Tag Archives: Ken King

SICKS BY JOHN WATERS: POLYESTER

Francine Fishpaw (Divine) faces a series of suburban dilemmas in John Waters’s odoriferous Polyester

POLYESTER (John Waters, 1981)
IFC Center
323 Sixth Ave. at West Third St.
Friday, April 19, and Saturday, April 20, midnight
Series continues through April 27
212-924-7771
www.ifccenter.com

Camp champ John Waters’s crudely rambunctious cult classic suburban satire Polyester, which underwent a 4K restoration in 2019, follows the misadventures of the Job-like Francine Fishpaw, ravishingly portrayed by drag queen extraordinaire Divine. Her God-fearing life takes a bitter turn when she catches her nasty, demanding husband, porn purveyor Elmer (David Samson), with his sexpot secretary, Sandra Sullivan (Mink Stole). Her status in the community, so precious to her, is ruined as she becomes an alcoholic, unable to rein in her wildly promiscuous daughter, Lu-Lu (Mary Garlington) — who has the hots for bad boy Bo-Bo Belsinger, played by Dead Boys frontman Stiv Bators!! — or her inhalant-abusing son, Baltimore Foot Stomper Dexter Fishpaw (Ken King).

She also receives no emotional or financial support from her skunk of a mother, La Rue (Joni Ruth White). The only one who stands by her is her ultra-strange, simple-minded bestie, the Baby Jane-like although kindhearted Cuddles Kovinsky (Edith Massey), but she finds a glimmer of hope in a handsome hunk of a he-man (Hollywood heartthrob Tab Hunter!!) who tantalizingly keeps showing up on her radar in a flashy white sports car, like Suzanne Somers does to Richard Dreyfuss in American Graffiti.

Francine (Divine) falls for the hunky Todd (Tab Hunter) in Polyester

Baltimore native Waters fills the film, his first major hit, with his usual Dreamlanders cast of oddball actors; in addition to Divine, Massey, and Stole, you’ll find Susan Lowe, Cookie Mueller, George Hulse, Mary Vivian Pearce, Sharon Niesp, Jean Hill, George Figgs, and Marina Melin in small roles. The score features a trio of songs — Hunter sings the title track, written by Chris Stein and Debbie Harry of Blondie, while Bill Murray warbles Harry and Michael Kamen’s “The Best Thing.” More than forty years later, Polyester is still like nothing you’ve ever seen before, a wacky work that established Waters in popular culture as a unique auteur with his own unique cinematic language. The film is screening April 19 and 20 — in Odorama — at midnight in the IFC Center series “Sicks by John Waters,” which concludes April 26-27 with Multiple Maniacs.

[Mark Rifkin is a Brooklyn-born, Manhattan-based writer and editor; you can follow him on Substack here.]

POLYESTER WITH JOHN WATERS AND KEN KING

Francine Fishpaw (Divine) faces a series of suburban dilemmas in John Waters’s odoriferous Polyester

POLYESTER (John Waters, 1981)
IFC Center
323 Sixth Ave. at West Third St.
Thursday, September 5, 7:00 & 9:15
212-924-7771
www.ifccenter.com

Camp champ John Waters will be at IFC Center on September 5 for a Q&A and extended introduction at two screenings of a new 4K restoration of his cult classic suburban satire Polyester, joined by costar Ken King, who plays Baltimore Foot Stomper Dexter Fishpaw. The crudely rambunctious film follows the misadventures of the Job-like Francine Fishpaw, ravishingly portrayed by drag queen extraordinaire Divine. Her God-fearing life takes a bitter turn when she catches her nasty, demanding husband, porn purveyor Elmer (David Samson), with his sexpot secretary, Sandra Sullivan (Mink Stole). Her status in the community, so precious to her, is ruined as she becomes an alcoholic, unable to rein in her wildly promiscuous daughter, Lu-Lu (Mary Garlington) — who has the hots for bad boy Bo-Bo Belsinger, played by Dead Boys frontman Stiv Bators!! — or her inhalant-abusing foot-fetishist son. She also receives no emotional or financial support from her skunk of a mother, La Rue (Joni Ruth White). The only one who stands by her is her ultra-strange, simple-minded bestie, the Baby Jane-like although kindhearted Cuddles Kovinsky (Edith Massey), but she finds a glimmer of hope in a handsome hunk of a he-man (Hollywood heartthrob Tab Hunter!!) who tantalizingly keeps showing up on her radar in a flashy white sports car, like Suzanne Somers does to Richard Dreyfuss in American Graffiti.

Francine (Divine) falls for the hunky Todd (Tab Hunter) in Polyester

When the Douglas Sirk-inspired Polyester premiered in May 1981 at the old Waverly, which became the IFC in 2005, it was shown in Odorama — each moviegoer was given a scratch-and-sniff card of ten smells that were signaled by the corresponding number blinking on the screen. (I unfortunately still remember number nine all too well.) It’s not just a gimmick; in the movie, Francine is constantly sniffing around like an animal, though she is not so much hunting prey as being prey. The acting is about as over the top as it gets and the editing and camerawork DIY sloppy as writer, producer, and director Waters, who had previously made such films as Pink Flamingos and Female Troubles and would go on to make Cry-Baby, Serial Mom, and Hairspray, addresses such issues as pornography, abortion, religion, addiction, marriage, class, fat shaming, parenting, and the movies themselves with a brash sense of humor that can never go too low. Baltimore native Waters fills the film, his first major hit, with his usual Dreamlanders cast of oddball actors; in addition to Divine, Massey, and Stole, you’ll find Susan Lowe, Cookie Mueller, George Hulse, Mary Vivian Pearce, Sharon Niesp, Jean Hill, George Figgs, and Marina Melin in small roles. The score features a trio of songs — Hunter sings the title track, written by Chris Stein and Debbie Harry of Blondie, while Bill Murray warbles Harry and Michael Kamen’s “The Best Thing.” Nearly forty years later, Polyester is still like nothing you’ve ever seen before, a wacky work that established Waters in popular culture as a unique auteur with his own unique cinematic language.

DONN PEARCE’S COOL HAND LUKE

Boss Godfrey (Nick Paglino) tries to keep Luke Jackson (Lawrence Jansen) in line in COOL HAND LUKE (photo by Jason Woodruff)

59E59 Theaters
59 East 59th St. between Madison & Park Aves.
Tuesday – Sunday through May 31, $30
www.59e59.org
www.godlighttheatrecompany.org

The Godlight Theatre Company follows up its spare, Drama Desk–nominated staging of James Dickey’s Deliverance with another testosterone-fueled tale, Donn Pearce’s Cool Hand Luke. As with all of Godlight’s productions — which also include One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, In the Heat of the Night, Slaughterhouse-Five, Fahrenheit 451, and The Third Man — this latest work is based on the original novel, not the popular film, in this case Pearce’s 1965 book rather than Stuart Rosenberg’s 1967 movie, which starred Paul Newman and an all-star ensemble and earned four Oscar nominations. (Warning: The classic line “What we’ve got here is failure to communicate” is from the movie, so it is not in the play.) Lawrence Jansen stars as Luke Jackson, a smartass war hero with what would now be called PTSD who is serving time for having cut the heads off of parking meters. “Luke had the devil in him,” fellow inmate Dragline (Mike Jansen) explains in a short prologue. “Luke done some kinda deal somewheres along the line. Don’t know what. Thar’s no telling. But Luke was jes’ natcherly mad at God.” Luke becomes part of a roadside chain gang with Dragline, Curly (Lars Drew), Society Red (Brett Warnke), and Rabbit (Jarrod Zayas), who are closely watched by Boss Kean (Jason Bragg Stanley), collaborator Carr (Ken King), and the evil Boss Godfrey (Nick Paglino), who has it in for Luke from the start. But through it all, Luke keeps on smiling, as he faces off against Boss Godfrey, tries to eat fifty hard-boiled eggs in one hour, and won’t take the advice of his mother (Kristina Doelling) to put his faith in the lord. “Ain’t you scared a’ dyin’ and goin’ to hell?” Dragline asks him. “Dyin’? It’s livin’ I’m scared of,” Luke responds.

Lawrence Jansen plays a Jesus-like prisoner in Godlight Theatre adaptation of COOL HAND LUKE (photo by Jason Woodruff)

Once again, the staging is the star in this Godlight production. The story, adapted by Emma Reeves (Anne of Green Gables, Little Women), unfolds with no props or scenery in a tiny black box at 59E59, where the characters are cordoned off on the right and left by an angled row of lights on the floor, with Luke and Boss Godfrey almost always in the center, Luke in the front, Godfrey in the back, the latter watching everything from behind his dark sunglasses. Director Joe Tantalo (A Clockwork Orange, 1984), the artistic director of Godlight for more than twenty years, announces scene changes with sharp flashes of light, courtesy of set and lighting designer Maruti Evans, accompanied by the crack of a rifle loading. (The sound design is by Ien Denio.) Cool Hand Luke is filled with religious imagery, with Luke envisioned as a Christ-like figure and a saint, Boss Godfrey as the devil, the other prisoners potential disciples. In a scene from Luke’s past, he seeks help from a woman named Mary (Julia Torres, who also curiously sings a spiritual at the beginning and end of the play), while Doelling portrays a prostitute in addition to Luke’s mother, furthering biblical references. The show lacks the dramatic conflict inherent in previous Godlight shows; it is significantly more slight, a series of episodes in search of a fluent narrative as a whole. But the strong acting and expert, unique staging will keep you chained to your seats.