John Waters and Divine

I just watched Pink Flamingos last week on the Criterion Channel and I was so scared of throwing up during the last 30 minutes, especially after that very last scene.

Love Divine though.

“Hairspray” is his greatest artistic achievement by far.

But “Female Trouble” is the most fun to watch.

Divine should have won an Oscar for Polyester.

At no point do you ever question that character is not a real woman.

I started listening to one of John Water’s memoirs, frankly I was bored to pieces. The only good chapter was one where he described meeting Johnny Mathis (I didn’t know he was so had to look him up) at Mathis’s home.

I knew of Waters mainly because of Hairspray, but the earlier works are more of a miss for me except for Polyester. That was fun camp.

Hairspray is his best movie. It had an amazing production design. Hell, he made Baltimore look like a place you'd want to live.

Divine really shined in this movie. He should have enjoyed his fame and recognition more. This is saying a lot when you're practically carrying a movie with Jerry Stiller, Sonny Bono, Debbie Harry, and Ruth Brown. All of the adults were "freaks" when they were younger.

Serial Mom is also hilarious IMHO! No one ever talks about it.

I love Hairspray. A lot of dancing hotties in that. Michael St Gerard was beautiful--and eventually became a pastor. Whatevs.

And I dont' what memoir you're referring to r4, but Shock Value is fucking hysterical. His stories of all of their exploits in crazy 60-s Baltimore--going to race riots so they could loot, renting out huge hotel ballrooms for insane parties that they'd pay for with bad checks. His P-town stories. Brilliant stuff.

I became friends with Mink Stole's brother when I lived in LA and hung out with Mink a bunch. She's an awesome gal.

"And I dont' what memoir you're referring to [R4], "

Meant to write "I don't know what..."

I always felt they were lovers. it always seemed their was this love with them that was beyond friendship.

R6 the memoir was Role Models, written in 2010. It’s basically chapters of John visiting or talking about his role models. I later traded the audiobook for another of his memoirs, Mr. Know It All: The Tarnished Wisdom of a Filth Elder. That one is much more entertaining, but his memoirs to me were not as fun as his movies.

Has John ever been in a relationship?

Divine used to date porn stars.

[quote] Their collaboration hit its creative apex with 1988’s “Hairspray,” which was well received by critics and became a cult classic.

Hairspray? “Cult” classic? My son’s school did Hairspray the musical. Hairspray - both the original movie & the musical — became a *mainstream* classic.

Does anybody fact check or edit anything anymore?

His post-Divine work has been inconsistent. [italic]Cecil B. Demented[/italic] was right to warn us about mainstream movie theaters turning into nothing but [italic]Star Trek[/italic] and [italic]Star Wars[/italic] movies, and that's gotten worse over the last 20 years.

I watched some early Waters' movies--and was amazed at how engrossing they were. The plots were often nonsensical but that totally didn't matter

[quote] Jerry Stiller, Sonny Bono, Debbie Harry, and Ruth Brown. All of the adults were "freaks" when they were younger.

Jerry Stiller was part of a very successful comedy duo Stiller & Meara, who frequently appeared on Ed Sullivan, a zillion other variety shows, played various recurring characters on various sitcoms over the course of 40 years, had their own sitcom and did radio commercials for Blue Nun wine for years.

Not a freak.

I am fascinated by these two. Seriously. They brought "Camp" to the forefront of American pop culture and made it an art form. Waters is absolute King and Monarch of cinema so bad it's good. Free Divine documentary free on Tubi - "I Am Divine!" - terribly interesting. Waters in a very funny guy! See his standup routine free on YouTube after this post - hilarious!

Some of the responses to this post are depressing me with their lack of wit or insight.

Maybe Datalounge really is dying.

John Waters stand up comedy

Divine was a natural. I read somewhere that John Waters first saw her on street corner pulling tricks…and their friendship started from there.

Sometimes I think everyone was dropping acid during the filming of those movies….they have a zaniness about them.

Fun fact, Divine inspired Ursula's design from the Little Mermaid. No wonder she's one of the better villains.

R14 Freak as in he was very different than his contemporaries

[R20]

i know…Divine was the first person I thought of when I saw the movie character.

His best film was Pink Flamingos.

i can’t remember if Divine eats dog shit in that one…she was soooooo over the top…she struck me as someone who would do anything on a dare

John Waters is an American treasure.

Hairspray is by far the best of their collaborations all around. Female Trouble might be my favorite one to watch, though. Pink Flamingos is just disgusting for the sake of being disgusting.

I think Serial Mom might be my favorite Waters movie. Wasn't it written with the intention of Divine playing the Kathleen Turner role before he became ill?

I never got them cha cha heels!

[quote] [R14] Freak as in he was very different than his contemporaries

He wasn’t.

Mike Nichols & Elaine May, Martin and Lewis, Allen & Rossi, Wayne & Shuster, Burns & Schreiber, Rowan & Martin, Smothers Brothers were comedy duos and all were contemporaries of Stiller & Meara. Burns & Allen preceded them. They weren’t freaky. They were all on mainstream network television. Comedy duos were a standard thing in the 50s & 60s.

[quote]Divine used to date porn stars.

In particular, he dated Leo Ford, the blond surfer boy king of early-'80s porn. According to Bernard Jay's biography, Leo genuinely cared for him, but they grew apart because all Divine wanted to do was lie around all day and smoke weed.

John Waters might be my favorite directing personality of all time. I think Pink Flamingos is my favorite just because of how daring it was - they passed out brown paper bags at some screenings! All of his movies are delightful, even the less quality ones like Pecker or A Dirty Shame. Cecil B. Demented is his most underrated and terrifyingly prophetic, as someone mentioned up the thread. He did a recent interview on Marc Maron's podcast that was good and out of the box compared to his other interviews. He just turned 75 this year!

I've met John twice in unusual everyday settings where he struck up a conversation, he is very chatty. He's also naturally funny, and very friendly and not attention-seeking. He pretended to remember meeting me when I reminded him where we'd met previously, but I'm certain he was just being polite, which was just a sweet thing to do.

I waited on Divine (out of drag) when I was a lunch waiter at Ernie's on the UWS in 1984. I was the only person in the restaurant who recognized him and I was so starstruck, which he was delighted by and autographed a cocktail napkin for me which sadly, I lost. He was very low-key and charming.

I absolutely adore JW's glorious Douglas Sirk–inspired camp dialogue ...

"I'm going to go soak in a long, hot beauty bath now and try to erase the STINK of a five-year marriage!"

"I wish I could be more like you, Cuddles—always optimistic . . . When I look into my future, all I can see is a long, dark highway with endless toll booths and no exits."

"O Honest Lady, whoever you are, don't let him go, PLEASE! He is our keeper! He has beaten me many times and caused me untold misery!"

"Tracy Turnblad, your ratted hair is preventing another student's geometry education!"

I think David Lochary from Waters' early films is so sexy. He's almost entirely forgotten these days.

"I'm just trying to get an EDUCATION!"

"True, true, TRUE, Miss Judefein!"

One of my favorite stories John Waters tells is how he hates Dorothy from Wizard of Oz. He saw it and went, this brat gets to visit flying monkeys, a land of munchkins, a woman with green skin and all she wants is to go back to fucking Kansas?! Always thought it represented his worldview, curious, fun and loving.

I saw "Female Trouble" and before I saw the old Joan Crawford film "Strait Jacket", and IMHO Divine copied a lot of her mannerisms and body language from Joanie.

Which totally worked for a drag queen, it gave her that touch of the diva she needed! Divine really was a terrific actress, a better actor than Waters was a director.

Cha cha shoes!

John Waters made gay cinema, not "queer" cinema.

Anybody see A Dirty Shame? Was thinking of renting it but don't know if it'd live up to his earlier films

A Dirty Shame is one of his weakest films - funny in places but largely forgettable.

Harris Glenn Milstead

Prolific?

These people need a dictionary.

Which one r42?

Hardy-har-har

The Diane Linkletter Story

as the acting talent he was able to attract got better, his shortcomings as a director got more blatant.

Having a bunch of amateur drug addicts scream that shitty dialogue was fine but having actual actors say it showed how bad it was.

As an aside, I've loved all the books Waters has written, they're such fun and delightfully funny.

She was prettier than Elizabeth Taylor!

R18 Well, you heard wrong. God, you are fucking dumb.

John Waters and Divine grew up in the same neighborhood. They were childhood friends. He put Divine is one of his early low budget films and she got a good response so he put in more.

[R47]

hater slime alert…..

Desperate Living

Please don’t use the “Q word”, OP.

The menthol-cool vocal stylings of Miss Massey...

I've always felt there should be a band somewhere called Edie & The Eggmen.

It sure didn't hurt that Divine was a very good natural actor. In John Waters films, Divine always stood out as the most professional.

Divine was also in other films in non-drag roles.

His comedy show 'This Filthy World' is very good. I love his story about Jackie On Assistance's auction.

Actually I remember seeing one of JW films where Divine played herself and a straight character without her wig..like a regular guy .

Jerry Stiller was never a "freak". Some here are either completely clueless or simply trying to argue.

Jerry and his wife Anne Meara were a popular comedy duo . They then both branched out into acting. Anne even took some dramatic roles. She played a schoolteacher in the film version of FAME. Anne also appeared in soap operas and many TV series. She later played Spence's mom on 'King of Queens' and ended up marrying Carrie's father, played by Jerry Stiller.

Jerry's most famous TV roles were as Carrie's nutty father in 'King of Queens' and as George's father in SEINFELD.

In case some here are completely clueless, their son Ben Stiller went on to become famous comedic actor.

"I'm getting an abortion and I can't wait" One of my favorite lines of all time.

What’s the movie where Divine says something like, “I’m in such a CRAZE” and goes wild, either walking down the street like a person whose skin is crawling, or rolling around on a floor in ecstasy?

Jerry Stiller is also in the low-brow comedy The Ritz which takes place in a gay bathhouse.

John's angels!

....

Just how gross is Pink Flamingos? I love Waters but I'm afraid to watch it because of THAT scene.

You absolutely can NOT leave out her originating the role of Bunny Flingus, r59.

R65 It isnt that gross. For audiences back then, of course it was. But for anyone watching it nowadays, it is very tame.

We run three films at Christmas at our house:

1. The Lion in Winter

2. Auntie Mame

3. Female Trouble

Mink

I'm [bold]GLAD[/bold] I had an abortion!

I’ll have two chicken breasts and an extremely large glass of water

That dress...

[quote]Cha cha shoes!

Oh, DEAR!

*

Mary Garlington (Lu-Lu Fishpaw) was a brilliant casting choice for [italic]Polyester.[/italic]

I like him and much of his material, mostly for the bizarre characters and little exchanges that he managed to keep in final edits (in Hairspray, Tracy gingerly shakes a squeaking rat off her foot when making out with Link; in Female Trouble, the knife in Concetta’s “pockybook”, touches like these). He also managed to cast and direct Debbie Harry better than most filmmakers were ever able to manage. Velma’s scenes and dialogue are so good (“I was Miss Soft Crab 1945!” and also an amazing quick close-up on Harry’s face grimacing at Amber’s dance practice and growling “faster!”).

But some scenes and themes are too much for even me, specifically the poor chicken in Pink Flamingos and a few incestuous exchanges. Fuck all that.

Dawn Davenport stomping on all the Christmas gifts is probably the dysfunctional adult equivalent of The Grinch who stole Christmas. Joyously menacing, a true pleasure. Also, her sobbing and self-pity as she runs away (“you ruined Christmas!”) is so cruel and ironic because she’s the one who pulled the tree down onto the mother and charged at the father like a bull (very clever stage combat when Divine shoves the Dad’s character over the arm of the sofa).

R74 Exactly. Waters’ genius is the way he “scaffolds” Dawn’s eruption. The parents’ irritating accents, the mother’s squeaky “pleading” tone and the father’s gentle mansplaining (and that wig). The audience is really ready for them both to get it bad from Dawn.

The singing of Silent Night is so tense and awkward. It’s like two songbirds landing on a crocodile in an old nature documentary. Also, the shoe Dawn unwraps is a super tiny navy blue flat. The wrong size and color and style, like a marker for all the disconnection between these parents and Dawn.

And even the choppy quick cut to the scene is actually appropriate here. It’s edited like the films they showed in driving school and health class during this era. Like a primitive form of education media, misguided, trying to scare and shame the viewer. Waters takes the piss out of all that.

John Waters when he was young was sorta hawt!

You're into Steve Buscemi, aren't you, r78?

I worked at a dance bar in the late 70s ish on Haight St in SF, I Beam. Divine came in frequently. Very friendly, lovely, personable. I asked him to dance once or twice. He was lots of fun.

Killing the chicken in Pink Flamingos was a bridge too far for me.

[quote]I like him and much of his material, mostly for the bizarre characters and little exchanges that he managed to keep in final edits.

My favorite of these little touches is in [italic]Polyester:[/italic] the marquee of the drive-in advertising [bold]3 MARGUERITE DURAS HITS.[/bold] After all the gross-out humor in his earlier films, this one stands out for its comparatively subtler (but still hilarious) wit.

The Christmas morning cha cha heels massacre was not unlike many ruined holidays in my house growing up. My older sister as an adolescent could be just as volatile as Dawn when things didn’t go her way.

What ARE cha-cha heels, anyway?

I'm a fan, but perhaps I might rethink things a bit - lol - he's hardcore!

Yeah, I eat chicken, but I don’t need to see one murdered in a film. In a “sex scene” no less! There’s blood and everything. You couldn’t even get that made today, with the Humane Society thankfully monitoring the production.

I never got an answer to a question I asked upthread so I’ll ask it again:

[quote] What’s the movie where Divine says something like, “I’m in such a CRAZE” and goes wild, either walking down the street like a person whose skin is crawling, or rolling around on a floor in ecstasy?

[quote] "and did radio commercials for Blue Nun wine for years."

My favorite!

🎶 "CHEERS to us, my darling, my dear Here's to us toniiiikight!"🎶

Oh! Oh, my. I just...spilled a little. Can somebody top off my drink?...Oh, to hell with it. I'm going to need a refill anyway.

Polyester

Blue Nun

His early films have always been a triumph of passion and good storytelling over technical shortcomings. A lot of the acting was community theatre level besides Divine and perhaps Mink Stole, but they worked. They were well constructed and told interesting stories. If they were released today, I'm sure most people would shut them off in the first 5 minutes because of how cheap they look. Everything looks the same these days.

Serial Mom is my favorite of his work. Kathleen Turner was such a great fit for the John Waters universe and I love how the film is a mix of Waters' trademark trashy and campy storytelling/dialogue with high budget Hollywood production values. His films after that are enjoyable, but not as good. Every director gets like that, though. Many of their first films are rough around the edges but have that special spark of someone who's expressing a unique world view and their middle stuff tends to be the most polished, but their later career offerings always lack something. You can see it with everyone from Spielberg, De Palma, Carpenter, Hitchcock, etc.

[quote] Serial Mom is my favorite of his work. Kathleen Turner was such a great fit for the John Waters universe and I love how the film is a mix of Waters' trademark trashy and campy storytelling/dialogue with high budget Hollywood production values. His films after that are enjoyable, but not as good

Totally agree. He peaked at Serial Mom.

I love "Serial Mom", because although Divine is a damn good actor, Kathleen Turner was the best actor he ever worked with, and IMHO gave one of the best performances of her career in that film. I mean, it was a star performance in the best sense, she was charismatic, hilarious, compulsively watchable, able to keep the audience on the edge of her seat through every moment of every scene.

It's one of the few films where he didn't use the deliberately bad acting, and it worked.

Netflix, Amazon, etc. are throwing millions at people; the new "Lord of the Rings" series is expected to cost $500,000,000.

Why not give John $10 million so "A Dirty Shame" isn't his last work?

My idea is "Serial Grandma," where the Sutphins put Beverly in a nursing home where she knocks off the seniors and staff who get on her nerves, before breaking out to kill her own family who put her in the home.

R93= John Waters

Why would she kill the seniors, r93? She didn't kill without cause.

[quote]Why would she kill the seniors, [R93]? She didn't kill without cause.

Many possible reasons! Cheating at bingo. Taking two desserts. Hogging the community TV remote. Stealing her weights from water aerobics class.

[quote] Why would she kill the seniors, [R93]? She didn't kill without cause.

And very important causes, too, such as eating fowl and wearing white after Labor Day!

R39, R53

It's so rich seeing posters scolding over the use of the word queer in a thread about the "King of Trash" John Waters. Of all things, trying to sanitize and make 'respectable' a tribute thread about John Waters and Divine...

Prepare your smelling salts and fainting couches, gentlemen, because John Waters actually also supports *gasp* Transgender people!

Queer identity, queer studies, queer activism, etc. have been around for many decades now. But keep trying to shove cultural developments back into the box until you're in the grave... I'm sure you'll succeed in eliminating all of the identities that you don't like any day now...

Dottie Hinkle is a bitch, you know.

Divine was a natural,star. She and John Waters are possibly the best thing about the 70s. The freedom, craziness and absence of propriety was something that probably could have only happened in the 70s. South Park is the modern equivalent - but its mean instead of fun. Both John and Divine seem like decent people who never got big heads.

My favorite is still Serial Mom though. Kathleen Turner was fabulous,

LISTEN TO YOUR FILTHY MOUTH YA FUCKIN' WHORE!!!

I still say that all the time.

John Waters introduced the world to Elizabeth Coffey.

A Serial Grandmom movie would be a good time. I bet Turner would at least consider it.

[quote] I bet Turner would at least consider it.

She's not doing much else these days aside from eating Twinkies and Ding-Dongs drowned in pints of Ben and Jerry's. Give her a call!

I'd pay to see "Serial Grandma"!

Seriously, someone get it touch with John Waters, someone here has to be in his orbit.

She works, r104...Kominsky Method and she's filming The White House Plumbers.

As far as reasons for Bev to murder at the old folks' home, this would be number one.

"I'm a divorced woman. Please help me."

R85 Yeah, no. That animal suffered and struggled. Waters’ schtick about the animal’s life being better because it got fucked, got to be in a movie, is meant to be darkly humorous, but isn’t.

Which movie is R108’s line from?

R110 Serial Mom, Mink Stole’s character.

I think his career suffered from being so vocal in his support for granting parole to Manson follower Van Houten.

I agree, R112. And there was no point to it: Van Houten is never getting out. None of the Manson killers will.

In "Carsick", Waters said that he stopped making films and started writing books was because he couldn't get financing, which seems likely enough. He said that it's because nobody will finance a low-budget film around $5 million, the people backing movies will only finance cheapo indies that cost less than a million, or big-budget extravaganzas which cost over $50 million-$500 million.

There's probably some truth to that, but my question is if that's the case - why not go back to making movies for nothing? There are actors who'd work for him for scale, he's never used CGI or special effects, and if he doesn't want to include musical numbers then what the hell do his sets and costumes cost.

I wonder if it’s because he doesn’t want to shoot on digital, which is what you need to do if you want to make an indie film on the CHEAP nowadays.

If that’s the case, I support him. Digital video, even the sexy kind that looks “good”, is for Netflix/HBO series and other TV productions, not feature-length theatrical movies. Unfortunately, the movie industry hasn’t agreed with this for the last decade+.

R112 Agreed. Truman Capote had that identity and gained recognition through the publication of In Cold Blood, but was a better writer. Waters’ advocacy for Van Houten is humanistic and his conviction is real, and compassionate. But he doesn’t really have the stature or gravitas to advocate persuasively. His ascent, culturally, has blind spots in some prurient and simplistic perceptions about violence, sex, race, fame/infamy. He abstains from accepting honorary degrees (“they just want a free lecture”), but really he’s got some vulnerabilities. He bled his label by becoming a cheerleader for tabloid culture in the early 1990’s, and that’s really too bad. He is actually a pretty “cancellable” guy. Social theorists would shit on his head for some of his cheesy, amateurish themes on race and identity and media. But he usually, wisely, stays in his lane.

R115 Technology aside, he may have simply run out of bankable ideas. His last films were really poorly conceived and lost a lot of money. But that has happened to so many filmmakers, to be fair.

If a LEGEND like John Waters is considered unbankable in this day and age, then we truly deserve to be exterminated as a species. Truly.

I love him but most of his movies are shit.

R20 Mother Gothel from Tangled was based on Cher. Quite a few Disney animators like the smell of cookies.

R119 - YES! That's the point - his movies are good because they're shit. Haha - really!

Lack of mainstream connections might be what's stopping John Waters from making another film. I remeber he wanted to make a Christmas parody movie with Parker Posey and Johnny Knoxville but couldn't get funds. He needs an in, the executive types don't really get his brand of camp and counterculture on their own.

It's a damn shame John Waters and Todd Solondz struggle for financing yet Michael Bay can get whatever piece of shit he wants greenlit in a heartbeat.

It's also odd that Woody Allen has gotten financing for his low-budget movies, which haven't made money for decades, while John Waters can't.

Not to mention the time is ripe to piss off the crazy Christians. Look how popular drag queens are, look how many records Lil Nas X broke twerking on Satan. It's the perfect cultural moment for a John Waters movie.

R102, Elizabeth Coffey is still around! I've interacted with her a couple of times on Facebook and she's really funny.

R126 Good to know that she wasn't beaten and sent to the Adjustment Center.

I've got hampers of ironing to do, and my diet pill is wearing off.

Lust in the Dust.

Oh, wait.

At first I thought that was Meghan McCain.

I would love for Waters to have one final go. A Dirty Shame sucked. It was boring and immature. It would be a horrible way to end an otherwise iconic film career. I think he would have better luck down than back them. Society has become a lot more pearl clutcy since A Dirty Shame. He would have a lot more to work with.

Water has a script for a Pink Flamingos sequel. He should cast Ginger Minge as Edith, Eureka as Divine, and make it.

For a lot of filmmakers, there's no shame in making movies for pocket change when they're in their 20's and 30's, but by your 60's or 70's, it's just too much of a struggle to make a low budget movie. It's exciting when you're young, but exhausting when you're older.

I'd love to see him do at least one more great movie. I think he has it in him.