The Pope Of Trash
William
Burroughs once deemed Waters "the pope of trash." Surely Waters wasn't
searching for critical accolades with Pink Flamingos. After thirty years,
that hasn't changed. Waters makes deeply personal movies about subjects that
matter most to him; the freaks in his films are often his closest friends.
John Waters grew up in Baltimore in the 1950s. Even as a child, he was obsessed by violence and gore. His favorite childhood memory was seeing real blood on the seat of a wrecked car when visiting a scrap yard. Waters has no formal training as a filmmaker; he began shooting silent 8mm and 16mm films in the mid 60's using his own counter culture friends as cast members. His first film Hag in a Black Leather Jacket (1964), filmed on the rooftop of his parent's house, was showed only in a Baltimore coffee house. (The star, Mary Vivian Pearce, has since appeared in every Waters production.)
Pink Flamingos forever secured Waters' place in film history. Waters founded the Dreamland repertory company and continued to produce low budget films, including Female Trouble (1974), Desperate Living (1977), and Polyester (1981), which was filmed in "Odorama" and came with scratch n'sniff cards. The commercial success of Hairspray (1988) began the career of Ricki Lake and marked the beginning of Waters' crossover from the underground into Hollywood. Since then, he has worked within the studio system to create Crybaby (1990), Serial Mom (1994) and one of the best and most underappreciated films of 1998, Pecker.
Waters has no moral qualms about working within the Hollywood film industry. Unless you are an underground filmmaker like his creation Cecil B. Demented, willing to brandish a pistol whip to make your film, there is little difference between studios and independent films, says Waters. For him, success has been a slow and steady process -- he was forty before he flew first class for the first time. He insists that bigger budgets and big names stars haven't confused him. "You grow with it," Waters says.
Cecil B. Demented opened on August 11 in limited release across the country.
Related Links
- John Waters Worship Page
- Cecil B. Demented Official Site
- Dreamland
- IndieWIRE interview
- Pink Flamingos
- Official Melanie Griffith Site
photographs courtesy of Artisan Pictures
Previous Articles
