Who better to spend the holidays with than John Waters? Few artists are as festive as Mr. Waters, who releases holiday covers and tours with A John Waters Christmas — evenings of storytelling and indispensable life advice from the filmmaker behind Female Trouble, Hairspray, Polyester, Multiple Maniacs, and Pink Flamingos, to name a few of his indisputable classics.
Waters is nothing if not a Renaissance man. He’s the bestselling author of Carsick: John Waters Hitchhikes Across America, Role Models, and his most recent published work, Liarmouth: A Feel-Bad Romance, long overdue for its planned film adaptation. On top of his wordsmith title, he’s also a singer.
Last year, Sub Pop Records released his cover of “The Singing Dogs.” This year, Waters returns to serenade all — in good and bad cheer — with a cover of Little Cindy’s “Happy Birthday Jesus.” As a holiday treat, there’s a “Pig Latin Visit From St. Nicholas” as the B-side. In short, it’s the perfect holiday gift from the Santa Claus of Baltimore.
It’s nothing short of a pleasure for High Times to present an interview with John Waters. The magazine interviewed him back in 1982. He is indeed one of the High Times greats, an artist who has always seen the beauty, fun, and truth in absurdity.
Thanks for speaking with High Times, Mr. Waters.
Glad you’re still coming out. That’s kind of amazing.
We went away for a bit, but then we got resurrected.
Yeah, but you’re not in print, right?
We just came back in print.
Oh, you did? Good, good, good, good, good. Well, good to hear, even though I don’t think I take drugs anymore. But anyway, we can talk about any drug you like. I’ve taken everyone.
What are some of your earliest memories of High Times Magazine?
I just remember always liking it, because when it first came out, it was really radical that there was such a thing, when marijuana was legal nowhere, ever. Your parents used to get scratch and sniff, where they smell like pot, and they could tell you that’s what your kids have, which is part of the reason I did Odorama [for Polyester]. But I always just thought it was a great magazine that most people who are all celebrities were afraid to be on the cover, even though they wanted to be.
I’ve experienced [that] fear, I will tell you.
Really?
It’s not always easy getting a yes.
You can never tell. Johnny Knoxville, who is a total straight boy who isn’t a closet queen, and very gay friendly, when we made A Dirty Shame, he said, “All I want to be on the cover is American Grizzly, the bear magazine.” And they said no, because he wasn’t gay. I said, “Are you crazy? You should put him on it.”
They wouldn’t budge?
They wouldn’t do it because he wasn’t gay, which is so ridiculous. That’s reverse discrimination. So you’re interviewing me and I don’t take drugs anymore. But as I said, I was taking everyone. What made me stop taking drugs was Ecstasy, the drug that made you love everybody. That’s the worst high I could ever imagine.
Your experience wasn’t enjoyable?
No, to love everyone, it’s too frightening a concept to ever take the drug, because that sounds like the worst high. That’s the baddest trip you could ever have, if you loved everybody.
It’s funny you say that, because your work is very loving of people.
It is, it is. I’m accepting of everybody, but that doesn’t mean I want to be in a cuddle pile and suck my thumb with a cuddle pile. I’d rather die than be in a cuddle pile.
How did pot make you feel the first few times you tried it?
I wrote all those movies on pot. Now it just makes me worry about things.
When did that change?
When I had success. I wrote all the movies on pot till I had success. And then, unlike most other people who become drug addicts, I stopped taking drugs, which was a wise decision.
You’ve always seemed like someone who’s very comfortable with success, with their place in pop culture.
Well, I’m very lucky. I say this in my Christmas show, “I could take drugs. I did shoot heroin once, and didn’t become a junkie. I could drink and not become an alcoholic. I did everything. But other people I know who did it with me became drug addicts, and had horrible lives and everything.”
I loved LSD. I took it again when I was 70, and wrote a whole chapter in my book about it. I hadn’t taken it for 50 years, but I took it again with Mink Stole at 70. And it was great. I don’t tell young people to take drugs. I mean, the ‘60s are over – stupid. But old people should take them. And then when they go home for Christmas, they can’t say you have dementia. You just say you’re tripping.
[Laughs] Cannabis helps a lot of our readers and friends during the holidays, especially at family get-togethers.
Me, if I have one toke, I start worrying about things. But I have other friends who are my age who still smoke it every day. It does not relax me at all anymore.
You stopped before more mass legalization, huh?
I did. Well, what fun are legal drugs? [Laughs] And now, poppers, RFK has made – R-F-U-C-K Kennedy Jr. – has made poppers illegal. Online, all the CEOs, they took everything down.
[Editor’s note: Poppers have long been restricted for human consumption; recent reports in 2025 describe stepped-up FDA enforcement actions against certain sellers.]
That’s unfortunate.
Well, poppers, I didn’t know we used poppers for sex. We used to take them… I don’t know, it’s very politically incorrect, but there’s this movie by Lars von Trier called The Idiots, where people purposely act mentally [redacted], and you could say that then.
But we did the same thing with poppers. We would just go out and do poppers in public and scare people. At the department store where five of us all do poppers and start laughing at people for no reason. [It was about shocking people]. It was fun.
[Laughs] Sounds like a good time.
And there is a movie called Assholes about popper addicts that’s pretty good. It’s actually pretty good. It’s the only movie about being a popper ever out. I know you might want to do a feature on it.
Any enjoyable drug-fueled holiday memories?
Oh, my God. I mean, I have always had great acid trips. I even did eat morning glory seeds, and then you’d puke for two hours, and then you get high. But I would think I was a parakeet. I’m eating all those seeds. But that worked. I did glue. I did every possible thing you could do.
But I liked best, if I had to pick best, it was liquor and Quaaludes. Coke, I liked, but I would be high for 10 minutes and then it’d take two weeks to recover. So, that never seemed worth it to me. And heroin, I’m not a jazz musician. I don’t have to take heroin.
Speed – it was fun. I love diet pills. But now with Ozempic, it gives you a big dick. So, why? That’s 10 pounds you don’t want to lose.
[Laughs] Throughout your drug years, you were incredibly disciplined. You still are, but unlike some artists, it didn’t negatively impact your work.
No, they didn’t, really. They might have impacted how I thought, but I would say drugs never got in the way of my career, no. We never took drugs while we were making the films. I certainly smoked pot when I was thinking it up, and people smoked pot when it was over, but no one was high when we made that movie that I knew of.
I can’t imagine making movies while high, with all the work you have to do.
No. I can’t, either. I don’t even like to watch movies high, really. I don’t like to watch movies while people are eating, either. It’s disgusting.
[Laughs] Valid. As a very well-traveled man, do you still enjoy life on the road?
I don’t mind it. I still don’t have to hitchhike. I mean, I’m certainly never going to hitchhike across the country again. But I did it, and I hitchhiked recently once when I couldn’t get anywhere in Provincetown. People picked me up in one second. So, I’m not afraid of being stuck anywhere, ever, because I know I can always hitchhike.
What keeps you entertained these days when going from city to city?
I’ve always got good books. Yep. That’s always the most important thing, to have a good book. And my favorite book of the year is about the girl who said the Virgin Mother appeared to the shepherd girls in the Fatima Letters. The Obsessive History of That is my favorite book of the year. So, look up a new book about the Fatima Letters. It’ll come up.
In Mr. Know-It-All, you wrote about the importance of having more than one profession. Today, it seems like you need to have five jobs or more.
That’s true. I just had a record come out, where I sing “Happy Birthday, Jesus.” I have a clothing line, where we sell celebrity cumrags and barf bags. I just did the audiobooks for all six of my screenplay books that were just re-released, and I play every character.
What books are you hoping to get from the holidays this year as presents?
Oh, I have a whole list.
[Note: Here’s the list, courtesy of his office]
Adèle Hugo by Laura El Makki (English translation only, please)
Two Of Me by Eleanor Coppola
David Lynch: His Work, His World by Tom Huddleston
Living In the Present with John Prine by Tom Piazza
Book of Lives: A Memoir of Sorts by Margaret Atwood
Fish Tales by Nettie Jones
The Pelican Child by Joy Williams
When you go out on stage, what are you hoping to accomplish with every show?
Well, every year, I hope the jokes work. I hope people laugh. I just want to make people feel great about themselves when they leave, in a way that genuinely might shame them.
I don’t believe in guilty pleasures, do you?
No. Why would you be guilty about pleasure? One time, they asked me to do a guilty pleasure album for Film Comment. I did all severe art films, because most people put exploitation or horror films, or something. I did the opposite. I did the most obscure French art films.
I think the best thing I ever did journalistically for Film Comment, I reviewed, and it’s in one of my books, the Godard film Hail Mary that caused all the trouble. I talked him into having a little sidebar that said, “One stupid question for a genius,” and they put Godard on the phone with me, not knowing that. I said, “What’s your favorite color?” And he started stuttering and was so mad. He finally said, “Blue,” and hung up. That was my best journalism I’ve ever done.
You should be proud.
This is my top moment of the Nobel Piece of Ass Award, I should say.
[Laughs] People often review your shows as “cozy.” Does that also make you proud?
I guess they’re cozy, because my audience, I mean, I say this in the show, they could drop a net on us and get all of us in one shot. There they all are. And people say, “Did your audience dress for Halloween?” How would I know? They look like they’re dressed for Halloween every day.
Do you enjoy Halloween?
No, I hate it, because my father used to always say, “Not Halloween, you know,” every time I went out. But Christmas, they do wear Christmas. I do hate blinking corsages, because I think it’s somebody videotaping, and it makes me crazy.
You recently covered Little Cindy’ “Happy Birthday Jesus.” The original recording is chilling. What made you want to cover it?
Well, it’s done without any irony. She stumbles over one word and I purposely stumble over the exact same word, and I did it for authenticity. That record was not meant to in any way be ironic, funny, or a novelty song. I’ve made it into a novelty song, definitely, but I’m a huge fan of novelty records.
Why was there no COVID novelty song? They don’t have novelty songs anymore. The last blatant one was “Valley Girl.” Gag me with a spoon. It’s like grody. It’s, like, totally! She’s a valley girl, but Moon Unit Zappa spoke all in that language.
[Laughs] The holidays can be tough. Do you have any words of wisdom for our readers during the holiday season?
Yeah. I tell them the ultimate high that we’re all going to do it. I talk about that in the show, and I’m not going to give you that for free. You’ve got to come see the show to do it. We’ll all do that together, later in life.
Mr. Waters, thank you for your time, and thank you so much for your work.
Thank you. I’m going to go sniff some glue [laughs].
Editor’s note: Statements about substance use reflect the subject’s personal anecdotes and humor. High Times does not encourage illegal or unsafe behavior.
PEN American Center, CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0, via Wikimedia Commons
