John Waters

“I remember when I first went to the Baltimore Museum of Art and I bought this little Moreau print in the gift shop. I took it home, and I was, like, 12 years old or something.”

“I believe that if a seven-year old kid has heard of Naked Lunch and is daring enough to want to read it, he’s old enough to read it.”

“I do take a one-week vacation every year, and I go to London in the fall.”

“I went through different looks. At one period, I was preppy because that's how I grew up. But then I had bleached hair in the front. And I used to wear - then I wanted to be a beatnik. It was hard to be a beatnik in suburban Baltimore. But I wanted to be one.”

“I read, every day, the 'Wall Street Journal''s editorials because I like to think how my smart enemy thinks.”

“Marriage equality is a hustler's feeding frenzy of gold-diggers. I campaigned for marriage equality in Maryland because I believe we should have the right to it, but I personally don't want to get married. I don't want to imitate the traditions of heterosexual people. I hate weddings: they make me uneasy.”

“I don't like rules of any kind. And I seek people who break rules with happiness - and not bringing pain to themselves.”

“People looked at my early pictures and called them the most disgusting things ever, and now 'Hairspray' is being done at every school in Britain and America.”

“I think it would be fun to die onstage! Just drop dead in the middle of my show? That wouldn't be so bad.”

“To me, the most important thing is the script. I would never make a movie that I didn't write. I wouldn't know how to.”

“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.”

“My dad saw 'A Dirty Shame.' I felt bad about my father knowing what 'felching' was.”

“I've been an art collector since the Sixties, and I kept it very separate from my showbusiness career. I've had art shows since the early Nineties, a museum show that travelled to four countries. I've had three or four art books; it's just another way I have to tell stories.”

“My mother's brother became the undersecretary of the interior for Nixon, which did cause a little drama in my family because I was going to riots and everything, but he turned out great and gave us a nice cheque for an AIDS benefit we had for the 'Serial Mom' premiere.”

“Do I like how digital films look? Sometimes, but sometimes it looks flat, and ugly.”

“Everyone's sex life is funny except your own. Every person's is, and yours never is.”

“I wish something on T.V. would trouble me. Then maybe I would watch it.”

“I like art. It's another way to rebel.”

“I never got along in school, really - I already knew what I wanted to do. I have never in my life got a paycheck from anywhere in the world that asked if I went to school.”

“My perfect day in Baltimore begins with getting my five newspapers. Then I would write.”