'We were all going to join this street theatre troupe. Tim got a job in Hair the next day. All he had to do was sing'

It was 1968, and a young Tim Curry was in the gods at London's Palace Theatre looking down at Judi Dench as Sally Bowles in Cabaret. Dench was in a spotlight, singing, and the audience was mesmerised. Curry turned to his friend Patrick Barlow and whispered: "That's what I want to be."

And that is what he is. In the same theatre, nearly 40 years later, holding the audience rapt, albeit comically, when he sings I'm All Alone in Spamalot, which opened with a bang this week. Curry achieved his ambitions quickly as well, appearing in the original 1968 cast of Hair. Five years later he broke through with a performance as subtle as it was outrageous as Frank N Furter in Richard O'Brien's landmark Rocky Horror Show.

It is a career with flashes of stunning brilliance. He is a fine actor with a rich, pitch-perfect singing voice - listen to him sing Sondheim's Losing My Mind. But it is also a career with stunning turkeys - his portrayal of megalomaniac tycoon Herkermer Homolka in the film of Michael Crichton's novel Congo, for example. In between he has spent his time in the voice studios, mainly working on children's cartoons - from Rugrats to The Wild Thornberrys to Scooby Doo.

"I remember being amazed by his extraordinary singing voice - it was just completely perfect, just something he was born with - it came ready made," said Barlow, who shared a house with Curry when they were both drama students at Birmingham University in the late 60s. "We would go to university parties and end up having a drink and whatever and he would break out into song, this marvellous bluesy voice."

Barlow, an actor, writer and director who achieved fame much later in life by creating the National Theatre of Brent, remembers being struck by how driven and determined Curry was. "You know you leave school feeling rather spotty and inadequate but he wasn't like that - he was rather marvellous, very assured. He was really good fun as well."

One story which says a lot about the young, ambitious Curry was a car journey down to London. In it were Curry, Barlow, Judy Loe (who married Richard Beckinsale and is the mother of Kate) and Barry Kyle (who went on to be associate director at the RSC).

"We were going to join this street theatre troupe in Chalk Farm. Someone had told us about it - none of us really knew how to get in anything in those days. We got there and of course I was the only one who stayed.

"Tim and Judy got a job in Hair the next day. All Tim had to do was just sing, of course, and Judy just had to say, hello, I'm here."

Curry may have a love of the limelight, but he is also a private man. He does interviews when he has to - for publicising reasons - and gives little away. Michael Palin, in his diaries, recalls filming Three Men in a Boat with Curry in 1975. During a lunchtime drink "I learn a little more about Tim, who used to be rather quiet for the first few days, but has gradually opened up and become more garrulous and at times quite ebullient.

"There's a soft, very English quality about Tim which is quite at odds with the Rocky Horror side."

It was that Rocky Horror film which made Curry's name. "He was brilliant in it. I was blown away, he was so funny and subtle and demonic," said Barlow. The critics and public agreed.

His career after that has been topsy-turvy, with his best work on stage. When it comes to awards he is a bridesmaid - nominated for a Tony in 1981 for example as Mozart in Amadeus (needless to say it was Salieri who won, played by Ian McKellen). There was another Tony nomination in 1993, and again last year for his current role as King Arthur in Spamalot.

Then there have been the film roles, principally as a hammy baddie, from the hotel concierge in Home Alone 2 to his all too brief role as the assumed villain in Charlie's Angels. It is easy to take seriously his comments that while Frank N Furter was his most memorable role, his favourite was as Long John Silver in Muppet Treasure Island because of the chance to meet Miss Piggy.

And to understand why he has done dozens of cartoon voices (he is Dr Doom in Fantastic Four and Dr Anton Sevarius in Gargoyles) you need to travel to the city he adopted as home in the 80s, Los Angeles.

Curry lives in the Hollywood Hills in a beautiful Spanish colonial-style villa with a breathtaking garden. In the huge Condé Nast coffee table book The Great Private Gardens of the World, Curry's diverse and wildly colourful garden leaps from the pages. He talks of inspecting it every morning, preening and pruning. "The idea is organising nature not just into pleasing shapes, but also as a kind of spiritual resource," he says.

His home and garden is also a place to entertain and Curry, while apparently not a regular on the party circuit, is a generous host not short of famous friends. He tells a wonderful story in a 1999 edition of House and Garden about doing a garden for his friend Freddie Mercury. "Freddie came back from a tour and said, 'The garden, dear, it's dead.' I said 'What? Did you water it? And Freddie said, 'Water it, dear?'"

Curry gives the strong impression that he wants to leave a horticultural legacy as much as an artistic one and those watching him in Spamalot should be aware it is probably his last musical. "They are hugely physically demanding, especially as you get older," he said recently.

The CV

Born April 19 1946 in Grappenhall, Cheshire

Family The son of a Methodist Royal Navy chaplain, James, and Patricia, a school secretary

Education Schools in Kingswood and Bath. Honours degree in drama and English at Birmingham University

Career Includes Frank N Furter in Los Angeles and Broadway productions of The Rocky Horror Show and the screen version, The Rocky Horror Picture Show

Awards Two Tony award nominations, 1981 as best actor (play) for Mozart in Amadeus, and 1993, best actor (musical) for My Favorite Year