Is Baltimore better or worse than Detroit?
That’s one of the questions debated before a national television audience on Wednesday night during a live panel discussion on Netflix.
Fortunately for Baltimore, native son and current resident John Waters was on the panel to defend his hometown and point out some of its positive attributes. He turned out to be Baltimore’s fiercest champion, calling it “the coolest city” and “super great.”
The program was “Everybody’s Live with John Mulaney,” a new weekly variety show that originates from Los Angeles with writer and stand-up comedian John Mulaney as the Johnny Carson-style host and chief provocateur, and Richard Kind as his Ed McMahon.
The hour-long program airs live on Netflix, and the main guests form a panel that spends much of the air time discussing a given topic before a live audience.
Wednesday’s show was the fourth edition of Mulaney’s program, which is presented on the East Coast at 10 p.m. Waters was one of four main guests, along with comedian Wanda Sykes; actor and comedian Stavros Halkias, also a Baltimorean; and lawyer and cable news show talking head Neal Katyal, who was introduced as the man who broke Thurgood Marshall’s record of arguing more cases before the Supreme Court than any other attorney “of color.”
After delivering an opening monologue, Mulaney asked his panel questions about the topic of the night, which was Squatters – “people who squat in properties that they don’t own,” as Mulaney put it.
“I want to be really clear: We’re not talking about the unhoused or going after people who are desperate for shelter,” Mulaney said. “We’re talking about those unique American pieces of sh*t who move into a house that isn’t theirs and cause all kind of mayhem. They’ve always fascinated and delighted me.”
Waters and Sykes were the first two guests on the couch, with Mulaney in a chair on one side. Halkias and Katyal joined them partway through the show. Waters, who will turn 79 on April 22, was in the middle of the screen for most of the program and was frequently the center of attention.
Mulaney is clearly a fan of Waters, calling him “an iconic filmmaker who’s delighted me my entire life.” But then he got Waters going by suggesting that living in Baltimore is “technically a squat” in itself.
Waters disagreed strongly.
“Baltimore is the coolest city now because it’s still cheap enough to have a Bohemia,” he said.
“Do you think Detroit is going to surpass Baltimore,” Mulaney asked, “in terms of: was once super sh*tty and now might be …?”
“I never thought it was super sh*tty,” Waters said of Baltimore. “I think it’s super great. Also, there are still bad neighborhoods gay people can take over.”
This is hardly the first time Waters has defended the city’s honor. He puts in a good word for his hometown every time he speaks in another city. He spoke out in 2019 when Donald Trump disparaged Baltimore during his first term as president, saying the late Rep. Elijah Cummings’ district was “the worst run and most dangerous anywhere in the United States.”
“Give me the rats and roaches of Baltimore any day over the lies and racism of your Washington, Mr. Trump,” Waters said in a widely-distributed statement.
Another Baltimorean
When Halkias joined the panel, there was even more talk about Baltimore. At times, it seemed as if Halkias and Waters were having a private conversation, and the chosen topic had shifted from Squatters to Baltimore.
Mulaney mentioned that Halkias is also from Baltimore.
“How come we’ve never met?” Waters asked him. “Where do you hang out?”
“You are The Man, John,” Halkias said. “I used to see you at Club Chuck.”
“OK, that’s where I still go,” Waters said.
“Where do you go?” Mulaney asked.
“The Club Charles” on North Charles Street, Waters answered. “That’s the local way we call it.”
“A little insider Baltimore stuff,” Halkias told Mulaney. “You wouldn’t know about it.”
“This show and ‘The Wire,’ so much authenticity,” Mulaney said, still egging Waters on.
“Baltimore is still like ‘The Wire,’ ” Waters said, referring to the HBO series that depicted Baltimore as a crime-ridden city.
“Is it?” Mulaney asked.
“I want bumper stickers that say that,” Waters said. “They don’t go for it.”
“Still like ‘The Wire,’” Mulaney repeated.
Waters also suggested a bumper sticker for Baltimore that references the Wicked Witch’s castle in The Wizard of Oz: “I’d go back if I were you.”
Crab cakes and calamari
Halkias said he has a connection to the second season of “The Wire.”
“They literally shot it in the restaurant my mother was a waitress in. For real,” he said.
“That crummy little place where they were dealing drugs?” Mulaney asked. “That run-down diner. I love it.”
“I had a lot of crab cakes and calamari from there,” Halkias said.
Later in the show, Halkias asked Waters about the Greektown neighborhood in East Baltimore.
“I used to go to, what’s the [restaurant] there, Ikaros?” Waters replied.
And “the best lesbian bar was there,” Waters said. “The best, scariest one ever, called The Port in the Storm.”
“Off Eastern [Avenue],” Halkias nodded.
“All the d*kes looked like Johnny Cash, slow-dancing, redneck women with beehives,” Waters said.
“What’s the name?” Mulaney asked.
“It’s not there anymore,” Waters said. “I took [singer] Debbie Harry there. She said it was the scariest bar she had ever been at in her life.”
“Why don’t you guys talk porn and Greektown offstage,” Mulaney suggested. “Are you officially embarrassed now about being on the show?” he asked Katyal.
Mulaney then asked Sykes a Baltimore-related question. “Are you from the Baltimore area originally?”
“Yeah, the DMV as we call it,” she replied.
“The DMV? What’s that?” Mulaney wanted to know.
“Delmarvia?” Waters suggested.
“D. C., Maryland, Virginia,” Sykes explained. “I was born in Virginia but grew up in Maryland. I started my career in D.C.”
Other topics
The topics of Mulaney’s preceding three shows were Lending People Money, Cruises and Funeral Planning.
His other guests have included Pete Davidson; Henry Winkler; Ben Stiller; Nick Kroll; Quinta Brunson; Michael Keaton; Joan Baez and Fred Armisen. Musical guests have included Cypress Hill; Kim Gordon; Kim Deal; Mannequin Pussy, and Daniel Hope and New Century Chamber Orchestra.
Waters has been the guest of numerous talk show hosts, from David Letterman on NBC (in an appearance with Divine) to Bill Maher on HBO to Greg Gutfeld on Fox.
Mulaney, 42, was clearly pleased to have Waters and Sykes on his new program – “The best!” he said.
But he also acted as if he were taking it in stride.
“If you told me when I was a kid that I’d be hosting a variety show with John Waters and the former acting Solicitor General and chamber music, I’d be like: Yeah, that seems right.”
Waters said the word Baltimore at least six times. The host and all the guests together said Baltimore more than a dozen times. Other subjects in the conversation included the Spirit Awards in Los Angeles (Waters and Mulaney are both former hosts); the 29th anniversary of the day the FBI apprehended the Unabomber, Ted Kaczynski; OnlyFans models with dogs in the background; calling the police in L. A.; the Citizen App; the difference between a squatter and an intruder; the difference between OnlyFans and Chaturbate adult web sites; and the Trump administration firing federal prosecutors.
Waters-specific discussion topics included whether the show provided Waters’ wardrobe (“No, you didn’t have this backstage,” he said); how many shows Waters has lined up this year (51); and Waters’ interest in a telescope on Mulaney’s set (“I like to peep,” he said. “There’s no law against it.” “Uh, yes there is,” Sykes responded.) Mulaney’s 11-minute monologue was about his failure to get Bone Thugs N Harmony, an American hip hop group, to appear on the show.
Squatter stories
Waters sat through the entire show without mentioning perhaps the most famous squatter he has written about. In his 2022 novel, “Liarmouth…A Feel-Bad Romance,” the title character, Marsha Sprinkle, is described as a woman who steals suitcases at the airport and lives as a squatter in a suburban McMansion somewhere north of Roland Park.
But Waters had other stories about squatters.
“I dated a squatter once,” he told Mulaney. “Somebody was walking down the street in Provincetown and they said, ‘John Waters, can I live with you?’ I said, ‘Yeah.’ And so he came over. He couldn’t spend the night though. He only could go squat. He couldn’t sleep in a building unless he broke in. He was an anarchist, so he was fun.”
“Wait, he couldn’t sleep unless he broke into the building?” Mulaney asked.
“No, he didn’t have to break in my house to stay there,” Waters said. But “he couldn’t even spend the night there. He said he had to sleep in somewhere illegal. He was an anarchist.”
Anarchists and Proud Boys
“I’ve never met an anarchist,” Mulaney said.
“Yes you have,” Waters said. “They don’t tell you. They’re wanted by the police. Like Antifa. They have good outfits…They look kind of good. And some of the Proud Boys are cute. I know you’re not supposed to say that.”
“What type are we talking?” Halkias asked.
“The pussy Proud Boys,” Waters said. “The ones that didn’t go in [The Capitol], that were there that day but they didn’t go in. The pussy Proud Boys.”
“Oh, you like the ones that went but didn’t quite go through the doors?” Mulaney asked. “Is that a particular fetish?”
“They didn’t go in,” Waters said. “They were the cowards. Whatever they were.”
“I have no pivot for this,” Mulaney said, asking Sykes about a completely different subject.
Cash for Keys
Waters also told a story about a friend he knows who has a job that calls for him to kick squatters out of houses for the bank that owns the property. He made it sound as if squatting is something he might consider doing if his talk show appearances and spoken-word engagements ever slow down.
“I have a friend, his job is called Cash for Keys,” Waters said. “Banks hire him to go in places that have been taken over by the bank and squatters are in there. He has to break in and sometimes there’s turds, rats, you know. He gives them money to get out. It starts with three thousand. I said, ‘You’re kidding.’ He said, ‘I’ve given them fifteen thousand.’ I said, ‘They know about this?’ I want to get my ass trespassing.”
“I know,” Mulaney said. “We’ve all got to move into some abandons and then we’ll be paid to leave.”
“I think it’s a scam,” Waters said. “I want to start one where the bank tells me and then I go in and dress like the people that live there and say that I really am those people. I’d get you thirty grand.”
“It’d be so fun to pretend to be the husband and the wife running back and forth, Mrs. Doubtfire-style, like the scene at the restaurant at the end of the movie,” Mulaney said.
“Have you ever squatted?” Waters asked Sykes.
“No,” she told him. “Well, if you ask my parents, they might call it that.”
‘A certain edge’
Waters indicated he isn’t particularly worried about squatters.
“They’d be scared if they came in my house,” he said. “Even my nieces and nephews: Nah-huh. I ain’t staying here.”
“What do you have in your house?” Mulaney asked.
“Just weird sh*t around,” he said. “I mean I have an electric chair in my front hall (a remnant from his 1974 movie, “Female Trouble”).
“You have an electric chair?” Mulaney asked.
“That gives a certain edge” to the hallway, Waters said.
“Some mornings you just must walk around and be like, “This is so fun to be John Waters,” Mulaney marveled.
“Well, fun,” Waters replied. “I hate it when people say, ‘Do you have fun making a movie?’ No! Twenty-hour days? I had fun when it was a hit and you’re having a drink afterwards.”
Breaking the rules
Waters revealed the secret of his success after Mulaney complimented him on his “very good manners.”
“Thank you,” Waters said politely. “I was raised to respect good taste so much that I rebelled and made a living off bad taste. But you have to know the rules to break them.”
“We all hope that our children grow up exactly like you,” Mulaney said.
