Van Smith
Costume & Make-Up
Known For

Notorious Baltimore criminal and underground figure Divine goes up against Connie & Raymond Marble, a sleazy married couple who make a passionate attempt to humiliate her and seize her tabloid-given title as "The Filthiest Person Alive".
Pink Flamingos

After killing her husband, Peggy Gravel and her murderous maid Grizelda wind up in the crazy town of Mortville, where Queen Carlotta presides over a sleazy collection of misfits.
Desperate Living

A prim and proper schoolgirl goes against her society grandmother's wishes when she dates a motorcycle-riding juvenile delinquent.
Cry-Baby

Beverly is the perfect happy homemaker, along with her doting husband and two children, but this nuclear family just might explode when her fascination with serial killers collides with her ever-so-proper code of ethics.
Serial Mom

Blessed with a keen sense of smell and cursed with a philandering pornographer husband, a parasitic mother, and a pair of delinquent children, the long-suffering Francine Fishpaw turns to the bottle as her life falls apart -- until deliverance appears in the form of a hunk named Todd Tomorrow. Originally screened with "Odorama" scratch and sniff cards so the audience could (at their own risk) smell along with the film.
Polyester

'Pleasantly plump' teenager Tracy Turnblad achieves her dream of becoming a regular on the Corny Collins Dance Show. Now a teen hero, she starts using her fame to speak out for the causes she believes in, most of all integration. In doing so, she earns the wrath of the show's former star, Amber Von Tussle, as well as Amber's manipulative, pro-segregation parents. The rivalry comes to a head as Amber and Tracy vie for the title of Miss Auto Show 1963.
Hairspray

Sylvia Stickles runs a convenience store with her husband and mother-in-law. One day, Sylvia is hit on the head and transforms from an uptight prude to a sex-crazed lunatic. As she goes on a rampage through town, Sylvia attracts the attention of Ray Ray, a sexual healer and tow truck driver in search of the world's greatest orgasm. Their sexual revolution, however, causes a class war in their tiny Baltimore community.
A Dirty Shame

A Baltimore teenager who picks up a second-hand camera starts snapping his way to stardom, soon turning into a nationwide sensation, with a fateful choice between his life and his art.
Pecker

Teenage delinquent Dawn Davenport, incensed after her parents do not give her the cha-cha heels she wanted for Christmas, runs away from home. After an illegitimate child and hairstylist husband bring her more misery, she's enticed into a life of crime when the owners of her husband's salon promise her fame and fortune.
Female Trouble

A young lunatic director and his devoted cult of cinema terrorists kidnap a Hollywood movie goddess and force her to star in their radical underground movie.
Cecil B. Demented

Harris Glenn Milstead, aka Divine (1945-1988) was the ultimate outsider turned underground hero. Spitting in the face of the status quos of body image, gender identity, sexuality, and preconceived notions of beauty, Divine succeeded in becoming an internationally recognized icon, recording artist, and character actor of stage and screen. Glenn went from the often-mocked, schoolyard fat kid to underdog royalty, standing up for millions of gay men and women, drag queens and punk rockers, and countless other socially ostracized misfits and freaks. With a completely committed in-your-face style, he blurred the line between performer and personality, and revolutionized pop culture.
I Am Divine

Documentary about the making of John Waters' 1990 film Cry-Baby.
It Came from... Baltimore!!

Produced in 1978, The Neon Woman is an “outrageous murder mystery” set in a run-down Baltimore burlesque house managed by a retired stripper, Flash Storm, the hottest stripper that ever lived who has gone legit, opened her own strip joint, and is trying to cope with whatever comes along. There's Kitty Larue, the stripper with an identity problem. There's the horny bible thumping senator who wants to pray with Divine but really wants something less spiritual. Finally, Divine's young virgin daughter returns from boarding school and within minutes is turned into an alcoholic, heroin addicted stripper who has been betrothed to the black janitor. There's more but as the cliché goes, it has to be seen to be believed! By the time of it's VHS release, the 12 year old live footage was already a bit raw and gritty, but still gives more than a fair idea as to why Divine was so loved as a performer. The production ran for eighty-four performances at the Hurrah Discotheque, New York.