Work on Sequel to Hairspray Begins

New Line has retained John Waters to write a treatment for a sequel to the $200 million+ grossing movie musical Hairspray:

"Planning to return are director-choreographer Adam Shankman, producers Craig Zadan and Neil Meron and Tony-winning songwriters Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman, who will write new songs for the film. No cast has been engaged yet, and none of the stars of 'Hairspray' had sequel options. But the studio hopes to reunite the original cast in a film that will be ready for release by Warner Bros. in mid-July 2010...Aim is to pick up the Baltimore saga of the Turnblad family after the resolution of the first film, which was set in 1962."

Previously
Hairspray: a Review [tr]

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McCain Prays For Victory, Clark Shoots Him Down

Meeting with Evangelical idols Billy and Franklin Graham, John McCain returned from the Mount with no tablets—just the heartfelt praise of these old family friends.

Meanwhile, General Wesley Clark—a former presidential contender and a possible Obama running mate—told Face the Nation’s Bob Schieffer of McCain:

"Well, I don’t think riding in a fighter plane and getting shot down is a qualification to be president."

Maybe, but McCain’s captor seems to think it counts for something.

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News: Quentin Tarantino, Ugly Dog, Bulgaria, Michelangelo

First-ever "Rainbow Parade" set for Czech Republic: "he National Party (Národní strana) sees the event as a 'pressure on the majority, pressure that is disgusting and awkward, pressure leading to social acceptation of the children being adopted by homosexual couples.' Members of the party are prepared to protest against the march. Police are evaluating potential risks in order to determine what security measures will need to be applied."

Quentin Tarantino accepts Filmmaker on the Edge award from the Provincetown Film Festival. John Waters: "You helped reinvent John Travolta as a man and I reinvented him as a woman."

DAD: Amy Winehouse in first stages of Emphysema.

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa to officiate today at marriage of American Beauty producer Bruce Cohen to art consultant Gabriel Catone: "After the state Supreme Court struck down a ban on same-sex marriage last month, Villaraigosa promised to preside at as many ceremonies as possible. But when the ruling took effect last week and other political officials were presiding over same-sex weddings, Villaraigosa was in Israel on a city trip."

Nationalists in Bulgaria plan "Week of Intolerance" in response to upcoming gay parade.

Gay health therapist Michael Shernoff has died at the age of 57, of pancreatic cancer.

Book: Michelangelo hid secret messages in Sistine Chapel attacking the Pope.

Jane Fonda on her first screen test, with Warren Beatty: "At the time I suspected that Warren might be gay, because he was so cute and had so many unusual, intellectual friends. Well, how wrong can you be?"

Brooklyn appellate judges to hear arguments on New York Governor David Paterson's directive to recognize out-of-state same-sex marriages: "he case being heard today, Godfrey v. Spano, will consider whether recognition of same-sex marriages first requires approval from the Legislature. So far the Legislature hasn't passed any laws relating to gay marriage. Whatever decision the Brooklyn appeals court reaches in the Godfrey case is sure to be quickly appealed to the state's highest court, the Court of Appeals."

Gerard Butler is a fashionista.

Dog named world's ugliest.

Salon bookmark: Gore Vidal's Inconvenient Truths.

Australian city council apologizes to gays for incident that happened 20 years ago.

SF Chronicle columnist's brief encounter with David Beckham: "Beckham is, for lack of a better word, man-tastic. He leans on a stool, wearing a crisp white shirt and silver tie, having just taken off his cream suit jacket. His hair is cut short and simple, ceding attention to his long stubble, which covers his face except for two Band-Aid-size vertical stripes shaved clean on either side of his goatee."

They got him!

The NYT takes a closer look at pregnant trans man Thomas Beatie: "Partly a carnival sideshow and partly a glimpse at shifting sexual tectonics, his image and story powered past traditional definitions of gender and exposed a realm that seemed more than passing strange to some observers — and altogether natural to those who inhabit it. 'This is just a neat human-interest story about a particular couple using the reproductive capabilities they have,' said Mara Kiesling, director of the National Center for Transgender Equality in Washington. 'There’s really nothing remarkable' about the Beatie pregnancy, she said."

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Johnny Knoxville and Parker Posey to Eat John Waters' Fruitcake

Johnny Knoxville and Parker Posey have signed on for John Waters' Christmas movie Fruitcake, says The Hollywood Reporter:

"The plot is officially under wraps but is said to center on the title character, a boy named after his favorite dessert. He runs away from home during the holidays after he and his parents are caught shoplifting meat, then meets up with a runaway girl raised by two gay men and searching for her birth mother. This Is That Prods. and Killer Films are producing "Fruitcake," which once was set up at New Line. ThinkFilm is said to be in talks to come aboard."

Of course, it'll be hard to top the best John Waters Christmas clip ever.

Watch it, AFTER THE JUMP...

That's Divine, of course, in Female Trouble...

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John Waters: I Was a Juvenile Delinquent 'Hag'

John Waters, whose Cry Baby musical is set to open on Broadway, appeared on The Daily Show with Jon Stewart last night and talked about his love affair, both on film and in real-life, with juvenile delinquents:

"I couldn't win any fight. Anyone could beat me up. So in high school, as a juvenile delinquent hag basically, I learned that - people who could beat you up - if you could make them laugh, they wouldn't beat you up, and maybe they would sleep with you!"

Watch the clip, AFTER THE JUMP...

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John Waters is No Cry-Baby for the Past

New York magazine's Ariel Levy profiles filmmaker John Waters, who has a Broadway musical forthcoming next month based on his musical Cry-Baby, noting that his interests in art, sex, drugs, class, and transgression have remained intact even though the shock value of his content has slipped away.

Says Waters, when Levy asks him if there's anything he misses about the past:

"I don’t think my generation is better or had it better. The one thing you’ll never see again—and I’m not so sure it’s bad you missed it—was the sexual revolution. You can’t imagine what it was like to go home and have sex with someone different every day … People really did! In Provincetown there was a bar called Piggies, totally mixed, gay and straight, but it was outside of town and everyone had to walk home and every person would just have sex in the graveyard along the way. I mean, those days will never happen again. Going to places like Hellfire in New York City, you look back and it’s so amazing, and that certainly did lead to terrible things like AIDS—and AIDS ruined everything for the rest of our lives. It ruined people taking chances. That’s over. You missed that."

Still Waters [new york magazine]

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John Waters Has a Solution for Intolerable Black-Tie Events

John Waters explained his novel alternative to the boring black-tie benefit to Lisa Phillips, the director of the new Museum of Contemporary Art on The Bowery in New York:

"An un-gala. You have to prove your outfit cost less than $200. You have to have been photographed in it one time before and bring the picture. The cleaning crew gives the speeches. You draw a ticket to which table you sit at. There are no power tables. You don't tell them till they get there! And you let everyone in free and make 'em pay to get out. That definitely would work. You could have fun with the whole thing. And un-raise money."

Perhaps (and those who have seen Polyester will understand) there could also be a squadron of "stompers" positioned outside the exits as well to ensure that everyone leaving receives a parting gift they won't forget for days.

‘UN-USUAL’ WAY TO RAISE DOUGH [ny post]

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Hairspray: a Review

[[WARNING: SPOILERS]]

Last night I saw an advance screening of Hairspray and while I went into the movie with my John Travolta shield at full power expecting the film to be a tired rehash of material I had seen before, I was pleasantly surprised, awakened by its raw energy and enthusiasm. I left the film thinking to myself that if a classic camp movie were to be retold on stage and then translated back to movie format, the newest Hairspray comes very close to the best possible outcome of that scenario. It feels like the logical creative progression to a story we've seen many times before.

The plot of the film is familiar to many: overweight girl overcomes fat bias to win a place on early 60's TV dance show and successfully battles Baltimore's segregation issues at the same time.

Many of the original film's lines are intact, including "Penny Pingleton, you are permanently, perenially, punished" (I'm sure I didn't get that exactly right) and the entire schtick about Edna Turnblad ironing ("My diet pill is wearing off!").

In fact, when I heard Travolta utter that line from the depths of his fat suit I was sure I was going to hate his portrayal, as Divine cast such a long (and large) shadow in that role. Whereas Divine uttered it as a brash warning to Tracy, Travolta's line reading is quiet, almost muttered.

So let's get to Travolta, who is certainly not the main character of the film but the one offered the most pre-show hype because of his transformation. I was trying to forget all the things he has said in press interviews for the film and just let the performance ride on its own. Travolta's Edna Turnblad is not the stern, commanding camp presence that Divine offered up, but at first a sort of strangely meek recluse who speaks in muted tones in an affected Baltimore accent.

With Divine, the breasts and the fat jiggling from the arms and the gaudy make-up was really in your face and with Travolta it's as if a fat suit has swallowed the Scientologist and all that remains of the actor himself are those familiar beady eyes staring out from a sea of plump, white seamless dough.

Travolta grows on you however, and his character really comes into her own when Edna dances, putting all that fake flesh into motion. It's then that the audience erupts into laughter, and the moment didn't happen nearly often enough. Edna Turnblad's voice is also strangely inconsistent, veering from the affected Baltimore accent back to Travolta's voice, in and out of character, again and again. I never forgot that it was John Travolta inside that fat suit, but his portrayal did win me over as the movie went on.

Also, gone is the seedy Baltimore that John Waters gave us, replaced by a freshly-rinsed happy-go-lucky Hollywood musical version. Waters' dark, twisted camp sensibilities have vanished, though his presence is still felt (once quite literally). The city here is crisp and colorful while Waters' Baltimore has always been dusted in a shadowy layer of thrift store grunge.

It's obvious that director Adam Shankman began his career in Hollywood as a choreographer, for the movie moves along at a dancer's pace. My boyfriend noted that he thought that the performances were not very well directed but the movement and pace of the story more than made up for it at the end.

Hairspray's diverse cast is its best asset.

"Discovery" Nikki Blonsky (Tracy Turnblad), who came, literally, from behind a counter at a Cold Stone Creamery and was plucked for the role from open casting auditions, has made herself a name to be reckoned with, even though her performance does not stray much from the character that Ricki Lake originated way back when.

Christopher Walken (Wilbur Turnblad) gives a quiet, endearing performance as Tracy's father and gag joke/novelty shop owner. Michelle Pfeiffer and Brittany Snow (Velma and Amber von Tussle) provide cartoonish, villainous foils to the film's themes of tolerance and integration. And James Marsden and Zac Efron twinkle as the squeaky clean leading men.

Queen Latifah is a commanding presence as Motormouth Maybelle. The movie actually strays from its two-dimensional cartoonlike box for a moment and reaches another, more emotional place altogether when she takes to the streets in a protest for integration, singing the gospel-tinged track "I Know Where I've Been".

And I won't soon forget Allison Janney as the uptight Christian bigot mom shouting "devil child" as she tosses holy water at her daughter Penny Pingleton, whom she's imprisoned in her bedroom. Seaweed (Elijah Kelley) is a standout and gives perhaps the best vocal performance of the film as Penny's (Amanda Bynes) "checkerboard" love interest. Bynes is perfect as the blinking airhead Penny. And Jerry Stiller is a great bonus as plus-size dressmaker Mr. Pinky.

The only real disappointment in the cast, because she didn't live up to the hype that the script built for her, was Little Inez (Taylor Parks), whose turn as Corny Collins' new, young dancing discovery wasn't dazzling enough to fill the plot that had been constructed.

And we're also treated to a few cameos, which I'll leave as a surprise.

Overall, I'd recommend Hairspray. It's an optimistic piece of filmmaking and a worthy summer diversion. I think it's particularly difficult to come at a piece of well-loved material and try to give it a fresh perspective. And they've succeeded here.

Hairspray hits theaters on July 20th.

You may have missed...
Drag Not Really a Drag for Travolta in Hairspray [tr]
Trick or Treat: More John Travolta as Edna Turnblad [tr]
John Travolta's New Look [tr]

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John Waters and Kathleen Turner Host Serial Mom Drive-In

The Provincetown International Film Festival is underway on Cape Cod and last night John Waters and Kathleen Turner hosted a screening of Serial Mom at the Wellfleet Drive-in Cinemas.

Said Turner, who is receiving the festival's Lifetime Achievement Award: "I’ve never been to the drive-in before. And I haven’t seen ‘Serial Mom’ for some time, so I was looking forward to this." Of Ptown, she said: "It’s beautiful here. But I wish it would warm up. I had to buy a sweater."

And always remember, no white shoes after Labor Day!

p.s. - Baltimore Magazine has a big new profile on John Waters.

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News: Hairspray, Knut, Day of Silence, Cannes Film Festival

"Day of Silence" tensions, combined with the recent fever over violence at Virginia Tech, lead to lockdown at Indiana High School: "The Day of Silence at New Castle Chrysler High School coincided with a national Day of Silence and aimed to support gay, bisexual and transgender students. 'People were in their shirts for it, people were in their shirts against it, and it just caused a lot of drama that I didn't think was needed,' said student Kayla Boyles."

Berlin's global warming icon, Knut the baby polar bear, is the target of an anonymous death threat.

Middlebury College in Vermont, one of the Advocate's top 100 colleges for gays and lesbians, is tagged with anti-gay graffiti.

Netflix cashes in on Virginia Tech killings, featuring Oldboy, film killer modeled himself after.

Line-up announced for Cannes Film Festival: Wong Kar Wai's My Blueberry Nights to open fest; Gus van Sant back in competition with Paranoid Park...

ERUPTING: Thousands flee Colombian volcano.

Purported David Beckham nude an instant internet hit!

Gaydar founder Gary Frisch, who plunged to his death from an eighth-floor balcony in early February, was found to have raised levels of ketamine in his body: "Estate agent Stephen Ruddock was standing outside a nearby building when he saw Mr Frisch's body hit the ground. He said Mr Frisch shouted 'Waheey' moments before he plunged to his death. Mr Ruddock said: 'It was a celebratory thing. I saw his body come into my line of sight. It arced in the air and hit the ground.' Pathologist Dr Peter Wilkins said raised levels of ketamine were found in Mr Frisch's blood and liver. He added: 'It can have similar effects to LSD, confusion and hallucinations.' Recording a verdict of misadventure, the coroner, Dr Paul Knapman, said: "I don't think that it can be said he intended to kill himself. 'This is not suicide at all. He jumped to his death from the balcony of his flat on the eighth floor while under the influence of drugs.'"

Baby pilot whale found swimming in Brooklyn, dies.

Hairspray trailer hits the internet Aqua Net.

Kathmandu, Nepal gets its first gay beauty salon: "The salon, which offers regular beauty parlour services like haircuts, facials, manicures and pedicures, is also a training academy for members of the gay community who want to train as beauticians. The first batch of 10 young metis - gay men who dress as women - is running the salon under the aegis of the Blue Diamond Society (BDS), Nepal's sole gay rights group." The Blue Diamond Society recently received two awards from the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission for grassroots groups making an impact in gay rights.

The Emma dilemma: "A 7-year-old girl is at the center of a court battle that is equal parts gay rights struggle, jurisdictional quandary and legal ethics question."

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News: Tonya Harding, Pizza, Barbara Gittings, Genetics

Statements by Baptist minister Rev. R. Albert Mohler Jr. that if a biological basis for homosexuality were proven then prenatal treatment to reverse gay orientation would be biblically justified have inspired criticism from the right and left. Harry Knox, HRC: "He's willing to play God. He's more than willing to let homophobia take over and be the determinant of how he responds to this issue, in spite of everything else he believes about not tinkering with the unborn."

Better late than never? Nearly a month after her death, the NYT publishes pioneering gay activist Barbara Gittings' obituary. Perhaps they heard the cries of Larry Kramer.

New York magazine has a few questions for photographer Patrick McMullan.

Activists, law students in Maine lobby for changes to "Don't Ask, Don't Tell".

Ryan Seacrest works it out.

Supporters outnumber opponents at New Hampshire gay marriage hearing.

The lawyer for Magdaleno Olmos, the former assistant production accountant on American Idol who recently accused former contestant Mario Vazquez of propositioning him, speaks out about his client's claim that he was fired from the show for reporting the incident. Lawyer Matt Matern: "I believe it (Vazquez's departure) was not voluntary in any way shape or form. There were meetings held on that same day with the executives Nigel Lythgoe and Ken Warwick, with my client and with the attorneys for ‘American Idol.' They asked my client what had happened. Then I believe they interviewed Mr. Vazquez that same day, brought my client back in for a second interview and [I'm told], Nigel Lythgoe, put his arm around my client and said, ‘we know that this happened and we are going to let Mario Vazquez go, and you're going to stay.'"

Tweaked out Tonya Harding calls cops after having visions of animals.

Filmmaker John Waters has a Christmastime kids movie in the works entitled Fruitcake.

Congressman spearheading repeal of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" announces he may be leaving office to become Chancellor of UMASS Lowell.

Is Jim McGreevey ready to become a gay activist?

New York restaurant presents the $1,000 pizza.

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John Waters to Host Court TV Show on Murdered Spouses

Via Popbytes comes news that John Waters is the "Groom Reaper" in a new series beginning March 19th on Court TV. It's a half-hour scripted series that Waters will host featuring "stories inspired by true crimes involving married couples whose once wedded bliss ends in murder."

The series is being marketed via a DC comic based on the first episode. Sounds like the creepiest thing to come out of Court TV since Nancy Grace.

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Music for the Bedroom from John Waters

John Waters talks to the Provincetown Banner about a new CD he has produced that is set to arrive on Valentine's Day. It's described by the paper as "a combination of the teen angst music of the ’60s along with lounge-y love ballads, rhythm and blues and a liberal sprinkling of cuts that defy categorization. It is both eclectic and electric on a lot of levels with everything from Dean Martin and Ray Charles to Ike and Tina Turner blended with punk rock and movie themes." The CD contains 14 of the director's favorite tracks and includes Waters' favorite actresses Edith Massey and Mink Stole singing "Big Girls Don't Cry" and "Sometimes I Wish I Had a Gun", respectively.

Waters says as a teenager he fantasized about being a DJ from his Baltimore bedroom: "I had a top 10 board over my bed and once a week or so I would call the record stores in Baltimore and pretend I was the radio station and ask them what sold the most and average them out and put the top 10 up with a blank piece of cardboard over each title, pull off the cardboard and say, ‘Number 10 is…’ and name the record and dance around the room. I was really obsessed by it."

Waters notes that one of the songs on the CD has an intimate Provincetown connection: "Every summer I ask, why are there no mixed bars, half gay half straight [in Provincetown]. I’m most comfortable with that. I like it when you don’t know what everybody is. Provincetown used to have that. I remember every summer, in the beginning, would be the Back Room [formerly part of The Crown & Anchor] and the A-House. One would be straight and one would be gay. You didn’t know, it just happened that first night. For a while the Back Room had a club once a week which [Waters’ movie regulars] Cookie Mueller and Sharon Nesp were the hosts of. It was kind of a punk rock gay club or mixed club which was unheard of at the time. ‘Jet Boy Jet Girl’ was played over and over. It’s the only song that got me a warning on the CD. I mean compared to ‘Johnny Are You Queer.’ This one says, I’m gonna penetrate, make you a girl . There aren’t very many gay punk rock songs — this may be the only one."

Dirty Dancing with John Waters [provincetown banner]
A Date With John Waters [amazon]

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Divine Dragmaster Van Smith Dies of Heart Attack

Van Smith, who designed costumes for John Waters' films and did the make-up for the first six, died of a heart attack in Florida last week. He was 61.

Smith was credited for setting a new standard in drag for the over-the-top camp persona he created for Harris Glenn Milstead, aka Divine. Waters told the NYT that Smith's creation was a revelation: "When we started in those days, drag queens were square. They hated Divine: they wanted to be Bess Myerson. And Divine would show up in a see-through miniskirt with a chainsaw instead of a pocketbook."

"The Divine look, which Mr. Smith first created in 1972 for 'Pink Flamingos,' had three components. First was the hair, shaved back to the crown to allow more room for eye makeup. Second was the makeup, acres of eye shadow topped by McDonald’s-arch eyebrows; lashes so long they preceded the wearer; and a huge scarlet mouth. Third were the clothes: shimmering, skintight numbers that gave a larger-then-life female sensuality. The net effect, as Mr. Smith ordained it, was a cross between Jayne Mansfield and Clarabell the Clown."

Among Smith's creative applications for everyday items were the use of egg whites for peeling skin, potato chips that would appear as yellowy plaque on teeth, and fake breasts filled with lentils because they afforded a more natural movement.

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The Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts has ruled that an amendment banning gay marriage can be placed on the ballot if approved by the state legislature: "Monday's decision frees Massachusetts lawmakers to vote on a constitutional amendment in a special session on Wednesday that would ban both gay marriage and civil unions. If 50 lawmakers in the state's 200-member Legislature approve of the measure, it goes to a second legislative vote in 2007. If it clears that hurdle, it will be added to a 2008 ballot for a popular vote."

Pope visits Spain, slams gay marriage once again: "According to human nature, it is man and woman who are made for each other and to give humanity a future." Gays show the Pope there is more to human nature than he thinks.

Detaching: amazing new video of the Space Shuttle.

John Waters speaks in Ann Arbor: "Early in our career, we didn't have any money to advertise. Before the films would open, we would tour with them, and I would come out in those days looking very much like a hippie pimp, and talk very seriously about nudist camp films and ludicrous kinds of films that no one was allowed to like in those days - especially at film schools. And then I would say, ladies and gentlemen, now I'd like to introduce the most beautiful woman in the world. And Divine would come out, pushing a shopping cart filled with dead mackerels and throw them in the audience...''

Former neo-Nazi skinhead and his victim spread story of tolerance in L.A.

POLL: Wisconsin residents evenly split on gay marriage ban.

A 40-second clip of the new Killers single "When You Were Young".

Ricky Martin has sold his Beverly Hills mansion for a cool $18 million.

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Johnny Depp's Gay Pirate Attitude

In Newsweek's splashy article this week on Johnny Depp, producer Jerry bruckheimer notes that Depp's "fey" portrayal of Captain Jack Sparrow in the first Pirates of the Caribbean film had studio execs on edge.

Bruckheimer: "The studio was, like, 'Is he gay? Is he drunk? We don't know what he's doing!' It took a little while to calm everybody down."

Depp's take on Sparrow seemed to please director Gore Verbinski however: "You know, there's a lot of conspiring that goes on between actors and directors that I think is very healthy. You should be a little concerned as a director if you're not making the studio nervous."

John Waters, who directed Depp in Cry-baby (1990), says it's all natural: "First of all, Johnny is a pirate in real life. It's the closest part he's ever played to his real self, but the fact that he played it kind of nelly was a big risk. If only real gay pirates were that much fun."

A Pirate's Life [newsweek]

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