At the time of this writing, Peaches Christ is somewhere in Austin, Texas with Elvira and Mink Stole, most likely doing something fierce and fabulous. In the meantime, half a country away, I find myself with the ever so rare weekend off.
Now, as a writer, I don’t technically ever have time off. There’s always something I could be doing. For example, I have a book I need to finish, a screenplay I need to edit, and about five magazines wondering when the hell my next article is coming in the mail.
But working in the horror genre, my life is constantly spent on the road. There’s always a convention to go to, a screening to attend, a plane to be on, or a car to pack. 10 of my last 14 weekends weren’t even spent in my home state, let alone my home. So to actually just be sitting at my apartment on a Saturday morning is kind of a really unusual experience.
But I’m certainly not complaining about being constantly on the go. In fact, as I sit here with a copy of Sam Arkoff’s autobiography on my lap and a Kenneth Anger short film flickering quietly on my TV in the background, I find that even at rest, I cannot help but be constantly immersed in this genre of cult which I love. I think the thing about horror & exploitation cinema is that once it gets its hooks in you, whether you work within it or are just a fan (though, I am quick to point out that those of us who do work in horror are still just fans, albeit lucky ones), it becomes a part of you.
=
Of this fact, I am absolutely certain. I know of no other genre of motion pictures that inspires such a sense of community or a devotion to the craft. The luminaries of the field are our surrogate parents in darkness, often taking chances with their art many of their non-cult contemporaries wouldn’t dare. It’s a rally against the mainstream collective to create our own collective…a collective of the creepy, if you will, that showed us there was something more than mini-vans and church on Sunday. That it was okay to revel in the unusual and celebrate the deranged. That liking the weird didn’t necessarily make us weird in effect.
Yes, I think horror is significant to those of us who are a part of it because, in essence, it’s the only genre that accepts us for who we are and allows the fact that our strangeness plays on within us long after it has stopped playing at the theater.
I think one of my favorite things that Peaches has continuously said over the course of various interviews and commentaries is that she considers herself the “child of John Waters and Elvira”. Now, obviously Peaches Christ is not the ACTUAL physical child of John and Elvira (though, take a moment to envision that love making session…and if you’re not turned on, your sex drive is as dead as Ed Wood’s ability to raise a budget), but is their spiritual offspring.
It goes back to what I was saying a paragraph or so ago about genre legends being our surrogate parents. While I believe it to be true that cult cinema becomes a part of us, I think also that like life, we have to be born into it…usually via the discovery of a certain film or filmmaker who changes the tide of our perception forever.
For me, I’d say my daddy in darkness is none other than existential filmmaker David Lynch. Granted, I’d experimented with cult films before, just as curious boys of a certain age do. There were the Rocky Horror outings and I’ve mentioned in other writings how much of a debt of honor I owe to USA Up All Night and its perky hostess, Rhonda Shear (who, invariably, is my mommy of the macabre), but I think with Lynch, the tide was forever turned in my blackest of hearts.
In films like Blue Velvet and Lost Highway, I gained the understanding that art didn’t always have to be sensible, comfortable, or even clear. I learned that it was okay to celebrate nonsense and acceptable to be anything but accepted. I fell in love with the whole world of dark dreams that Lynch created and shared his understanding that underneath the veneer of cheerful, small town America lived the true evil. For the first time in my whole film-going life did I think, despite the fact these movies had been shared with audiences the world over, that someone was making movies just for me.
=
I mean, really…I could go on for a long time about David Lynch, but I don’t really want to do that. He’s one of those filmmakers who means a lot to me and I’m pretty set in my opinion about him, so it would sound more than anything like blind idolatry (and it is).
More so, why I share this is because I have this great interest in who our “cult parents” are, who allowed our rebirth into the world of the weird. Peaches Christ has John Waters and Elvira, I have David Lynch and Rhonda Shear (right). But, Peaches and I are just two amongst a community that is very large.
We aren’t the only ones who were fostered into this world…and I want to know who brought you to us.
So, I guess this article isn’t a traditional piece in the sense that I have a topic and I am hammering home my thoughts on the matter, but instead it serves as a question. I love the horror community and I love getting to know horror fans, so rather than hear my thoughts…I want you to tell me yours. I want to know who your horror “parents” are…who brought you into this greater world of cult cinema?
Which of you got here through the guidance of Herschell Gordon Lewis?
Who out there suckled at the size 73 teats of Chesty Morgan via Doris Wishman’s (left) lens?
Whose father of fright is Frankenhooker’s Frank Henenlotter?
Maybe for the newer generation of cult fans, Peaches Christ herself is your malicious mama. Regardless though of who brought you into this world, we can all rest assured that we live in solidarity as the children of the popcorn, forever united by our love of blood, sex, and things that go bump in the night.
I’ll be back soon with a full-fledged account of Peaches and her adventures in Austin with All About Evil, but in the meantime I’d like you to mull over what I’ve asked you here today. Consider your cult parents, who are they, and what did their films mean to you? I’d love to hear who birthed you screaming and covered in blood into our world of horror…so leave a comment here, on facebook, scrawled on a bathroom wall in bodily fluids, wherever…just take a minute and do what your community has always told you to:
Respect your parents.
Until next time, my dear children of the popcorn…until next time.
