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John Waters (filmmaker)
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John Samuel Waters, Jr. (born 22 April 1946) is an American filmmaker, actor, writer, celebrity, visual artist and art collector, who rose to fame in the early 1970s for his transgressive cult films. Waters' 1970s and early '80s trash films feature his regular troupe of actors known as Dreamlanders — among them Divine, Mary Vivian Pearce, and Edith Massey — often committing cinematic crimes. Starting with Desperate Living (1977), Waters began casting real-life convicted criminals (Liz Renay, Patricia Hearst) as well as famous (Sonny Bono, Debbie Harry, Tab Hunter) and infamous people (Traci Lords, a former porn star).
Waters skirted mainstream filmmaking with Hairspray (1988), which introduced Ricki Lake and earned a modest gross of $8 million domestically.
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John Samuel Waters, Jr. (born 22 April 1946) is an American filmmaker, actor, writer, celebrity, visual artist and art collector, who rose to fame in the early 1970s for his transgressive cult films. Waters' 1970s and early '80s trash films feature his regular troupe of actors known as Dreamlanders — among them Divine, Mary Vivian Pearce, and Edith Massey — often committing cinematic crimes. Starting with Desperate Living (1977), Waters began casting real-life convicted criminals (Liz Renay, Patricia Hearst) as well as famous (Sonny Bono, Debbie Harry, Tab Hunter) and infamous people (Traci Lords, a former porn star).
Waters skirted mainstream filmmaking with Hairspray (1988), which introduced Ricki Lake and earned a modest gross of $8 million domestically. In 2002, Hairspray was adapted to a long-running Broadway musical, which itself was adapted to a hit musical film which earned more than $200 million worldwide. After the crossover success of the original film version of Hairspray, Waters' films began featuring familiar actors and celebrities such as Johnny Depp, Edward Furlong, Melanie Griffith, Chris Isaak, Johnny Knoxville, Martha Plimpton, Christina Ricci, Lili Taylor, Kathleen Turner and Tracey Ullman.
Although he has apartments in New York City, San Francisco and a summer home in Provincetown, Waters still mainly resides in his hometown of Baltimore, Maryland, where all his films are set. He is recognizable by his trademark pencil-thin moustache.
Biography
Early life
Waters was born in Baltimore, Maryland, the son of Patricia Ann (née Whitaker) and John Samuel Waters, who was a manufacturer of fire-protection equipment. Waters grew up in Lutherville, Maryland, a suburb of Baltimore. His boyhood friend and muse Glenn Milstead, later known as Divine, also lived in Baltimore County, Maryland, a short distance away.
The movie Lili inspired an interest in puppets in the seven-year-old Waters, who proceeded to stage violent versions of Punch and Judy for children's birthday parties. Biographer Robert L. Pela says that Waters' mother believes the puppets in Lili had the greatest influence on Waters' subsequent career (though Pela believes tacky films at a local drive-in, which the young Waters watched from a distance through binoculars, had a greater effect).
Waters attended Calvert Hall College High School in nearby Towson. For his sixteenth birthday, Waters received an 8mm movie camera from his maternal grandmother, Stella Whitaker.
Early career
His first movie was Hag in a Black Leather Jacket. According to Waters, the film was shown only once in a "beatnik coffee house" in Baltimore.
Waters was a student at New York University (NYU) in New York City. The school, however, was not what Waters had in mind:
Waters has credited his influences among others as Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Herschell Gordon Lewis, Federico Fellini, and Ingmar Bergman. He has stated that he takes an equal amount of joy and influence from high-brow "art" films and sleazy exploitation films: "I love Bergman and I Dismember Mama".
In January 1966, Waters and some friends were caught smoking marijuana on the grounds of NYU; they were soon expelled. Waters returned to Baltimore, where he began work on his next film, Eat Your Makeup, which was filmed that year. Waters' films would become Divine's primary star vehicles. Waters' early films were all shot in the Baltimore area with his company of local actors, the Dreamlanders. In addition to Divine, the group included Mink Stole, Cookie Mueller, Edith Massey, David Lochary, Mary Vivian Pearce, Susan Walsh, and others. These early films were among the first picked up for distribution by the fledgling New Line Cinema. Waters' films premiered at the Baltimore Senator Theatre and sometimes at the Charles Theatre.
Waters' early campy movies present filthily lovable characters in outrageous situations with hyperbolic dialogue. Pink Flamingos, Female Trouble, and Desperate Living, which he labeled the Trash Trilogy, pushed hard at the boundaries of conventional propriety and movie censorship. A particularly notorious scene from Pink Flamingos, simply added as a non sequitur to film's end, featured — in one continuous take without special effects — a small dog defecating and Divine eating its feces.
Move towards the mainstream
Waters' 1981 film Polyester starred Divine opposite former teen idol Tab Hunter. Since then, his films have become less controversial and more mainstream, although works such as Hairspray, Cry-Baby, Serial Mom, Pecker (film), and Cecil B. DeMented still retain his trademark inventiveness. The film Hairspray was turned into a hit Broadway musical which swept the 2003 Tony Awards, and a movie adaptation of the Broadway musical was released in theaters on July 20, 2007.
Waters' 2004 film, the NC-17-rated A Dirty Shame, is a return to his earlier, more controversial work of the 1970s. He also had a cameo in Jackass: Number Two, which starred Dirty Shame co-star Johnny Knoxville. Waters has stated that his next movie will be a children's film titled Fruitcake. It began shooting in January 2008.
Waters is currently a professor of cinema and subcultural studies at the European Graduate School. In 2007, he also became the host (as "The Groom Reaper") of 'Til Death Do Us Part, a program on America's Court TV network featuring dramatizations of real-life marriages that soured and ended in murder. As an openly gay man, Waters is an avid supporter of gay rights and gay pride.
Waters has been known to create characters with alliterated names for his movies including Bo-Bo Belsinger, Corny Collins, Donald Dasher, Donna Dasher, Dawn Davenport, David Divine, Fat Fuck Frank, Francine Fishpaw, Link Larkin, Mona Malnorowski, Motormouth Maybelle, Mole McHenry, Penny Pingleton, Prudy Pingleton, Ramona Rickettes, Sandy Sandstone, Sylvia Stickles, Sandra Sullivan, Todd Tomorrow, Tony The Tickler, Tracy Turnblad, Ursula Udders, Wade Walker, and Wanda Woodward.
Waters recently announced that the production of his newest proposed film, "Fruitcake", a children's Christmas film starring Johnny Knoxville and Parker Posey, has been cancelled. "I can't get it made...I thought it would do well, but it's not. In this economy, I'm going to have to do a puppet show."
Other work
Puffing constantly on a cigarette, Waters appeared in a short film shown in movie art houses announcing that "no smoking" is permitted in the theatres. This short spot was filmed by Waters for the Nuart Theatre (a Landmark Theater) in West Los Angeles, California, in appreciation to the theater for showing Pink Flamingos for many years. It is shown immediately before one of his movies, and before the Midnight movie showing of the Rocky Horror Picture Show.
Waters has a fascination for true crime and, aside from buying serial killer art, collecting biographies of famous murderers and watching Court TV, has attended several high-profile court cases as an observer. Waters has been quoted as saying that he saw many of the same observers at different trials all around the country. Waters stopped attending court when fans began recognising him and showing up just so they could meet him, as he didn't feel it was appropriate considering the seriousness of the legal system. Waters owns one of John Wayne Gacy's paintings, which he hangs in his guest bedroom "so people don't stay too long".
He played a minister in Blood Feast 2: All U Can Eat, which was directed by one of his idols, Herschell Gordon Lewis, and is a sequel to one of his favourite exploration films.
Filmography
Writer/director
Writer
Actor
Films
Voice
Acting
Television
Acting
Voice
Other appearances
Documentary appearances
Bibliography
Waters has published collections of his writings including:
- Shock Value (1981)
- Crackpot: The Obsessions of John Waters (1987, Revised Edition 2003)
- Trash Trio: Three Screenplays: Pink Flamingos, Desperate Living, Flamingos Forever (1988)
- Art: A Sex Book (2003) (with Bruce Hainley)
- Hairspray, Female Trouble, and Multiple Maniacs: Three more screenplays (2005)
Waters has published collections of his photos including:
- Director's Cut (1997)
- John Waters: Change of Life (2004)
- Unwatchable (2006)
Fine art
Since the early 1990s, Waters has been making photo-based artwork and installations that have been internationally exhibited in galleries and museums. In 2004, the New Museum in NYC presented a retrospective of his artwork curated by Marvin Heiferman and Lisa Phillips.
Other works
External links
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