by Robert Berry
rberry@retrocrush.com

John Waters is one of the most underrated, yet influential directors of all time.  As one of the great pioneers of artistic exploitation films, John has elevated sleazy and shocking cinema to a level of respectability that is mind-blowing.  In this increasingly puritanical society his latest film, A DIRTY SHAME, is being released with an NC-17 rating stamped on it like a badge of honor.  From his early 70s classics like Female Trouble and Pink Flamingos, to an appearance on The Simpsons, to an acclaimed Broadway musical based on HAIRSPRAY, John Waters has made his mark on American culture like few artists have.  It was an honor and a privilege to interview John and talk about his latest film, trash culture, and of course, Gobbles The Garbage Eating Goat!

How are you doing today?

I'm fine, we're having a long press day, tonight is the big premiere of the movie (A Dirty Shame) at the Toronto Film Festival. So...YIKES! We'll see!

Tracy Ullman stars in A DIRTY SHAME as Sylvia Stickles, a prude who suffers head trauma and gets a sexual awakening thanks to the talented tongue of Johnny Knoxville photo (c) 2004 Fine Line Pictures

A Dirty Shame seems like a return to the super trashy John Waters films of yesteryear. Did you feel like you were getting back to your roots again with this?

No, not really. But I understand why people say that 'cause it's about sex, so it always seems more salacious, but Cecil B. Demented would hardly be considered what you call "a normal Hollywood movie."

That's for sure, none of yours have, I guess.

Imagine trying to get THAT movie made now, a movie about teen terrorism. It would be as hard to get made as it would to get a comedy about sex addicts made 10 years ago because of AIDS and everything. And I've been very very ummm...I think...all the sex in this movie is safe, and so I didn't want to ignore that it's impossible to ignore when young people are still getting HIV, being infected, so this way I had to think of really ludicrous sex, that maybe is responsible now, but would have been called 20 years ago foolish sex or ridiculous sex. This movie is about thinking up a new sex act, maybe we have to, there's none that you can do anymore without risk.

From giant lobsters raping cross-dressers, to eating real dog shit on camera, your films have really covered it all. Is there any scene or subject matter that would be going too far for you?

Sure! In this movie, there's no sex that's "anti-women". It's a feminist movie. It's about a woman that demands she's satisfied orally, and has a happy ending, and they discover a new sex act, and miracles happen. It's a spiritual movie.

Is there any subject...? Yeah, I guess there's subjects that don't work for humor. I didn't put in fisting I didn't put in things like that are kind of hard to make funny because the other person has to be so humiliated, and people have the right to do that, but some things work and things don't when you're trying to do a comedy.

It's funny actually when you look back at your movies, you've never really had a degrading or humiliating act of that nature.

Well the sex in my movies is always ridiculous. It's always for comedy reasons. I mean nobody's jerking off while watching one of my movies. Well, I guess some people would jerk off...

I'm sure that there's somebody

I'm sure you're right. But still, all the sex in my movies, even in Female Trouble when Dawn gets fucked by a hammer, that in a way was for a comic purpose.

Sure...sure

Go fuck a toolkit.

Selma Blair grows 80 bra sizes larger to play Caprice in Water's latest film A DIRTY SHAME
photo by James Bridges (c) 2004 Fine Line Pictures

You've got Selma Blair in your film as a dancer with these gigantic breasts. What sort of challenges were there in dealing with those monstrous boobs?

The main challenge was with the lights because it would wrinkle and melt the plastic. There was this seamless kind of part of her chest that keeps them on, how they were applied. They didn't have a shelf life of too long. Especially in the one scene where she's nude and titty-whips someone with them. You had to be really careful. The hot movie lights made them wrinkle. And you don't see that at all in the movie, I think it was pretty seamless. But you certainly had to be very very careful.

Selma Blair plays exhibitionist, Caprice, in A DIRTY SHAME, with giant fake boobs!
photos (c) 2004 Fine Line Pictures

So we won't see any melting boobs outtakes on the DVD then.

No...because when they melted they were just like a hunk of plastic on the floor. They looked like what The Wicked Witch looked like after she melted. It wasn't like two big giant tits sitting there.

You had a part in BLOOD FEAST 2, what was it like working with Herschell Gordon Lewis?

Oh it was great to walk in there, it was filmed like an hour away from New Orleans, a place I never went to, and so they took me there, and we drove there, and I go to this shed and I see some movie equipment outside. And in the inside, there was this girl covered in guts and fake blood, and Herschell's directing I was like, "Ohhh, isn't this great?!" So it was fun! I was in a Woody Allen movie, too, "Sweet and Lowdown". I'm in the new Chucky movie, too.

That's right, you're in THE SEED OF CHUCKY.

The Seed of Chucky, yup! I heard I'm in Fangoria, but I haven't seen it yet.

You continually cast surprising pop culture icons like Patty Hearst and Traci Lords when they weren't getting a chance in films like that with great success. Has there ever been a great casting choice you've just loved that just didn't work out?

Amy Carter. I tried to get Amy Carter, and she was nice, but she was like "WHY?, I'm not an actress?". An thought because, for a while she was hanging out with Abbie Hoffman, and I thought well...maybe she'd be game, and I'm still a big fan of her, I'd like to see her, she keeps a very low profile.

Yeah she sure does.

I mean she got married, and I think her father's a great man and is doing wonderful things what ex-Presidents should do, and she probably helps him there. I think she turned out to be probably great. She just was perplexed, I heard. "Why is he talking to me?" She was correct! She had the proper response, really...She had good advisors, a good head on her shoulders.

What would you say is your favorite trash film of all time?

Well, Trash Films...you know the real Trash Films are the ones that weren't meant to be. Things like Mahogany, The Other Side of Midnight. I guess I would never get sick of watching some of Russ Meyer's movies...Faster Pussycat. The gore movies
were great because they invented a new genre. You know, Herschell Gordon Lewis with Blood Feast and David Friedman, the producer had that girl rip her heart out and everything, that was a new thing, THAT was like eating shit then, there wasn't a
law against it yet. So it was a way they could go further with exploitation when they couldn't go any further with sex, so that movie will always have a lovely memory to me.  Ummm, but real Trash, I don't know if it's possible to make it anymore, because real Trash isn't infected with irony. Real Trash takes itself seriously. It is not working on two levels, ever. All the vintage sexploitation footage that I have in A Dirty Shame really were from movies that were supposed to be sexy at the time, it was never supposed to be funny.

They weren't self aware...

And self awareness, in a way, it ruins it...my movies were always, you know, I was in on it. I was trying to make exploitation movies for art theaters, which had really not happened. It was my sort of genre that I was trying to do, to make really trashy bad taste movies for the best taste neighborhoods and theaters. My movies always did the best in rich neighborhoods with intelligent and educated people. And I was always crushed when we played them at drive-ins or grind houses and people did not like them.

Waters, from a photo grabbed from the DVD "DIVINE TRASH" (which I highly recommend) on the set of Pink Flamingos in 1972, with some of the greasiest hair the world has ever seen

They weren't the right target audience.

No, they smelled a rat, correctly, namely me, cause there was irony involved. They don't get the irony but they know you're making fun of them. Which you are.

Why do you think America might be enjoying a sort of Golden Age of Trash Culture right now?

Because there's no such thing as Trash Culture. The Golden Age of Trash is over. It's now just plain American humor. And it's what's on television, and it's what's on the radio. It's what the culture is. This is the main thing that we export to the world now, but it's not called Trash now, it's just humor.

I remember reading an essay you wrote about a great toy called Gobbles the Garbage Eating goat...

I still have Gobbles, and I took it on Letterman once, and they didn't use it and they broke it, but they were really great though and found another Gobbles and replaced it. It comes with garbage and you an send away for more garbage for a dollar. It's right in my guest room, I play with Gobbles. I miss Gobbles, you just said that, I haven't been home in a while he's at home all alone. I hope he's OK there on the third floor. I hope he doesn't feel neglected.

What are some of the coolest toys and weird things you've collected that really stand out?

I have candy, different candy. I couldn't believe it there was one product that was actually called Dingleberries, which I'm amazed, and they were pellets of chocolate. There was a candy I found called Crack...I guess it was named before crack became a problem. There was Dirty Laundry candy, that came in a little dryer and a washer, and you could eat your dirty laundry. And candy bullets, which I loved, talk about politically incorrect, giving your children candy bullets!

Waters, in another photo grabbed from the DVD "DIVINE TRASH"

You're well known for visiting a lot famous murder trials, have you made the time to visit the Scott Peterson trial yet?

No, I don't do that anymore.

Oh, you stopped?

I stopped that with SERIAL MOM. I can't go anymore...Because I think there are very few cases that are that great. Secondly I think Court TV has made it kind of common, anyone can do it now. And if I go now, I'm recognized, so it's not the same.

Too much attention?

I'm worried the jury will take it out on the defendant if they don't like me. The defendant may get uptight. People might think I'm making a movie about it. I can't really go anymore.

Everything got spoiled for that now, huh?

Well, it's a little harder for me to be anonymous, and when I went I was anonymous.

What's the one question you wish interviewers would ask you, but they never do?

There's never that question. To me, what I hate is at the end of the interview when some of them say, "Is there anything YOU'D like to say?" And I say, "No...YOU think of the questions, I'll do the answers. Or you send me part of your paycheck, if I've got to prepare for you." (laughs)

I read a quote from you that you "Vote Gay". What's the gay vote for this year's Presidential election?

I said that yesterday, you can already read that? It's probably the only thing I do 100% Gay, besides having sex. Voting Gay means even though I have nooooo desire to get married, and it seems kind of square to me, to imitate heterosexual tradition, I firmly believe that gay people have the right to do that. So even though I don't want to get married, if one politician would ever be against that, I would never ever vote for them, you know what I mean? It would become a more important issue than it is to me sometimes in real life.

So that's enough to vote against Bush, would you say?

Oh, I don't need THAT to vote against Bush. The only thing I don't understand, the thing when I say VOTE GAY, I also think they should decorate better the polling places. Why are they so dreary? Why do people dress badly when they vote? You know, you should wear something sexy when you vote, like CRUISE when you vote, act DIRTY when you vote, think sexual thoughts as you vote. PERK IT UP! Because people wear the worst outfits to vote in. Just look when you vote...it's like "WHY DID YOU WEAR THAT?"

It's a once in a four year event, you should really play it up.

And why are those booths so dreary? Why do they look like bad peep shows? Why don't they have some colors in there? Why is it so dreary, the voting experience. It's something that's supposed to make you feel proud to be an American. Can't we
have a little more fun with it? Can't we make voting a sexy experience? Have a little style about it?

Do you plan on writing any more books?

Sure, I plan on writing more. I did write one that came out earlier this year with Bruce Hainley the art critic called ART OF SEX BOOK, about contemporary art. Eventually I will do a sequel of SHOCK VALUE, which is my memoirs, that only went up to well really I started making Polyester.

Well, I'm looking forward to that. Well, hey, I've always been a great fan of your work, and it was great to talk to you.

Well, thank you.

---

At this point, we ended the interview, and I told him to look up the Trash Film Orgy midnight movie festival we have each Summer in Sacramento, to which he seemed intrigued, and got him talking about Squeaky Fromme and the SLA, for a bit longer
before we had to part ways.

A Dirty Shame opens on September 24th in theaters across America. If you'd like to attend a showing at The Crest Theater in Sacramento, email me at rberry@retrocrush.com let me know, as I'll have a lot of free passes for the run of the film to give away.