Irony and Ecstasy: John Waters talks about Role Models, dinner seating, and his career of celebrating tastelessness

"It is impossible to live without irony in New York City. You can't have a real biker bar. You can't have a real redneck bar. It would just be people dressed like rednecks. Real rednecks are too stupid to come to New York!" -- John Waters


During the book signing (sponsored by Greenpoint's WORD to kickoff the Brooklyn Book Festival), a pretty young thing offered up his clavicle to be signed, ostensibly for a tattoo, dashing his modeling career.

With giddy hearts did we step into the back room at Coco66 in Greenpoint, and note the intimate setting: a kitchen table with 2 chairs and glasses on a small stage. He would be seated at one of those, the king of the lunatic fringe. Our hero, John Waters, the filthiest mind alive!

He takes his seat before the adoring assembly, ever the dandy in his slim dark suit and creepy 'stache. He more than once referred to himself as being taken for a child molester. Well, he loves going to see the Alvin and the Chipmunks movie at Christmas. By himself.

He tells us he was seated by a young Martha Stewart at a dinner and they didn't know each other. They could only eye each other quizzically as the photographers went wild to snap them together, the trash master and she-of-complicated-napkin-folding. Waters touched in his heartfelt way upon the subjects of his book, Role Models, from Zoro the irate lesbian stripper ("what the F@#$ are you people lookin' at?!"), the parade of deeply weird people who inspired him in his Baltimore youth, to Leslie Van Houten, about whom he is no less candid than eloquent. The talk is breezy, filled with classics of observation, the wit flows like Malbec and we each feel as though we spent some time hanging out in our living room with our best friend. Who is INSANE.