Years before she even came out, Kristen Stewart leaned into the leather-clad queerness of rockstar swagger when she played Joan Jett alongside Dakota Fanning's Cherie Currie in Canadian director Floria Sigismondi's 2010 The Runaways biopic. There's a scene in that movie where Stewart's character breaks into the dressing room of an unnamed band and urinates on one of their guitars — which, as Jett herself later revealed in an interview with Jam! Music, belonged to Rush, for whom the Runaways opened a 1977 show in Detroit, MI.
Currie is still a little upset about Rush having allegedly sabotaged her band's set all these decades later, reflecting on the incident that she claims could have left her paralyzed in a new interview with The Metal Voice.
"We had been treated so well by Tom Petty who opened for us, and Cheap Trick who opened for us, but Rush sabotaged our set," Currie recalled. "We're at Detroit's Cobo Hall. It's a big venue. I saw them and they were throwing pieces of paper — just like standard eight-by-ten-inch paper — onto the stage, whipping it like you would a pizza." (Both myself and Exclaim!'s Editor-in-Chief, Alex Hudson, have questions about this. He's wondering if Rush were tossing the paper like you would toss pizza dough, whereas I'm guessing they were just shooting it frisbee-style — but either way, Currie's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle imagery is appreciated!)
The Runaways vocalist continued, "I was in six-inch platform boots and I had to jump off of Sandy West's drum riser. I hit one of those pieces of paper and I slid across that stage, and there was an orchestra pit with all the photographers. I'll never forget seeing them reach up with fear that I was going to go over, and somehow I caught myself right at the last minute and did one of those, you know [rockstar poses], to one of the photographers."
"I could have been paralyzed," Currie said. "I'm not exaggerating, I could have been very much injured had I gone off that stage. So that's why Joan and I in particular don't care much for [Rush], because they weren't protecting us; they were sabotaging us that night, and they would be sitting there behind Lita [Ford]'s amp [snickering]."
As Consequence points out, Geddy Lee addressed the feud between the two bands in a 2013 interview with Prog Magazine. "The Runaways had a ginormous chip on their shoulders," the singer-bassist told the publication. "I remember that show. We had trouble with our gear so our soundcheck got delayed and the Runaways never got one. But we were always good to whoever was opening for us."
Lee added, "We had no bias against them because they were girls — none of that bullshit. I know they said that we were laughing at them when they played, but quite frankly they were too shitty to listen to. And 40 years later they have a story to tell about it. Who knew?"
Check out the lengthy full interview with Currie below, and find her discussion of Rush's alleged sabotage at around the 17:40 mark.