ultracultural – Page 3

My role model

John Waters in Bristol

Another stop on John’s book tour for Role Models. This was at the Festival of Ideas in Bristol, a spur-of-the-moment ticket booked while my pal Jeremy from Bristol was visiting me in Brooklyn. Charming as ever, and an intimate little venue for a change.

Although it was a minor detail, I was happy when he told the story of meeting Justin Bieber, who told John that his mustache was “the jam”, on Graham Norton’s show. That happened the day I last saw John at the Southbank Centre in December, when I was stranded by the snow in the UK for a day after my visa expired. I had John autograph my outdated visa that night, which pissed off the folks at passport control when I re-entered as a tourist later that month.

John Waters visa

It was a superb start to a superb weekend overall. I like Bristol more and more every time I visit.

The people are not free

pleasureunit:

Red Women’s Workshop was a screen printing workshop run as a women’s collective between c1974 and the early 1990s. It was a radical campaigning and publicising organisation fully committed to the ideals of the second wave feminist movement.

Timeless

I hope these Youtube videos stay online for a while, so you can all see this British documentary about John Waters, made around the time Hairspray (the first, non-musical one) was released. It’s a little annoying to listen to Jonathan Ross‘s voice-ver, but it’s so charming to see the interview with Divine in the first section:

Divine died only a week after the release of Hairspray in 1988, and this is the only footage I’ve ever seen of him enjoying the well-deserved praise for his work in the film. It also makes me sad all over again to think that he never got the chance to see how big Hairspray eventually became.

Trouble Maker

jonnodotcom:

Troublemaker Invades Walker Art Center: “Can artwork sexually attract each other? Does minimalism make pop horny? Does pornography elevated to high art lose its erotic power? Does size matter or can a tiny joke compete with a maximalist icon? Can art ever be ‘funny’ without losing academic enthusiasm? … Maybe the entire museum-going experience is in need of intervention. Why is there no art in the parking lot? Wouldn’t a symphony of car crash sound effects remind visitors not to drink too much and drive home after an opening? And shouldn’t the public know how much this show cost? Why not display all the expense receipts (shipping, insurance, construction) in a vitrine like artistic ephemera and let the museum-goers snoop at the endless price of exhibition? Who says simple sculptural vandalism somewhere in the building make the whole experience of visiting an art museum sexier? And what if the blue-plate special being served in the restaurant is a photograph rather than an actual meal—isn’t that nutrition of a different kind?”

– John Waters @ the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis; see also, and previously

A Room with Angels

It’s a totally minor thing, but in the middle of a dull week it made me smile. After watching a really, really terrible made-for-TV version of A Room with a View (my exile from England has driven me to gorge on British period films) I decided to wipe the disappointment from my mind by watching the original again.

Room with a View

There is still plenty to love about the first version, even after all these years, but watching it again I caught something small but charming that I wouldn’t have noticed the first time around. In the book, the pivotal scene on the Fiesole hillside is quite brief, but it gets a little more time and attention in the film. There’s a film-only moment where cousin Charlotte and Miss Lavish are gossiping about an English woman who runs off to Italy and marries a much-younger Italian in a town called Monteriano. That, of course, is actually the scandal at the heart of an earlier novel of Forster’s (also turned into a film later on), Where Angels Fear to Tread. It’s a quick aside, but a cute detail to throw in, and it actually does a neat job of establishing that Charlotte and Miss Lavish develop the kind of friendship where they’d swap indiscreet stories.

Continue reading “A Room with Angels”

Divination and finding Waters

I first watched all of John Waters’ films on video or in the theater, so I totally missed the inclusion of deleted scenes in the more recent DVD releases. Bliss! It pains me that I’ve gotten this far without seeing these.

Hmmm, perhaps I should use this stay back in the States to grab the earlier movies. The UK still only sells a more heavily edited version of Pink Flamingos.

Filth for future reference

I’m amazed that I never stumbled across this interview with John Waters before, since it was in BUTT years ago. However, I’ve worked about 14 hours today and I’m too tired to concentrate even on a pleasant surprise like this, so I’m just pass out and leave it linked here for you to enjoy until I get a chance to come back to it.

Update: Best quote from the interview: “You can’t get AIDS from sitting on a pie.”

The Lasagna Sandwich

Tesco Lasandwich Sandwich Oh, for fuck’s sake. I try to quietly accept that my aversion to most British food is just a matter of a cultural adjustment that I can’t make. Regularly, though, I’m pushed to the brink and I have to lash out at the culinary monstrosities I encounter, especially at lunchtime, which has become the most stressful time of the day for me since moving to England. As if things weren’t bad enough already at the Tesco near where I work, there’s a new contender for most soul-destroying approximation of food — the lasagna sandwich.

Now, I’m not automatically opposed to the idea of a lasagna sandwich. In fact, I’m intrigued. Until I remember this isn’t something from a great NY deli, something that involves a crusty roll and hot, fresh-made Italian food. No, this is the British take on it:

Between two thick slices of white bread, you’ll find a generous filling of diced beef in a tangy tomato and herb sauce, layered with cooked pasta sheets and finished with a creamy cheddar, ricotta and mayonnaise dressing.

I think I’m sick already. It’s bad enough that cheddar cheese is a common ingredient of Italian food here, but I’ve been trying to adapt to that. And their idea of “thick” white bread is nothing of the sort. It’s just clammy and tissue-like. The fucking mayonnaise, though! Ugh. I can’t even bear to think about it. Tesco regularly offends me (and leaves me with little to eat at lunch besides hummus and bread) with their generous use of mayonnaise on unlikely foods — cheese salads, Southern fried chicken, sushi — and it seems that this madness has no end in sight. The writer of that article about the lasagna sandwich gives a pretty good indication of what horrors lie in wait, but as he points out, there’s a market out there for even the unlikeliest concoction.

I just want a decent grilled cheese and bacon. Is that so much to ask?

Oh Coney, My Coney

The start of Summer always makes me long for Coney Island, especially now that it’s so far away and I’ll probably never see it again before it finally gives in to all the pressure and becomes something else.

Wonder Wheel

But there’s so much to love. If you haven’t been there it may be hard to see past the decay and appreciate the real charm that comes from the liveliness of the place, and the visible signs of a long, colorful history. I’ve always had trouble putting my finger on my love for the place, although it’s such a goldmine of lettering and kitsch that it’s easy to understand what first sucked me in. But it’s always been more, somehow, too.