John Waters

Born: April 22 1946
Where: Baltimore, Maryland, USA

The maverick film-maker - who revels in the title The Pope of Trash - has made an off-kilter career making movies of "no socially redeeming value".

He made his breakthrough with Hairspray -"a comedy extravaganza about star-struck teen-age celebrities, their stage mothers and their quest for mental health."

The film was a box office and critical success and starred the then unknown Ricki Lake, Deborah Harry, the late Sonny Bono, Jerry Stiller, Pia Zadora and Ric Ocasek.

Its success brought Hollywood backing for Cry-Baby, a delinquent musical spoof, starring a young Johnny Depp.

On set, he harbored former underage porn star Traci Lords - who had a role in the movie - during a police raid.

In 1994, Serial Mom, starring Kathleen Turner as the crazed matriarch, continued his mainstream course and was the closing night attraction at the Cannes Film Festival.

Born to an upper middle class Catholic family, Waters was drawn to movies at an early age, particularly exploitation movies with lurid ad campaigns.

(he claims that the biggest rush of his childhood occurred when he found dried blood on the crushed remains of a wrecked car).

He was obsessed with the cinema detail drawn from the pages of Variety (he subscribed to the magazine from the age of 12).

Waters even resorted to watching adult movies through binoculars at local drive-in cinemas.

After giving puppet shows for children's birthdays, he began making 8mm films with influences ranging from Disney to Warhol to Bergman.

Using Baltimore, which he dubbed the Hairdo Capitol of the World, as the setting for his films, Waters assembled a cast of ensemble players.

These included high-school classmate Harris Milstead - better known as female impersonator Divine - which became the repertory troupe the Dreamland Players.

His first film was the 1964 short Hag In a Black Leather Jacket, starring Mary Vivian Pearce.

Waters followed with Roman Candles in 1966, the first of his films to star Divine and regular collaborator Mink Stole.

In 1967, he made Eat Your Makeup, the story of a deranged governess and her lover who kidnap fashion models and force them to model themselves to death.

He borrowed $2,000 off his father to make his big screen debut with Mondo Trasho in 1969.

(the movie was completed despite the director and two actors were arrested for "participating in a misdemeanor, to wit: indecent exposure.")

In 1972, Waters outdid himself with Pink Flamingos, in which Divine, Mink Stole, and David Lochary vie for the title of "World's Filthiest Person".

(Divine wins by eating dog faeces, lending the film the reputation of being one of the most revolting movies of all time).

His first widespread cinema release was Polyester in 1981, which featured mainstream actor Tab Hunter and revived the old promotional trick of handing out scratch-'n'-sniff cards to cinema-goers.

After a six year gap, during which he wrote for National Lampoon and taught film comedy to prison inmates, he returned with Hairspray.

After Serial Mom, 1998's Pecker starred Ed Furlong as a young Baltimore photographer who becomes the reluctant darling of vacuous art world folk.

In 2000, Cecil B Demented told the story of a renegade director who kidnaps a Hollywood starlet and forces her to act in his latest movie.

Boasting titles including the Sultan of Sleaze, the Baron of Bad Taste and the Prince of Puke, Waters is now an upstanding champion of Baltimore.

He's even made small appearances in "proper" films, including Woody Allen's Sweet & Lowdown as well as horror fests like Blood Feast 2 and Seed of Chucky.

He returned to the big screen in 2004 with A Dirty Shame, starring Tracey Ullman, Johnny Knoxville and Selma Blair.