During the launch of Lip TV’s Talk Show with Harper Simon, comedian/actor/musician Fred Armisen opens up about discovering John Waters as a teenager and the impact the cult filmmaker had on his comedy career.
Fred tells an amazing story about discovering and becoming fascinated with groundbreaking writer/director Waters as a teenager after being sent to the school psychologist for writing an essay that his teachers considered disturbing.
He said he felt isolated and alone as he was being evaluated for his behavior, but around that same time, he heard Waters being interviewed on the radio. “And John Waters was talking about his book Shock Value and he was like, ‘I’m a filmmaker and I go around the world and I shock people and I’ve got these crazy movies.’ And I thought, who is this guy?”
He said he was a freak when he was a kid, and Fred sayd, “I’m like, he’s talking about somebody like me.” So he bought Waters’ book and read that when the filmmaker was in New York he stayed with his underground actress Cookie Mueller. So he looked her up and she gave him Waters’ address.
“I wanna make things, I wanna make films, I wanna do what you do, I wanna be shocking,” he wrote Waters in a letter. “How come I get sent to the school psychologist and you’re famous and you travel throughout Europe.
He recited Waters’ response: “Dear Freddy, thanks for your enjoyable and funny letter. I guess the difference is that they don’t drag me to the psychiatrist because I’ve been making films for a long time and you just started. Just don’t let anyone tell you you can’t do it and just keep plugging away. I do hope you can take over my pukedom, just remember to keep it funny, because it’s simple to just be disgusting, but not so original.”
During the full interview, Fred also talks about what it was like backstage at Saturday Night Live and working on his popular comedy series Portlandia with co-star Carrie Brownstein.
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