From Miuccia Prada to Rei Kawakubo, we look at the perverted legacy the so-called Pope of Trash has left on the runway
Every day, for the past 50 years, John Waters has drawn a pencil-like wisp of a moustache along the contours of his top lip, which, throughout the course of the day, tends to sweat itself into an increasingly sparse smear of kohl. What started out as an homage to the musician Little Richard has become an absurdist crux for Waters, who cannot go a few hours without reapplying his “magic little wand of sleaze” – a Maybelline brow pencil in Velvet Black. He’s tried other, more expensive products, of course, but they’re just “too thick, too penetrating, too indelible”.
As prim as it is perverted, Waters’ trademark slither is but a gateway into the cult director’s vulgar universe – one full of incest, dog shit, and anal prolapses (which could actually be the tagline for his 1972 film Pink Flamingos). “I know my mustache is creepy to some people,” he told the Baltimore Star in 2011, “but it’s creepy in a positive way”. The same can be said for almost all of Waters’ artistic endeavours – from 1974’s Female Trouble, to 1981’s Polyester, to 1990’s Cry-baby – all of which tow the line between filth and frivolity, crowning Waters as the so-called ‘Pope of Trash’ or ‘Prince of Puke’.
Pre-trigger warnings, Waters’ depraved filmmaking looked to both camp and crud as a way to poke at the edges of bad taste, bad behaviour, and shockingly bad hair. Be it Bab Johnson’s grotesque fishtail gown in Pink Flamingos or Dawn Davenport’s transparent wedding dress in Female Trouble, Waters created looks so diabolical that the fashion world has had no choice but to rubberneck. As the provocateur turns 75 today, we look at Waters’ unlikely relationship with designers and the lurid legacy that he has left on the runway.
COMME DES GARÇONS AW92
In his 2010 book Role Models, John Waters dedicates an entire section to Rei Kawakubo, whom he deems the “genius fashion dictator”. For the last 20 years or so, the director’s own look has been “disaster at the dry cleaners” – meaning he likes his clothing to come a little off-kilter. Torn, crooked, ill-fitting, thread-bare. The kind of post-atomic irregularities which have come to define Kawakubo’s approach to fashion. “I was amazed at the gall and the wit of the Japanese clothing designs. Many pieces looked fresh out of the sale bin at the Purple Heart thrift shop in Baltimore,” Waters says of his first encounter with Comme at the brand’s store in New York back in the 70s. Safe to say he has been obsessed ever since. Later, Kawakubo recruited Waters to open her AW92 show in Paris, leaving the gobby director uncharacteristically tongue-tied. “Whatever courage I had managed to work up vanished instantly, but she gave me a severe pat of confidence and shoved me through the curtain onto the runway”.
MIU MIU SS15
In 2015, Miuccia Prada sent out models in beehive bouffants, plaid skirts, and ruffled blouses. And her collection had one clear point of reference, as was echoed over the soundtrack: John Waters’ Female Trouble. While the mustachioed deviant may not make an obvious source of inspiration for the youthful Italian label, both auteurs are known for their subversive takes on femininity, pushing the limits of taste, and repackaging the ugly as something wholly covetable. Just like the film’s protagonist – Dawn Davenport – who proclaimed herself "a thief and a shitkicker," for SS15, Mrs. Prada presented a twisted riff on womanhood with 18th century style floral silk and cloqué, countered with fraying wool checks and murky shades of leather.
JEREMY SCOTT SS16
Of course Jeremy Scott has looked to John Waters for inspiration. Both are unabashed in their brandishing of camp-as-subversion and love a countercultural drag look. For SS16, it was the beauty department that came indebted to Waters’ Dreamlanders – the cast members who show up throughout his oeuvre – with exaggerated black wings of eyeliner and sky-scraping bouffants. They were looks which could have easily been plucked straight from the faces of drag queen Divine, Debbie Harry, Traci Lords, and Cookie Mueller. With their trashy forays into low culture, Scott and Waters oppose the stuffy frigidity that so often underpins film and fashion. Remarkably, however, Waters was never invited to the Camp-themed Met Gala in 2019. "I wasn't invited even though I was in every article," he told Vulture, suggesting that Anna Wintour was unequipped to host a camp ball – “Do you think Anna Wintour is that funny? She’s an incredibly successful editor, but I’ve never heard her say anything that funny”.
SAINT LAURENT SS20
‘Pope of Trash’, ‘Prince of Puke’, ‘Duke of Dirt’. And Now? The face of Saint Laurent. For his SS20 campaign at Saint Laurent, Anthony Vaccarello placed John Waters in front of David Sims’ lens. As he follows in the footsteps of Keanu Reeves, Marilyn Manson, Lenny Kravitz, and Courtney Love, Waters grimaces deep into the camera, his slit of a tache somehow a fitting accessory to the slick black tuxedo, polka dot cravat, and retro sunglasses, which he wields in his hands like a haunted Marlon Brando. In an accompanying video, Waters declares that “transgression is when you break the rules and you make people laugh,” which is perhaps to make sense of his unexpected appearance fronting the storied Parisian label.
LOEWE’S PRIDE COLLECTION
For Loewe’s 2020 Pride collection, Jonathan Anderson looked to John Waters and in particular, Divine, to front the label’s capsule. With her eyebrows halfway up her forehead and wrenched-back hair line, the larger-than-life Divine is perhaps one of the most enduring images of Waters’ body of work, whether she’s getting humped by a giant lobster in Multiple Maniacs or eating faeces in Pink Flamingos. It’s alleged that alongside the epithet of “the most beautiful woman in the world, almost,” Waters also gave Divine her drag name. Originally, Loewe’s limited edition line was meant to coincide with an exhibition on the life of Divine, “the filthiest woman alive”, though corona scuppered those plans. Nonetheless, the collection brought screen prints on polyester of B-movie posters together with stacks of outrageous marabou feathers, patent platform heels, and felt bags – a typically Divine, and Waters, mix of high and low.