Saw him last weekend. A brilliant, if somewhat filthy, monologue. Of course, if you can't stand bad words, you don't go to see John Waters, right?
He discussed how Beyond the Valley of the Dolls is a better film than Valley of the Dolls.
Look- it's trying to think!
He must be a very quirky, interesting character. How cool that you got to see him!
I didn't really know who he was until I first saw the 2007 version of Hairspray. If I had, I would have likely appreciated Baltimore further when my sister lived there and I'd visit from DC.
I hear Ursula from the Little Mermaid was inspired by the cross-dresser Divine, who came out in Waters' original Hairspray movie and some of his raunchier films (aka Pink Flamingos, etc.)
Vastly preferred the earlier Hairspray. Casting Ric Ocasek and Pia Zadora as the beatnik couple was genius!
Among his later films, I think of Serial Mom as the hidden gem. Used to use Pink Flamingos as a test of people's tolerance.
Several years ago, a friend was having a Halloween party, and he asked me to bring a scary movie. I suppose he thought I was going to bring something like Blood Feast, or one of the Jason/Freddy Kruger/Saw type films. Instead, I brought Desperate Living. On the plus side, I succeeded in scaring the people there way more than any slasher film would have. However, he didn't ask me to pick a film for a long time after that.
Look- it's trying to think!
I'll be honest, other than Hairspray and Pink Flamingos (for their reputation), I'm really not overly familiar with Waters' other films yet.
However, I'm glad for his legacy; Baltimore is a very interesting and under-studied city (as are many others). I usually saw it with a fair amount of distaste or horrified awe before knowing about Waters (with the exception of its northern neighborhoods, perhaps, like Roland Park and the Hopkins area, or niches like the Inner Harbor and Mt. Vernon). I found the vast rowhouses with their Formstone strange and alien-looking, and of course the high crime rates and deep poverty unsettling.
I additionally remember walking with my mom towards Falls Road in Hampden once (before knowing who John Waters was or that those were his haunts), and her getting scared out of her mind at the drug addicts on the streets. (She would have passed out had she known I'd gone exploring the hard-core Wire-like ghettos elsewhere by car out of curiosity and for kicks and thrills before the Wire had come out).
Sometimes one needs narrators like Waters to get to know a city's (or its neighborhoods') stories better, and appreciate their past. Then they stop seeming so strange.
Went to the American Visionary Art Museum last October. Truly a hidden gem.
Look- it's trying to think!
I thought that his version of The Fellowship of the Ring was amazing.
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dies ist meine unterschrift