As you might expect from the director who brought us Odorama and Divine eating dog shit, these role models are a raffish lot: lesbian stripper moms, foul-mouthed barmaids, pornographers, perverts. Not to mention the occasional cult celebrity (including "Monster Mash" singer Bobby "Boris" Pickett and former child actress Patty McCormack, star of "The Bad Seed"). Loitering as always on the edges, Waters finds inspiration where others see squalor and makes provocative points about art and morality and the good life — without losing an ounce of his ironical cheer.

Salon spoke with Waters in Washington, D.C.

Continue Reading...

Continue Reading...

"Real Sex" isn't particularly sexy -- for one thing, these are "real" bodies we're talking about, of all ages, shapes and sizes. But "Real Sex" is an exceedingly cheerful show, not because I particularly want to watch a naked old codger in a cowboy hat sidling up to a chain-mail-clad dowager in the Ran-D-Ranch chow line, but because I find their lack of embarrassment wonderful. Groups of concerned parents tell us sex is everywhere in the media, which is true if you believe that buff midriffs in a music video necessarily equal sex. But "Real Sex" reminds us that the really interesting stuff still goes on behind closed doors. It's doing its part to keep sex dirty.

Continue Reading...

That is one of the premises of the brain- and sometimes groin-titillating new volume by filmmaker-artist John Waters and critic-curator Bruce Hainley. In "Art: A Sex Book" the kind of contemporary artworks that usually lead unseasoned viewers to simply scratch their heads and dismiss the whole arena of hoity-toity galleries are sprayed with an alluring conceptual scent of musk. The authors give a new and often sexy spin to images that don't initially scream with sensuality, and they offer more serious consideration to images with uncloaked porno roots -- for example, Claude Wampler's indelible photograph titled "Scrotum Yarmulke," a wacky image of a guy pulling his balls over the head of his lapdog.

Continue Reading...

She has, she tells Rolling Stone, "Many wet dreams, all the time, very sexual dreams."

She also dreams a lot about her "XXX" costar, Vin Diesel, but these, she insists, are perfectly dry.

"Never sexy dreams, but magical, dreamy dreams, symbolic dreams," she says. "One I saw his soul and I was in awe of him."

Soul-sighting aside, Argento says she prefers the wet kind of dreams.

"They are the best," she says. "Recently, I had one about a love I'd had, and actually the sex with him wasn't really great. But in the dream he was very good. So maybe I was trying to help him in some way."

Perhaps by talking about his lack of prowess to the press?

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Paltrow on men

"While the English man beats nervously around the bush, the American suitor goes for the female jugular."

-- Gwyneth Paltrow comparing the dating habits of men on different sides of the Atlantic, in the British magazine Now.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Granny gets gabby

Continue Reading...

According to Jolie's father, Jon Voight, Jolie and Thornton are now the proud parents of a bouncing baby boy, whom they've adopted from Cambodia.

"Angelina just got a baby yesterday," Voight told reporters at the annual luncheon for Oscar nominees on Monday. "Angelina adopted a Cambodian baby. I'm a grandfather today."

Voight says Jolie is currently doing the single mom thing in Africa, where she took custody of the tyke and is currently filming a movie. Thornton, who has children from three previous marriages, is still stateside.

But while the chatty gramps says he has yet to be told the child's name, he's all in for lending a hand where it's needed.

"I'd be happy to go to Africa and baby-sit, change diapers," he says.

Someone's clearly feelin' like hot shit.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

Promises, promises ...

"Never, ever, ever, never wear them again. I'll break them on the last show."

Continue Reading...

On a rerun of Ally McBeal (9 p.m., Fox), John is attracted to a client accused of sexual harassment (guest Marcia Cross), and Ally takes the bull by the horns in her sex life. Everybody Loves Raymond (9 p.m., CBS) repeats the one where Ray is suspicious of Debra's motives when she gives him a DVD player for Christmas. Gideon's Crossing (10 p.m., ABC) wraps up the crossover story line begun on last week's episode of "The Practice." Pregnant Ellenor collapses and is rushed to the hospital. The new cable series The Chris Isaak Show (10 p.m., Showtime) is a "Larry Sanders"-type comedy in which Isaak plays a singer/surfer named Chris Isaak. His real-life band costars, along with guests like Stevie Nicks, Minnie Driver, Shawn Colvin, Lisa Loeb and Jay Leno, who all play themselves. In the first episode, Chris consults his mother, a psychologist, when he's attracted to the rare woman who won't give him the time of day.

Specials

Continue Reading...

That's the sum a golf caddie named James Parker is looking to collect from Douglas as compensation for the loss of his left nut. Parker blames Douglas for hitting the golf shot that bogeyed him right in the ball at the Elmwood Country Club in White Plains, N.Y., two years back.

But Douglas says it was his golfing buddy Mark Drach, not he, who nailed the caddie's unprotected gonad, rupturing it and leading to its eventual removal. And as the nutty case nears its trial date, Maximum Golf has seen fit to publish the details of Douglas' deposition in its upcoming issue.

Asked what sort of ball Drach hit, Douglas replied he hit "a liner."

"There are liners and there are liners, sir. I am not trying to be facetious," said the lawyer. "There are some people that hit a liner so low to the grass they are almost called grass-cutters. Some hit them 5 or 6 feet off the ground. What is your best recollection as to the type of hit it was?"

"He hit what we call somewhat of a duck hook," Douglas recalled. "He hit it low and hard."

Continue Reading...

In case you missed it last week, head case Ikaika finally quits O-Town on a rerun of Making the Band (9 p.m. Fri., ABC); a new episode follows (9:30 p.m.), in which Lou and the gang scurry to find a replacement. We hear George Michael is available. The new series This Week in History (9 p.m. Fri., History Channel) chronicles the major events that took place on, well, this week in history. It's just like the little feature you read over breakfast in your daily newspaper, except it's an hour long and opposite "Making the Band," so forget it. American Movie Classics unveils its version of "Behind the Music" with the new series Backstory (5:30 p.m. ET/8:30 PT, Sat., American Movie Classics), a behind-the-scenes look at the making of a film classic. First up: Arthur Penn's 1967 groundbreaker "Bonnie and Clyde." The movie immediately follows. Dylan McDermott hosts a repeat of Saturday Night Live (11:30 p.m. Sat., NBC) with music from the Foo Fighters. The new reality series G-String Divas (11 p.m. Sat., HBO) follows the adventures of four real-life Pennsylvania strippers. Jordan, call your agent! The Simpsons (8 p.m. Sun., Fox) reruns the one where Bart has a mystical glimpse into the future at a Native American casino. Three words: President Lisa Simpson. Bob Dylan is the subject of a two-hour edition of Biography (8 p.m. Sun., A&E), in which the Bard of Hibbing is scrutinized by scholars and critics. Only slightly less fascinating: "Dallas" is under the microscope on E! True Hollywood Story (9 p.m. Sun., E!). Carrie has a lot of balls in the air (pun intended) as she juggles relationships with Mr. Big and Aidan on Sex and the City (9 p.m. Sun., HBO).

Continue Reading...

Take a good look at Dorff's track record and you'll find that, at 27, he not only has worked with some of the best actors around -- Jack Nicholson, Harvey Keitel, Susan Sarandon -- but has consistently taken interesting and risky roles, most notably with his performance as transvestite Candy Darling in "I Shot Andy Warhol." When he tells me he does these films not for the money but because they challenge him, it doesn't sound like the usual actor's rhetoric.

There is something charming in the earnest way he tilts his head as he speaks, in the flush of his cheek, in the way he sits eagerly at the very edge of the linen-covered couch as he talks excitedly about his new role. Under the hard-shelled veneer of 10 years in the Hollywood gristmill, I glimpse something that looks surprisingly like innocence.

Continue Reading...

In "Cecil B. DeMented," a gang of underground-film kids led by Mr. DeMented (Stephen Dorff) captures stuck-up movie star Honey Whitlock (Melanie Griffith) and forces her to star in the kids' no-budget movie. Dorff, who has "Otto Preminger" tattooed in Gothic script on his forearm, is a rebel nut case who's ready to sacrifice his life to bring down mainstream cinema, which Honey represents in a big way. "One day you'll thank me for saving you from your bad career," he tells her, a howlingly obvious echo of the way the Symbionese Liberation Army tried to save Hearst from being a tool of the establishment by making her a tool of its own.

Continue Reading...

He is nearly as famous for his persona as for the films he's directed. With his pencil-thin mustache and his clean-cut look of suit and skinny tie, like some demented '50s high school guidance counselor, he's appeared frequently on TV talk shows, in movies and as a guest voice on "The Simpsons." But mostly, of course, there are the movies. Waters' place in movie history is such that you only need to hear his name to see the picture reeling in your head. You might imagine bodily fluids (both animal and human), rats, roaches and "actors" with bad skin and missing teeth. You might look back fondly on a 350-pound transvestite sensation named Divine. You might also think of deliciously ludicrous dialogue:

Continue Reading...

Biography (8 p.m., A&E) has a new profile of Tammy Faye Bakker. Don't know who she is, kids? Well, before "Big Brother," there was "The PTL Club," the original dysfunctional chuckleheads on parade reality series, with the added fun of yahoo evangelism. Tammy Faye was Brittany. Ray and Debra present "Rashomon"-like conflicting versions of their "can opener fight" on a rerun of Everybody Loves Raymond (9 p.m., CBS). Danny Glover hosts the new series Courage (9 p.m., Fox Family), which profiles real people who've overcome adversity or performed acts of heroism. The West Wing (10 p.m., NBC) pops up with a bonus episode this week, a rerun of the pilot. It features an unforgettable last-act entrance from Martin Sheen's President Bartlet, who tells off some strident pro-lifers in no uncertain terms.

Specials

Continue Reading...

Waters told a group of reporters this week that he picked the squeaky-voiced actress to star in his new Hollywood satire "Cecil B. Demented" because he "just knew" she "had a sense of humor about what it is to be a woman in her early 40s and a movie star that grew up in Hollywood. And believe me, many of them do not have a sense of humor about that."

"Plus," he said, "she knows she has to reinvent herself."

But although the actress was willing to do just about anything he proposed, Waters says there was one thing she wouldn't do: reinvent herself as Phyllis Diller.

"The only thing I ever had to negotiate with her a little strenuously was what her hair looked like after it caught on fire," he recalled, chuckling. "I wanted it bald, with clumps. Phyllis Diller on a bad day. She wasn't ready to go that far."

Fang will be so disappointed.

- - - - - - - - - - - -

The wimple was ruining her serve

Continue Reading...

Just not hard enough. Babbit's motives seem pure: She has said that she wanted to make a movie from the femme point of view, since so many pictures about lesbians ("Boys Don't Cry" is the most recent example) feature characters who are more or less butch. And to her credit, Babbit doesn't spend a lot of time exploring, or even debunking, butch/femme stereotypes: Her heroine simply likes pink, girly things and feminine clothes, the way any of us make choices about the things we want to wear or have around us.

Continue Reading...

"The thing that hurt me the most was
that they tried to pin something on me
that I was not. My mother raised me to
never, ever be ashamed of what I
am," Houston tells Out magazine. "But
I'm not a lesbian, darling. I'm not."

And in case you missed that, allow her
to make herself perfectly clear. She is
"not lesbian, not gay, not all that B.S.
I don't want to hear that. It's
over."

What, you need to hear her say it again?

- - - - - - - - - - - -

What
would Lucy and Desi say?

"What I often do is think of what the
Little Ricky inside me thinks of what
the grown-up Ricky has become. I will
ask him: 'Are you happy with how things
have turned out? Are you proud?' And you
know what? Sometimes, Little Ricky isn't
proud."

Continue Reading...

My suspicions are confirmed: You guys are a bunch of sick twists. And so, without further ado, I bring you the 1999 Nothing Personal Readers' Choice Awards.

1) The celebrity you deem most likely to have named a body part:

The winner is ... Celeb: Mike Myers. Part: Schlong. Moniker: "Mini Me."

Honorable mentions: Sylvester "Rocky" Stallone's cojones: "Pebbles," Marilyn Manson's breasts: "Publicity" and "Stunt," Ricky Martin's booty: "Dinero," Monica Lewinsky's privates: "Humidor," Mick Jagger's lips: "IMAX."

2) The celebrity you'd most like to have make your dreams come true:

The winner (at least the weirdest) is ... The Rev. Jerry Falwell: "My recurring dream is that Jerry Falwell has undergone male to female transexual surgery. The new Falwell changes his, I mean her, name to the Divine Reverend Ms. J and holds a press conference to tell the world that during a previous life she was the Ms. J. who wrote the Bible."

Continue Reading...

An upcoming issue of Movieline magazine rounds up the 50 most persistent (and toothsome) Tinseltown rumors of all time, and -- sniff, sniff! -- debunks some of my personal favorites.

For instance, even though your cousin's best friend's boyfriend's aunt swears she was on duty at an L.A. hospital the night Richard Gere was brought in to have a gerbil plucked from his body's own internal Habitrail, it just ain't true. According to Movieline, Gere was in India on the night of the alleged rodent removal.

Reports that Barbra Streisand was in a porn flick back in the '70s? "Totally fallacious," Streisand's handlers insist. And Bruce Willis does not insist on having the special-effects department in his films digitally sketch in a full head of hair. (One look at him in "The Sixth Sense" could have told you that.)

But, hey, here's one that is true, though I must admit I had never heard it before. Sharon Stone has confirmed that she was so unpopular on the sets of two of her early films, "King Solomon's Mines" and "Allan Quatermain and the Lost City of Gold," that members of the crew peed in a barrel of water she had to swim around in. (Talk about a lost city of gold.)

Continue Reading...

OK, "Happiness" might be a masterpiece. I'd have to do more than see it again to really know -- I'd have to see it again five or 10 years from now, when the distractions and diversions of its present context have fallen away. "Happiness" is a good enough film, though, to deserve its audience's best efforts to banish distraction and view it clearly. A heralded entry in this month's New York Film Festival, "Happiness" was controversial before release for its scrupulous depiction of the daily life of a child molester -- though that, it should be said, is only one of several threads in this two-hour-plus, multiple-story-line black comedy. Dropped by its intended distributor (who scored a considerable success with Solondz's previous film, "Welcome to the Dollhouse"), the film has been released without a rating by a unique consortium brought together expressly for this purpose.

Continue Reading...

Continue Reading...