John Waters is a filmmaker with a true pedigree. After making numerous underground movies, he struck gold with 1972’s “Pink Flamingos” and became known for films that were ordinarily tasteless, but always hilarious.

More recently, he has written and directed the films “Hairspray,” “Serial Mom,” “Pecker” and “Cecil B. Demented,” and attained the true sign of celebrity status with a guest appearance on “The Simpsons.”

Waters’ lecture, titled “John Waters: Negative Role Model” will take place 8 p.m. Tuesday in the Sun Room of the Memorial Union. He spoke last week with Daily staff writer Tim Kearns.

Tim Kearns: Have you ever been to Iowa before?

John Waters: I’ve actually been to Iowa several times, usually to Iowa City. I do about 20 or 30 of these lecture tours every year. I like it because it helps remind me that every place you go people are the same. It wasn’t like that 20 years ago, but now with the Internet, video stores and cable TV, it’s not as different as things used to be.

TK: What projects are you working on now?

JW: Well, I’m a man with a lot of projects. I’m always working on numerous things at once. I’m working on a film called “A Dirty Shame” about blue-collar sex addicts in Baltimore, dealing with their addiction and their search for dignity. Iit’s kind of a Three Stooges sex addict comedy.

TK: How do you feel about “Hairspray” opening on Broadway?

JW: I’m excited — it’s nice to see your work being put up on stage, and I’ve been involved since the very beginning. It’s a nice thing, because the project will go on for several years. The Broadway cast has opened, but now they’re working on forming the tour, where I think Bruce Vilanch will be playing the role that Harvey Fierstein is playing on Broadway.

TK: How did you start out in the film industry? Did you always aim to act, write and direct?

JW: Well, I had no clue what those things meant. I didn’t know anything about editing — I just thought a movie was something that came out of a camera. I had been a puppeteer from when I was 10 until about 13, and I was successful. I was booked for two birthday parties a week, making $25, which was a lot of money in the 1950s. My grandmother gave me an eight-millimeter camera, and I just learned to make movies by doing it. I never had any schooling or anything — I just learned by doing.

TK: How did you raise money for your early movies?

JW: My first film cost nothing. The budget was zero. The girls who were in it stole the film and the developing, and the girls stole the clothes they wore. After that, my dad would lend me the money, and I would always pay him back with interest, and he would always be amazed. After a while, I started asking him for more than I needed, and was still paying it back. After a while, he just said, “Don’t pay me back, just keep it for your next movie.” He never saw them, of course. That’s my advice. If you have rich relatives, be nice to them. I don’t like it when people say, “I hate rich people.” If you’re going to make movies, you can’t have that attitude, because who’s going to give you money? Poor people? It’s not like the government has a movie stamp out there.

TK: Are there any films you saw and wished you’d directed them?

JW: No, because of the way I write. When I’m making a movie, I already went through the process of writing it, and I may have already read all the lines onto a tape recorder. If I was directing someone else’s work, I’d just be saying, “Cut,” or telling people to stop on their marks.

TK: Why is there such a difference in the frequency of your films?

JW: I never take a day off. I am constantly working. If everything’s working perfectly, it will take two years to get a film made, and nothing ever works perfectly.

TK: Do you watch your movies after you’re done?

JW: No, I normally never will. Maybe at a festival or an art show, I’ll sit there for a couple of minutes and see if the audience is laughing, but if I’m alone, I’d never just sit around and watch my movies.

TK: Is there anything in films that offend you? In “Cecil B. Demented,” they were pretty negative about sequels, in particular.

JW: No, I actually like sequels. I like the sequel where they’re just about out of things to do, around the eighth film, where the things that had made the movie original had been done so many times that they aren’t original at all anymore and they’re really stretching themselves to the limit. I think anything that would actually offend me is something like romantic comedies, but I’m not a masochist. If I know I’m going to hate it, I won’t go see it. I see a lot of movies — I’ll go to the movies three or four times a week.

TK: Who are some actors you’re dying to see in a John Waters movie?

JW: Well, I’m not going to tell you who I want in the next one, because then they’d find out. But definitely Meryl Streep. I don’t think she’d do it, but I love her work.

TK: Patty Hearst has appeared in “Cry-Baby,” “Serial Mom,” “Pecker” and “Cecil B. Demented.” How did you come to meet her and get her to be in your films?

JW: Well, I was obsessed with her, which she doesn’t know, and I had attended her trial. But when Paul Schrader made his movie “Patty Hearst,” he had bought the rights to use her story, which is the true story, and a friend of mine had a party and sat me next to her, and I asked her to be in a movie. I think she thought I was kidding, but I called her a month later and asked her to come in for a reading and she was in. Now the whole ordeal’s finally over, the final person finally pled guilty. She was put in prison for being kidnapped, and I think the city of San Francisco owes her an apology.

TK: How is the foreign reaction to your movies?

JW: It’s really no different than it is in the U.S. I always joke that bad taste is universal. As much as I hate dubbing, I still have fun watching them dub my films in other countries, listen to people that I know have Baltimore accents. It’s odd, because some places things are just very different, like in Japan, “Pecker” was my biggest film. They love Eddie [Furlong] — he’s a star there because they love androgynous people and hairless boys.

TK: If someone was to make a movie of your life, what actor would play you in the movie?

JW: Definitely Steve Buscemi. In fact, he was even on my Christmas card a couple of years ago, dressed like me.

TK: How did you come to be on “The Simpsons”?

JW: They just called my agent and asked him if I’d do it. I’d always wanted to be a cartoon character — I still want to be Captain Hook. But I had a lot of fun. More people have seen that episode of “The Simpsons” than have seen all of my films, and that episode ended up winning the Emmy.

TK: You’ve worked with some prominent directors, like Jonathan Demme and Woody Allen …

JW: And Herschell Gordon Lewis. I was just in “Blood Feast 2: All U Can Eat.”

TK: Do you think you work the same way as the other directors you’ve worked with?

JW: I think I work about the same. They always say that Woody Allen doesn’t say anything to his actors about what they’re doing, but he does. I don’t see a really huge difference, because all those guys that I worked with are writers-directors too.

TK: What are some films you’ve enjoyed in the last year?

JW: There’s a Belgian movie called “The Son” that won best actor at Cannes, even though for most of the movie, you just see the back of [the actor’s] head. I loved “Far From Heaven,” “Chicago” was good, “About Schmidt”… there’s a French comedy coming out called “The Pussy With Two Heads” that takes place in a Paris porno theater that’s quite funny. I think that’s probably a good list.

Who: John Waters

Where: Sun Room, Memorial Union

When: 8 p.m. Tuesday

Cost: Free