex, and is available for digital rental or purchase via Amazon Prime Video & Apple TV.

You can keep track of all LGBTQ+ films covered in our A Gay Old Time column via writer Jorge Molina’s handy Letterboxd List.

Related

“I’m Going Home”: The late Tim Curry gave us a defiant queer anthem with Rocky Horror‘s 11 o’clock number
Tim Curry has gone home. But he leaves behind a song the encourages us to keep pushing through, and a character that emboldens us to be our truest & queerest selves.

Sign up for the Queerty newsletter to stay on top of the hottest stories in LGBTQ+ entertainment, politics, and culture.