With a cult following built on filthy and debaucherous cinema, John Waters developed a reputation over the last seven decades that continues to repulse and delight audiences worldwide. September 29, 30, and October 1, he will bring that irresistible puke-green aura to The Mahoning Drive-In in Lehighton, PA, where Philly’s Exhumed Films will be screening seven of his best-loved titles with Waters onsite as the ringleader.
“I think I was in Philadelphia once with Pink Flamingos,” says Waters, referring to his last Exhumed Films event. Waters was a special guest for the annual Exhumed Films 24-Hour Horror-Thon back in 2017. The Pennsylvania-based Exhumed Films, known for their exclusive screenings of genre and exploitation films, has been working to have him back ever since.
“I’ve never been to [The Mahoning Drive-In], so this is a new experience, which I’m really looking forward to because I’ve heard great things about this place. I know that it’s the biggest, greatest cult drive-in in the country, so I’m excited.”
As one of the most widely celebrated genre film directors in the world, Waters has made a delightfully well-deserved moniker for himself as the Pope of Trash to lowbrow wannabe Dreamlanders and high-ranking award nomination committees alike, printing his name on ballots for The Independent Spirit Awards and The Grammys, but this special event will be a first for everyone involved, including Waters.
“My films never played well in drive-ins. My early films like Pink Flamingos, Female Trouble, and all of them that were made to be exploitation films or for art theaters, they were directed to be that. But they did the best business in very rich neighborhoods and art cinemas. They did the worst in exploitation theaters and drive-ins because the audience then didn’t see those movies as ironic, and they smelled a rat, and that rat was me.”
For the director, a Filthy Film Fest in the open air of a Mid-Atlantic drive-in is the clasp of his love for film coming full circle. Make a list of all the things that remind you of John Waters, and you can daydream your way to an anachronistic hodge podge of performance art ร la the Warhol ’60s, and a niche peek into an atomic age of glowing neon signs, Little Richard on the radio, and maybe a Pepto pink Cadillac with a pair of fuzzy dice on the mirror at the drive-in, beneath the ethereal glow of a jumbo screen and some twinkling stars.
“Now, this drive-in, it’s a hip drive-in with people that celebrate genre filmmaking. But when I was young, people went to drive-ins and saw exploitation films, they thought they were really scary. They didn’t think they were funny. They were jerking off at them. They thought they were sexy, not funny.”
Recalling reasons his films made less of a smash at drive-in box offices, he cites one of his signature themes from his earliest productions. “My films made fun of gore. Nobody jerked off looking at my movies unless you were really in trouble, so the sex scenes were ludicrous, too.”
When asked about films that stood out most for him on his own teenage drive-in adventures, he gushes that he was also there for the gore and all the things that come with it. “Oh, certainly the Herschell Gordon Lewis movies, the gore movies, and then Mark of the Devil. They’re the ones that gave out the barf bag first. I think Blood Feast is the one I remember where the whole audience would go crazy honking the horn and screaming and everything.”
With loyalty to the reader, I needed to know what Waters’ earliest days as a drive-in attendee were like. Perhaps less charming but admittedly as appealing as a film festival in his current residence of Provincetown, Rhode Island, our forever Baltimorean had some tales to tell.
“Oh my God, I was arrested at one for underage drinking, and they took us all to jail, and they said the girls were seen urinating outside of the car, which was true. It was a far walk up to the concession stand, and we had a lot of beer,” he recalls. “Yes, I was arrested in the drive-in.”
“We went every night, and it’s all the same movie. It didn’t matter, we’d take beer. That was the only place we could go party. Everybody would sneak in in the trunk, which I did myself. In the winter, we had horrible heaters on poles that let smoke come out, and I’d forget to take it out of the window, and I’d have my parents’ car and just drive away and rip the whole window out, dragging the pole. I have many memories of drive-in movies.”
Times have changed since the debauchery and exploitation highlights of Waters’ teenage drive-in days. “Now it’s the opposite. Drive-ins are now family-friendly. They don’t show R-rated movies and have flea markets and custom car shows on weekends. When I was young, the drive-in showed exploitation movies, or when I was really young, they showed black movies. But I don’t mean black exploitation movies. I mean movies white people had never heard of, really, that were just shown for black people. That’s the only reason I ever knew about these movies. Drive-ins, when I was young, had a real niche there. It was either that they couldn’t get Hollywood movies, so they purposely played the different kinds and invented new genres. Today, Barbie is playing at the drive-in here, so it’s the opposite.”
Waters is on his way to The Mahoning to right the wrong that has persisted his entire career, bringing his biggest fans on the crusade. “It’s finally time for a John Waters-directed film to play in a drive-in, and this may be the only drive-in where they would work. Another time, I played in a drive-in, and it was a big trouble. It caused car accidents because you could see the screen from the road.”
And so, the remote location of this particular drive-in also appealed to him for the screening. “It’s near nowhere. Right? I mean, are there even townies to come? There isn’t even a town, is there? That’s, as they call it, a ‘destination booking’.” And he’s right; there is not much of anything within walking distance of the drive-in. On my last trip there, my partner considered walking two miles into the woods in search of a cigarette before making pals with a fellow smoker attending Troma-Thon in July.
“People would be driving by and see, what the hell is that? No, I have very, very little history of my films ever being shown in a drive-in, much less me. I mean, I’m coming to be interviewed on stage, that’s why I’m there. I’m taking my vaudeville show there, so that’s definitely a new one.” He pauses before recalling some fond memories. “I did once speak at the drive-in in Wellfleet, which is outside of Provincetown, but that was in the middle of the Provincetown Film Festival, so that was a film festival audience. Another time during COVID for the New York Film Festival, I had a drive-in at the Bronx Zoo they set up, and we showed Solo and Climax by Gaspar Noรฉ. That was amazing because I told everybody when I was young at the drive-in that you honked your horn when there were tits on the screen or gore. I said, ‘whenever you see art, honk your horn.’ Whenever there was an out-of-focus shot or something, everybody would start honking. It was really good.”
It’s worth noting that people camp at The Mahoning as part of the experience that begins with the inevitable road trip and takes shape at your self-selected parking spot as you settle in for a night, or a whole weekend. Nestled in the edge of Pennsylvania’s Pocono Mountain range, there is a nostalgic element in the air at least a mile before you reach the iconic marquee at one corner of the venue lot.
Before Filthy Film Fest, another major and recurring destination event for only the biggest John Waters fans has been Camp John Waters. When asked if the director himself enjoys camping, he is quick to dispel any rumors that may have begun from his quite campy annual venture stakeout in the woods.
“Do I camp? Do you mean sit around and talk about Judy Garland movies? You mean the other kind of camp. All right. No, I don’t, but I go to my John Waters Camp. But I stay in a hotel. I went to summer camp when I was young, but do I camp now? No. But I go to the John Waters camp and participate in the camp where, once again, I am celebrated as a director, and so I’m looking forward to that again this year. Yeah. This will be the seventh year, I think.”
You read that right – two major camping events honoring a man who refuses to camp. The Mahoning Drive-In does offer lodging suggestions on its website for patrons who share similar sentiments about sleeping in the great outdoors.
Former camp junior counselor turned director John Waters is a twice-nominated contender for Best Spoken Word album at the Grammys in both 2015 and 2020 for self-narrated audiobooks of his non-fiction works Carsick and Mr. Know-It-All respectively. Anyone familiar with his book tours and live performances, most notably his Christmas events along the Atlantic coast, will be familiar with his blend of fearlessly funny social commentary and very candid anecdotal retellings of his life and one-of-a-kind career.
In 2018, Waters was named an Officier of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, a cultural award from the French government recognizing significant contributions to the arts, literature, and continuation of those fields. To be even considered a nominee for the title, one must be thirty years or older, in compliance with French Civil law, and must have “Significantly contributed to the enrichment of the French cultural inheritance.” TL;DR The French love our finest Esthรจte du Grotesque, one of the many monikers attributed to him in French editorials.
His first novel, Liarmouth: A Feel Bad Romance, debuted in 2022 , but as for its potential future transition from one form of art to another? “I’m honoring the writer’s strike by not being able to turn in the script I’m working on right now that’s optioned. And I’m honoring the actor’s strike because there are two big movies I was supposed to be in that I couldn’t have told you anyway, but are on hold. I am honoring both strikes. Definitely.”
Imagining all the art tentatively lost to the strike pales in comparison to the loss of livelihoods of performers and creators during the strike, but it is painful to think even a single John Waters appearance in a film could be blipped out of future existence.
“I’m in the Director’s Guild, that is not striking, and I’m in Equity, which is not striking,” he adds. “And I’m not in the UPS, and I can deal with FedEx now. They just settled their feud. That was an important strike to me, too. I would hate it if there was no FedEx.”
The seven films showing at The Mahoning this Fall will span from all eras of his career, including his last feature film, one that starred Johnny Knoxville and Tracy Ulman, titled A Dirty Shame – a shocking reminder of this interviewer’s age, came out twenty years ago next fall. When asked if we could refer to the earliest films as “John Water’s Classics,” he reflected on what that might mean.
“You can call them anything you like. To me, I think all my films are the same. Some of them are made with a tiny budget. Some of them are made with a bigger budget. Some are made with unions. In the beginning, I was scared of unions. But when I worked with them, finally they were very understanding of our budgets and everything. We even had teamsters that only did John Waters movies in Baltimore. I’m all for the unions. I have great healthcare through them, and I get a pension, so there’s no reason for young people to be scared of unions, really. They will work with you no matter if your budget is $10.”
Friday, September 29, and Saturday, September 30 will feature live in-person appearances from Waters discussing his films and experiences. “That’s where my old vaudeville experience comes in 6 4 2 8 10, pose for pictures. Do everything. I’m a Carney at heart. I’m writing my new spoken words right now. That I can say because it’s nothing to do with the movie business.”
Night one of the event will consist of Female Trouble, A Dirty Shame, and one highly anticipated mystery film, but Waters is quick to mention he will not reveal details, leaving only a hint that he has not watched this particular film in some time. The films on the bill for night two include Pecker, Pink Flamingos, and Desperate Living.
“Of my films, I always like to see maybe Desperate Living or the ones that were made early that maybe weren’t as popular when they came out and didn’t do as well. You always root for the kids that cause the most trouble that were never understood when they were young.” He begins before rephrasing a question about Desperate Living, “Is it politically incorrect?” Referring to the film’s subplot of a romance with a transgender man.
“At one point, there was some trans resistance to it, but now I hear when it plays, the young trans go and cheer the crazy part, so I was really touched when I heard that. I think it’s very pro-trans when Mole says, ‘I want a wang and I want it now.’ Okay, maybe that’s not being very polite about it, but what’s the matter with that? That’s being a trans militant, isn’t it?”
The festival’s final night will consist of a screening of the original Hairspray, Waters’ final film with his muse and childhood friend Harris Glen Milstead, known around the world as drag sensation Divine. Hairspray is the most universally well-known of Waters’ works, particularly after the cinematic remake by director Adam Shankman in 2007 reimagined the film as a family-friendly musical that went on to take over Broadway, another endless vault of nostalgia that was temporarily dimmed by COVID.
“COVID made drive-ins valuable again,” he says, reminding me of one of the few bright sides of the pandemic. “COVID made drive-ins come back really, so I’m thrilled. I mean, drive-ins were such a part of my life. I saw Herschell Gordon Lewis appear at Benji’s Drive-in Baltimore at the Maryland Film Festival, and I shot a long scene in one of my movies in a drive-in. Drive-ins have always been important to me. They’ve always been a part of my life. Even when I didn’t go to them, I missed them.”
I was surprised Cecil B. Demented did not make the lineup, but as a diehard wannabe Dreamlander myself, I did offer my commitment to be “demented Forever,” an iconic refrain of the film. If you’ve watched, you know the drive-in scene I volunteered to replicate involves self-immolation for cinema.
“No, I’m not going to light anybody’s hair on fire,” he says, potentially noting the disappointed sigh from me on the other side of the line. “I think that the insurance company might take a dim view on that. Right?”
I have had the gleeful fandom experience of having John Waters, my favorite director, sign my arm only to have it tattooed over, also not unlike the merry cast of criminals in Cecil B. Demented who cattle-brand their favorite purveyors of extreme cinema on their limbs. I have driven a few hundred miles to hear him speak more than once and experienced the most joyful reclaiming of normalcy witnessing him perform again at City Winery in Philadelphia.
The first time I met him, I was an eighteen-year-old art student who had just sprinted from the subway through the city in cheap six-inch leopard heels to The Philadelphia Free Library for one of his spoken word events. Being able to recount that experience to him during this interview, he gave me more meaningful feedback than any parent or employer could provide: “That’s great that you’ve learned how to even run in heels. That’s what you need to know how to do in case you commit a crime. You have to learn how to run in heels because they never think criminals can do that.”
Tickets are available for purchase through The Mahoning Drive-In Theater with tier options featuring passes to meet Waters.
