John Waters is one of the leading filmmakers of the American underground scene. From his home city of Baltimore, Maryland, Waters began his career as a teenager making scatological B&W short films. Eventually, his color, feature-length gross-out production Pink Flamingos became a monster hit on the midnight movie circuit in the early '70s, securing Waters' place as an underground icon.
After making several more "filthy" feature films, but wanting to achieve more mainstream success, Waters finally did so with the PG-rated musical comedy Hairspray. Since then, he made the major studio film Cry-Baby before going back to the indie film world with Serial Mom, Cecil B. Demented and others.
Waters has also narrated and appeared as an interviewee in numerous documentaries, hosted a show on Court TV, written several books, performs a live stage show and has branded himself as a respected cultural commentator.