John Waters Blossoms Amongst Filth

dirty show 16 detroit

Detroit’s annual Dirty Show, a celebration of erotic art in all its myriad forms, welcomed the crown prince of deviancy and master of bad taste, Mr. John Waters, to the Motor City to enlighten attendees on the finer points of, well, being dirty. Not that the audience really needed much help. Dommes, daddies, and heavily-inked degenerates of all kinds swanned about the Russell Industrial Center’s exhibition hall in various revealing or suggestive outfits, really only settling down for Waters’ performance, a revised version of This Filthy World the filmmaker and raconteur claimed was “dirtier, filthier than before.”

Waters regaled the audience with anecdotes of his early filmmaking years, from how he got Divine to eat dog shit on camera to which drugs resulted in the smoothest productions, and aside from a few left wandering the exhibition, had everyone listening with rapt attention. He also discussed my very stock in trade, pornography, calling out the hetero porn industry for rendering even the most filthy vulgarities quite bland. (Case in point: anal prolapses are called “blossoms” in gay porn, “rosebuds” in straight.)

Looking around Dirty Show 16, it seemed Waters was onto something. The more outlandish and adventurous works hanging on the exhibition hall walls were not predominantly heterosexual. Where the female form was used (from a clearly male view point) it was as an object of distant appreciation, an almost abstracted lust that no longer produced a physical reaction in the viewer, just a gentle appreciation of the form before them. Following Waters’ line of thinking, it’s not greater video definition, hotter or younger women, or more “intense” schtupping that straight porn needs, but that obscure element of genuine filth that could reinvigorate what many regard as a floundering industry and (yes) art form. Whether this filthiness can be found in the throng of recent step-incest movies or Kink & Co’s consistently taboo-smashing aggro-fetishism remains to be seen. If you ask me, though, it’s far more likely to spring from a figure like Dana Vespoli (arguably the most sour-looking woman in porn yet a fan- and critic-favorite for her truly adventurous performing career and boldly individual and highly inventive work as a director). With female performers launching themselves as directors after Belladonna, Bobbi Starr, and Ms. Vespoli paved the way, and with the 2015 AVN Award for Best Director going to a woman, Mason, it seems women are only gaining more strength and, we can only hope, bring a decidedly filthy and blazingly original element back to porn.

And, no, unfortunately we can’t hold out hope for Mr. Waters’ foray into mainstream hetero hardcore, which he considers about as sexy as open heart surgery. And besides, the man William Burroughs called The Pope of Trash is trying to get the financing together for a long-gestating family-oriented film.

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Photos by John Froelich, Detroit Free Press

World’s Dirtiest Artists Hit Detroit

Dirty Show 16 Detroit

Talk about new centers of artistic creativity and thriving entrepreneurship these days has moved past the overcrowded and overpriced mainstays like New York and San Francisco and is now focused on less obvious hotbeds of young urban growth. One such city, and arguably the one struggling to defeat a horrible reputation, is Detroit, Michigan. Once the heart of America’s immense industrial might, the Motor City has, as everyone has heard again and again and again, fallen on hard times. And, while craft breweries, hipster tattoo parlors, “artisanal tea” growers, and intellectual-copyright-infringing art fairs now litter Detroit in a tribute to the bland commodification of former vices and artistic outlets, there is someone working hard to promote debauchery, degeneracy, and complete and utter filth. His name is Jerry Vile and he’s the creator of the annual Dirty Show.

Launching this weekend and running until February 21st, The Dirty Show is Detroit’s annual exhibition of erotic art and performance. Now one of the largest exhibitions of its kind in the world, The Dirty Show was created by Vile in 2000 as a small art showing and in 2005 opened its Call to Artists to anyone who dared submit work. The resulting thousands of submissions saw more than 250 artists from 20 countries exhibit work over four days. For this year’s 16th annual celebration of the filth and the furry see such artistic luminaries as Ron English, the late H.R. Giger, Clive Barker, and Saturno Butto along with prominent national and local talents like Glenn Barr, John John Jesse, Pamela Wilson, and Jason Levesque. And, to top it all off, Vile and Exhibition Director Genevive Zacconi have nabbed another sterling lineup of erotic performers of all kinds. Hell, they even got exhibiting artist, filmmaker, and hitchhiking enthusiast John Waters to agree to deliver an updated “Filthier and Dirtier” rendition of his acclaimed one-man show This Filthy World.

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Sure, you’re not in Detroit (and, if you’re like most Americans, don’t plan to be) and can’t partake in all the ribald revelry of the Dirty Show 16, so why should you care? Well, dear reader, in a never-ending quest for further erotic inquiry, I am writing this blog from an unnamed airport terminal in the continental US, waiting to board a flight to Detroit and find out for myself the real dirt on The Dirty Show – and naturally I’ll be reporting back here with highlights, lowlights, and tantalizing tidbits galore. What, you think I’d let my close, personal friends and fellow porn enthusiasts miss out on all the fun?

Kagney Outs Celebrity Stalker

There are certain male celebrities who’ve apparently used their influence and power to corrupt the innocent and prey on defenseless young women. Bill Cosby’s currently in hot water over a handful of nasty accusations. Woody Allen allegedly preyed upon his own almost-daughter. Even Canadian celebs are getting in on the act, as the recent furore over CBC broadcaster Jian Ghomeshi’s aggressive sexual practices proves. The tides, however, have turned. Using social media to launch a public counter-attack after being harassed and harangued by a popular music figure notorious for committing violent acts against women, Kagney Linn Karter has proven the power of the verbally aggressive retort made public.

kagney linn karter brazzers

After allegedly being paid upwards of $2,500 by rapper Chris Brown to escort him on a date, Karter refused to consummate what Brown apparently assumed would be consummated (i.e.: she wouldn’t fuck him), which Brown then allegedly responded to with bullying, predatory online notes and comments. He also is said to have sent Karter a photo of his below-the-belt business, presumably in a vain attempt to entice her to fornicate. Class act that she is, Ms. Karter turned not to the police (who’d likely believe the male) nor to Brown’s legal team, but to her Twitter followers to shame her would-be conqueror. She also posted what she claims was a photo of Brown’s penis, causing her Twitter account to be deactivated faster than pornstar thighs during a syphilis outbreak.

kagney linn karter tweets about chris brown

For his part, Brown has, through his representatives, called Karter “mentally unstable” and said her claims are completely fabricated. Brown’s rep also took responsibility for having her Twitter account shuttered “under the claim of harassment and slander.” Still, with choice parting words like these, it seems Kagney Linn Karter is the triumphant one in this little tussle.

Kagney Linn Karter tweets

 

Kagney Linn Kater @Brazzers

 

The Interview Heads to Hustler

the interview

Now that Sony Pictures has cancelled all release plans for the controversial Seth Rogen, James Franco comedy The Interview, prospective fans are wondering if the film will find another life after the nightmare of its proposed theatrical release. North Korean supreme leader, King Jong Un has denied his government had connection to an invasive hack that brought Sony Pictures to its digital knees, a connection strongly suggested by media pundits. Americans are rightfully concerned that Sony’s bowing to the wishes of a cyber-terrorist group, no matter how dubious their origins, sets a precedent for erasing our hard-won freedom to laugh at whatever the fuck we want. And that, dear reader, is something Larry Flynt of Hustler Magazine holds very, very dear.

Telling the Hollywood Reporter that he’d “spent a lifetime fighting for the First Amendment,” and declaring that “no foreign dictator is going to take away [his] right to free speech,” Flynt announced This Ain’t The Interview XXX, his company’s parody version of the doomed political comedy. “If Kim Jong Un and his henchmen were upset before, wait till they see the movie we’re going to make.”

And, whaddya know, it appears President Obama might be right on Flynt’s side this time: “We cannot have a society in which some dictators someplace can start imposing censorship here in the United States because if somebody is able to intimidate us out of releasing a satirical movie, imagine what they start doing once they see a documentary that they don’t like or news reports that they don’t like. That’s not who we are. That’s not what America is about.”

No, he’s right. America’s about tits. Lots and lots of tits. (And maybe some heavy duty ass, too!)