HOME |
DINING |
MOVIES |
LIVE SHOWS |
ARTS |
UPCOMING EVENTS
ARCHIVES |
ABOUT |
ADVERTISE |
CONTACT |
DISTRIBUTION
entertaining u newspaper: your weekly guide to entertainment
|
|
By Jon Bosworth
"I get to be a human director's commentary. In person!" John Waters is talking about his participation in Tim Masset's newest venture, THE TALKIES. The concept of THE TALKIES is to allow a director the opportunity to present a pinnacle piece in it's intended form - 35 millimeter film - and let the director stroll down memory lane with insight and retrospect.
|
|
|
In November, Masset had the "Godfather of Gore" Herschell Gordon Lewis come to the San Marco Theatre and provide live director's commentary throughout the presentation of his classic film Two Thousand Maniacs. Lewis loved it and he passed the word along to auteur John Waters.
"I love the idea of this whole thing, no other town in the country does anything like this." When Masset contacted John Waters' office they negotiated a deal to be included on his speaking tour and the Jacksonville Film Festival took on some of the expense to have THE TALKIES be a part of this year's festival.
"It's like being a movie psychiatrist. So you get Odorama cards and me on the psychiatrist's couch in a beautiful theatre."
Waters will be presenting his film Polyester in Odorama. Polyester was released in 1981 and featured his friend and cross-dressing starlet Divine. Polyester was considered Waters' crossover film from the shocking and trashy Pink Flamingos and Girl Trouble to the more mainstream era of his filmmaking. In Polyester, as he later became known for, Waters paired the bizarre Divine up with Tab Hunter who had only been known as a sort of teenage heartthrob prior to appearing in the 1981 film.
Odorama is a concept that John Waters brought to life, but that Jacksonville Film Festival programmer Tim Masset revived by tracking down the scratch and sniff cards that accompanied the original release of Polyester so that the Jacksonville audience can experience it in all of its original glory.
"[Odorama] came about because in the 50s there was a film made in Smell-o-Vision called Scent of Mystery. They pumped smells into the theatre. After 6 days of showing the film, nothing could get rid of the smell. And unfortunately they were all pleasant smells. Then there was Aromarama. Larry Flint did a scratch and sniff centerfold where the beaver smelled like lilac."
Although Waters couldn't get the rights to use Smell-o-Vision, he decided to combine the concept of smelling along with a film and a scratch and sniff centerfold to create Odorama.
"It was stolen by a big Hollywood studio when they made a kids movie called Rugrats. The studio forgot to renew the patent. They called it homage, but I said a check would have been homage. They have homage in New York, not in LA. In LA homage is a check."
From his adventurous, albeit somehow oddly perverse, early films to his more mainstream period, when he made films such as Cry-Baby, Serial Mom, and Hairspray, John Waters has always presented comically exaggerated characters struggling to adapt to the "normal" culture around them. In his most recent film, A Dirty Shame, Waters made a stride toward returning to his edgier subject matters, attacking the concept of normalcy that dominates the lives of middle-America. The large retailers, Wal-Mart, Target, Blockbuster, and many others have refused to carry the NC-17 film.
"Because they're assholes. Target, Wal-Mart, none of them will. Take your old porno and sneak it onto the shelf in those stores. They are assholes and we have to fight back. Buy some family films, splice a porn scene into them and then put them back on their shelves to sell to someone."
Although Waters' is openly gay and his films may convey an interesting take on sexuality and perversion, he is not a homewrecker. He is not against families. In fact he currently plays "the grim reeper" in a campy, Vincent Price sort of way on the Court TV show Til Death Do Us Part, which he bills as a pro-divorce show.
"I'm just an actor on that show, but I had a great time doing it. I went to [Court TV] in the beginning, when we were making Serial Mom, about doing a show, but they were just a young cable network back then. They weren't ready for John Waters."
They since got ready and the show tells the true stories of couples whose marriage ends when one murders the other. How can that message be good?
"Stay single and you wont get killed. Anyone that's been in love can relate to wanting to kill the person, but no one on the show gets away with it."
Okay, so it might not be exactly a pro-family show, but his next project just might be the one that changes your mind about letting John Waters into your family home.
"My next film is a terribly wonderful children's Christmas movie called Fruit Cake."
Waters doesn't try to claim a place in American cinema, but he is undoubtedly considered by anyone that follows film to be an innovator and a relevant voice.
"I made trash one half percent more respectable. I think its made nothing off limits for humor. People have been kind; I've had a good career; I don't feel misunderstood. All of my movies have the same message and the same tolerance. In a weird way they have the same joy in things that are usually associated with losers and not heroes."
His permanent residence in our culture was made certain when he played John, the owner of Cockamamie's, a kitsch store in Springfield on The Simpsons.
"A lot of people thought I wrote it, but I just played the part. I teamed up with the director Mikel Anderson during that and we came up with an animated show that we almost sold to MTV. There are still children that come up to me and ask for my autograph and only know me from The Simpsons. Some people only know me from my appearance in Jackass 2."
EU: What has happened to television culture, how has the average American perspective changed?
JW: I think a lot of people just turn the TV on for company. There are so many channels now that you don't have to be a slave to one network. Now it's a secret mistress. If you feel too stupid about watching, you can Tivo it and watch it in secret. If each person can find 5 TV shows they like, then that's great. Television has lost censorship in many ways.
With movies, it's so disappointing. Grindhouse was a brilliant movie that didn't do well. I'm always surprised how adventuresome and un-adventuresome people will be."
EU: What is the difference between tasteless humor and a good dirty joke?
JW: I hate jokes. I like wit. There has never been a funny joke, but there is really great wit. I just hate jokes. When people are having good conversation, everyone has to stop and listen to this person tell his joke. I want to punch the person before the punch line. Jokes aren't funny; wisecracks are funny. A good story is funny. Jokes are a middle class attempt at wit that fails.
EU: Tell me a little about the A Date with John Waters Soundtrack.
JW: It is the music I would play if you came over and I seduced you. That isn't really true, I would put on rap music, but the idea is that I would tempt you, scare you, make you laugh and then get you to do something you don't want to do.
|
|
EU Critic’s Choice Awards
