Note:Seating for this event is very limited and is available on a first-come, first-served basis. Patrons will be issued stickers for admission to the event beginning at 6 pm. Entry to the event space begins at 6:30 pm.

This evening, the legendary writer and director John Waters will be presenting his film A Dirty Shame, then speaking afterward about his filmmaking career and answering audience questions.

Waters's filmography includes Pink Flamingos (1972), probably the most notorious film of 1970s American independent cinema; Polyester (1981), a comic melodrama starring Divine and Tab Hunter filmed in glorious "Odorama"; Hairspray (1988), starring the then-unknown Ricki Lake, Deborah Harry, the late Sonny Bono, Jerry Stiller, Pia Zadora, and Ric Ocasek; and Cry-Baby (1990), a juvenile delinquent musical comedy satire starring Johnny Depp. Waters subscribed to Variety at age 12, and as a teenager began making 8-mm underground movies influenced by the likes of Jean-Luc Godard, Walt Disney, Andy Warhol, Russ Meyer, Ingmar Bergman, and Herschell Gordon Lewis. Waters is the author of six books, a photographer represented by Marianne Boesky Galley in New York, a one-man spoken-word lecturer, an actor, and a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. He was a juror for the 2011 Venice Biennale.

The Design and Craft Lecture Series is funded by the Wornick Endowment Fund.

The Cinema Visionaries series is made possible through the generous support of Carla Emil and Rich Silverstein.

Generous support for CCA public programs in San Francisco has been provided by Grants for the Arts / San Francisco Hotel Tax Fund.