John Waters Quotes - Page 2

I like rap music. But bragging about being rich to poor people is really offensive. I want to hear a rap song about buying a Cy Twombly painting or dating a museum curator. I want to hear about that kind of rich.

I liked speed. I was on black beauties all the time. Nothing bad happened to me. I didn't become a drug addict because I always had to make a movie. We weren't stoned when we made them; I was stoned when I made movies up. I did them all.

How come there's no terrorism with humor, which is a great way to humiliate your enemy? It's a great time for that.

The first real thing was Divine as Jackie Kennedy [in Eat Your Makeup]. His mother found the bloody Jackie Kennedy outfit in the boot of his car and said, 'What is this?" and Divine said, "I am Jackie Kennedy!" His mother just changed the subject; she didn't know what to say.

Sometimes I wish I was a woman, just so I could have an abortion.

People vomitied at my movies; not because of the movie but because they were drunk. I took credit anyway.

Technique is nothing more than failed style.

A psychiatrist once told me early in treatment, "Stop trying to make me like you," and what a sobering and welcome smack in the face that statement was. Yet somehow, every day of my life is still a campaign for popularity, or better yet, a crowded funeral.

You have to remember the police used to raid and arrest the audience for seeing Scorpio Rising (1964), or Jack Smith movies. Wouldn't that be exciting today, if you see went to the movie and everyone at the IFC was arrested in a paddy wagon and taken away?

I understand why people want to look up their friends - usually they want to see what people they've wanted to have sex with look like.

I like hard movies; I like ones that are basically the opposite of a date movie.

I don't know how I made those movies. I went out every single night, I smoked pot every single day. I drank. We did everything, but I never became a drug addict or an alcoholic. Other friends are dead, many of them. So many people in this retrospective...in Female Trouble, almost everyone is dead.

My films can be considered political action against the tyranny of good taste.

I want to be harder to reach, not easier.

I always want to see films that are startling and amazing. Not just shocking. Shocking is easy to do. But startling in the way that makes you change how you think about things. Those are the movies I like the best.

I've had a pretty amazing life, a good life, and God knows I'm thankful, but I do believe that after 30, stop whining! Everybody's dealt a hand, and it's not fair what you get. But you've got to deal with it.

Just make sure your children hate authority and they'll do fine.

The selfie has become a new autograph, but it takes twice as long to do as a real autograph. I do it because I'm like, "What am I going to do, these people bought me my house." Why am I not going to take a picture with them except I always say, "You have to hold it up! Shoot down or it's really ugly if you shoot up!" So not only does it take longer, you have to teach them camera angles.

People that pick up hitchhikers I believe are basically good people that believe in other people and understand problems and don't judge people. That's always the kind of person I'm looking for.

The way I photograph... in many ways it's directed by chance and all my mistakes, which are often the best stuff. I found that no matter if it's the same tape, the same TV, and the same camera, I can never duplicate an image... your arm jiggles, there's just too much chance. And I never put it on pause, or use any of that fancy equipment.

Contemporary art hates you.

I learned that people like my work because I praise things that others don't like.

I think that in America there is a new movement of underground movies that wants to kick the ass of independent films that they think whine too much.

Watching a movie should be like hunting. Out of context, every image of the cinema is yours for a split second. Take them before they bury it.

Going to a sensational murder trial is the only way I can relax.