Early celebrity crushes

In the ’70s and ’80s, while other girls were crushing on musicians like Shaun Cassidy and NKOTB, or “brat pack” stars like Rob Lowe and Emilio Estevez, my tastes were always a little more nerdy.

The 1978 TV movie Dr. Strange featured Peter Hooten as comic book sorcerer supreme Stephen Strange. I not only crushed on the main character, I loved everything about the movie and got into reading the comics soon after.

Then there’s Malcolm McDowell as author and time-traveler HG Wells in the 1979 movie Time After Time. Something about his intelligent but socially-awkward “man out of time” character falling for the sweet “modern woman” played by Mary Steenbergen just really appealed to me, even at such a young age. Science fiction with romance is still my favorite genre.

Buck Rogers in the 25th Century was a science fiction TV show that lasted two seasons, from 1979 to 1981. I could never decide who I liked more, the titular swashbuckling, hairy-chested Buck, or his silent feathery friend with a tragic backstory, Hawk. I wrote fan letters to both and received autographed pictures in return, which I put on my bedroom wall.

I first saw Rutger Hauer in the 1982 movie Blade Runner and became a lifelong fan. Roy Batty’s “Tears in rain” monologue deeply moved me then, and still does now.

When I got really into the 1985 movie Ladyhawke, my parents mistakenly thought I had a crush on Matthew Broderick, but no. I watched every Rutger Hauer movie I could get my hands on in our small-town video rental store, including Flesh+Blood, The Hitcher and The Blood of Heroes.

~ J.L. Hilton

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