17/03/2022
💩Happy 50th Birthday, Pink Flamingos! 🤎🎂
On this date in 1972, "Pink Flamingos" world premiered in Baltimore, Maryland, at the third Annual Baltimore Film Festival, held on the campus of the University of Baltimore, where it sold out tickets for three successive screenings. It is part of what director John Waters has labelled the "Trash Trilogy", which also includes "Female Trouble" (1974) and "Desperate Living" (1977). The film stars the countercultural drag queen Divine as a criminal living under the name of Babs Johnson, who is proud to be "the filthiest person alive". While living in a trailer with Edie (Edith Massey) and Crackers (Danny Mills)—her mother and son respectively—and her companion Cotton (Mary Vivian Pearce), Divine is confronted by the Marbles (David Lochary and Mink Stole), a pair of criminals envious of her reputation who try to outdo her in filth. The characters engage in several grotesque, bizarre, and explicitly crude situations.
According to production designer Vincent Peranio, the art department's budget was about $200. Half went to purchasing a trailer, half to decorating it. "And then after that (running out of money)," said Peranio, "we would just steal things." Filming only took place on weekends; Waters raised money during the week. According to Waters, the film's budget was so tight, that he could not afford "A" and "B" reels. The work print was in effect the master copy.
Divine and the party guests are actually inhaling amyl nitrate during the party scene. At the time of filming, it was still legal to buy such "poppers" at the drug store. If you watch Divine's face during the scene, she suddenly starts laughing uproariously. Waters says that's where "it kicked in."
During filming, Divine was arrested for stealing, and in her defense said that she was a method actor playing a criminal.
In the 2005 film "Midnight Movies,", Waters says, "I was high when I wrote this film. I was NOT high when I made it." (Wikipedia/IMDb)
