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47 “A Lot of People Were Upset That We Put the Baby in the Refrigerator . . .”: An Interview with John Waters Louis Postel / 1977 From Provincetown Magazine, 1977, 13–18. Reprinted by permission of Louis Postel. In Provincetown, as in most small towns, everyone’s a star: a star for something. Hair, teeth, former lovers, athletic ability. We’re mythic, larger than life, like gods, which is terrifying and wonderful. John Waters is bigger than life and is now playing simultaneously in New York, Tokyo, Paris, and Mortville, Maryland. Once upon a time John worked at the Provincetown Bookshop across the street from the Crown and Anchor. A polyvinyl plaque is planned for that spot sometime in 1990. When I asked Waters how he got money to do his films in the beginning , he said he borrowed it from his parents. His father is in the fire department and doesn’t think much of his son’s films, doesn’t even go. There are a lot of people who don’t think much of his films: Mondo Trasho, Multiple Maniacs, Pink Flamingos, Female Trouble, and now Desperate Living, which world-premiered here in Provincetown this summer. All but Desperate Living starred a mammoth transvestite named Divine (mythic!) whom Waters calls “the most beautiful woman in the world.” Divine isn’t in Desperate Living, and neither is another Waters Company player, David Lochary. There are those underground pundits who said Waters could never make it without this berserk duo, but he did and did well. For some reason, the only thing that didn’t work about Desperate Living was the world premiere party following the show, which was not only desperate but flat as onion dip left in the sun. 1977: the year eye contact went the way of the B-1. 48 john waters: inter views Waters has quit his job at the Bookshop but he will return to town soon to write his next gross-out spectacular. Meanwhile, if you feel the need to embellish your own mythic proportions with a little stardust, hang around: Waters regulars Cookie Mueller and Sharon Nieps are right behind you on Commercial Street. PM: Last year you had a lot of trouble with a theatre in suburban New York where your film was closed down. . . . Waters: Where I got busted. PM: Was that cleared up? Waters: Well, we had to pay a fine, a $5,000 fine, plus legal fees and that was to plead guilty. In order to plead innocent, it would have cost about $20,000. We figured it wouldn’t be worth it to pay $20,000 to be able to play in Hicksville, New York. Even if we had won, the district attorney watched Female Trouble and thought it was obscene, so it wasn’t worth it. But that’s the only trouble I’ve had; Female Trouble played everywhere else without any trouble—it’s even played in drive-ins in South Carolina, but I guess you have to go to a city to see it. They play it in some really small towns, but not in Mom and Pop theaters. There’s really nothing I can do about it. I wish it were playing on Main Street in every city. PM: I remember one time we were at an opening at the Elgin and someone asked you who was the most beautiful woman in the world and you said Divine. Then we went down to a real big gay bar on Bleecker Street, the Road House. There was a guy standing there dressed like a cop and I thought Divine was going to be a really big hit in there. Instead, she seemed to put everybody off. Waters: Well, in those kinds of gay bars, they don’t want drag queens. It goes against the image of the heavy cruise; everyone’s trying to outbutch each other and they don’t want drag queens around. PM: I guess I don’t think of Divine as a drag queen. Waters: I don’t either, but they might have, and this was right when it opened, so probably none of them had seen the movie yet. PM: Would you ever write for a mass audience, say, for television? Waters: I’d rather write for myself. It’s much more rewarding to write your own thing. That way, you make sure it’s the way you want it. I’m writing an article right now for Oui, but that’s different...

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