Filmmaker Waters brings his "DeMented" style to SIFF

So, what's provocateur filmmaker John Waters, who brought the world Divine in "Pink Flamingos," been up to lately? He's been making -- wait for it -- a children's film.

"Fruitcake," the tale of a small boy who becomes separated from his small-time-crook parents on Christmas Eve, stars Parker Posey and Johnny Knoxville and will likely hit theaters next year. And Waters is sure to talk about his most recent (and most unlikely) foray at 7:30 tonight at Benaroya Hall, where he'll discuss his life and work in an evening co-presented by Seattle Arts & Lectures and Seattle International Film Festival. Tickets are $25-$100 (the top price gets you into an after-party with Waters at the W Hotel) and available through www.lectures.org or 206-215-4747.

The Baltimore-based filmmaker with the unmistakable pencil-thin mustache has been making movies for four decades, with perhaps his best-known work being the 1988 comedy "Hairspray," which recently became a successful stage musical. (It was also remade as a movie musical last year, with Waters in a gleeful cameo as a flasher.) Waters also recently released a DVD of his spoken-word performance "This Filthy World," which he described in a recent interview as covering all his interests: "aberrant human behavior, movies, art films, crime, parents, advice on how to be a happy juvenile delinquent -- all the things that I find joy in."

"Cecil B. DeMented," Waters' 2000 comedy about the moviemaking industry (starring Melanie Griffith as kidnapped movie star Honey Whitlock) will screen today at 4:30 p.m. at the Egyptian, with Waters present for a pre-screening interview onstage. For tickets ($11), see www.siff.net or call 206-324-9996.

Moira Macdonald: 206-464-2725 or mmacdonald@seattletimes.com