For my money, when Waters writes, his innate and uncanny sense of the mondo bizarre makes him one of the most entertaining journalists describing our now declining world. (It anthologizes, like his earlier hilarious book Shock Value, some of his “alternative,” as in outrageous commentary on popular culture and American social mores). He was all over the place when I interviewed him during the fall, 1986 promotion of his book Crackpot: The Obsessions of John Waters ’cause the media blitz was on. What self-respecting reader/midnight movie buff has not heard of, let alone seen, his world famous shockeroo films? Viva his entire oeuvre!īut there are those others who rebuke this decadent doyen of dirt as the “Prince of Puke,” the “Pope of Bad Taste,” and the pinnacle of all that is immoral in our culture.
Yet even if Waters were to never produce another film, his existing work has made him world famous and an inspiration to radical filmmakers everywhere. Now he’s back with another film, an exercise called Hairspray, due for nationwide release in the first months of 1988. For these hardy souls, his filmic adventures a la Pink Flamingos, Desperate Living, Polyester have virtually made him a god among the avant-garde. This document of his clever, searching mind will inspire old fans to laugh with renewed affection, and may win him a few new admirers.Certainly, many untraditional filmgoers know who John Waters is and what he represents.
In his career as filmmaker, gallery artist, journalist and professional wit, Waters has always championed the loser with irrefutable panache.
She's got balls") or the success of "Hairspray" on Broadway ("The real reason I'm praying that Hairspray.succeeds is that if it's a big hit, there will be high school productions, and finally the fat girl and the drag queen will get the starring parts"), Waters exhibits a moral heart buried in the garbage of celebrity culture. Whether discussing the life story of Pia Zadora ("Pia Zadora is my kind of movie star. In Crackpot, a reissue of Waters' 1986 collection of rants and reviews, originally published in Rolling Stone and elsewhere, the sweetness of the auteur's alleged perversity shines through on every page.
Beneath the lewd exterior of punk filmmaker John Waters lies the discipline of gay novelist Jean Genet, and below that lies a tender humanity that some might even call saintly.
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