John Waters talks Pecker

>> The legendary gross-out director mellows but delivers

by MATTHEW HAYS

John Waters wraps his legs into a pretzel shape as we sit down to discuss his latest film at the Toronto International Film Festival. He's just like a little kid on some kind of sugar high: full of energy and dying to talk about his latest film, Pecker, and answer to charges that he's, well, just not gross enough anymore.

Entertainment Weekly posed the question in their fall movie preview issue: in the season following the runaway success of There's Something About Mary, has the Prince of Puke been out-grossed-out? "I never try to do just gross humour," insists Waters. "I really liked There's Something About Mary. But I don't think it was just out to gross people out, any more than my films are just about that.

Shock treatment

"I don't even think of my films as gross. It's just because I did that one scene, the grossest scene ever. Nobody can top Divine eating dog shit. No one can do it. Anyway, it's easy to disgust; it's much harder to shock with wit."

The dog-do-eating scene, of course, is from Waters' landmark independent gross-out film Pink Flamingos, which instantly put the writer-director and his star diva Divine on the road to celebrity. Since then, Waters has continued to shock, with films like Polyester, Serial Mom, Desperate Living and Female Trouble. He has, by his own admittance, mellowed, which isn't such a bad thing. He's made peace with his parents, saying he's come much closer to their politics of late (this is actually a big step for a man who once took delight in the fact that a member of his extended family was part of the disgraced Nixon administration).

Pecker is in keeping with Waters' mellowing evolution. Edward Furlong (of Terminator 2: Judgment Day fame) plays Pecker, a young Baltimore man who photographs everything he can (he's earned the nickname because he always pecks at his food, never seeming to eat a full meal). He's soon discovered by Lili Taylor, who plays an ultra-ambitious Manhattan art agent. And soon enough uninvited fame is ruining life for Pecker's girlfriend (Christina Ricci, who plays a laundromat manager), his mother (Mary Kay Place of Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman fame) and everyone else he cares about. Fame, Furlong learns, isn't everything (perhaps a fitting casting call for the actor who hasn't done much of note since his turn in the James Cameron blockbuster).

Celebrity nation

Waters chuckles when I refer to Pecker as a meditation on celebrity and fame. "Meditation sounds a bit highfalutin to me," he says, stroking his trademark razor-thin moustache. "All my movies are about fame on some level, if you think about it. It's what all of America wants. It really doesn't make your life any better, just different. My films are about how fame affects people. This is what Pecker doesn't want--fame. It used to be un-American to be communist. Now you're being un-American if you don't want to be famous."

Waters has his own reasons for resenting fame: "I can't have bad sex anymore. You can't go into the backroom with someone and they say, 'Oh, I have my Polyester Odorama card with me.' It puts a big damper on it."

Pecker has its share of ludicrously wacky scenes. There's a trip to the local Baltimore gay strip-club, a talking Virgin Mary (in the form of a ventriloquist doll) and Pecker's younger sister, who's got a bad sugar habit. But there's also a warm, caring family at the heart of the film and a seemingly genuine feel-good closure at the end.

Furlong, 21, says the choice to do a Waters film was an easy one. "I just read the script and fell in love with it," says the actor. "Yeah, I did rent some of his films and think, 'What have I gotten myself into?' But John is very cool." Any comparisons to James Cameron, the king of big budgets and glitzy special effects, who brought Furlong to fame with Terminator 2? "They're actually quite similar, in a way," says Furlong. "They both have the script mapped out and know exactly what they want."

Waters has a long history of trouble with the censors. This time around, however, one would have thought there wouldn't be any problem. But Waters soon found the film under attack for its title. "I always thought I could get away with calling a film Pecker," he says, obviously delighted at the ruckus he raised. "The Motion Picture Association said I couldn't do that. But I told them, 'No child carves the word 'pecker' into a school desk. No one says, 'Suck my pecker.' It's a silly word. I made my arguments, they let it go. Hey, I got an R-rating with a giant shot of pubic hair. I try to go as far as I can go.

"I never try to second guess what audiences are going to think. Ultimately, I'm my only test audience. I'm trying to make myself laugh." Does Waters, like Pecker, find a relationship hard to sustain in the throes of his own fame? "It's not something I would actively seek as much as a budget," explains the gay icon. "I don't feel lonely. Being in love is another job. You have to devote a lot of time to it to make it work. Let's just say I'm better at making movies than falling in love.

"People often think they're attracted to people who are famous--until they experience it."

Pecker opens Friday, September 25