John Waters co-hosted Play School from 1972 until 1991, making him a beloved figure for parents and children for nearly two decades. But away from the rocket clock, Waters is also a musician and esteemed actor, whose CV includes a long list of theatre and screen appearances.
Acting is a family affair for the Waters clan: his father, Russell Waters, was a Scottish film actor from the 1930s to the 70s. But despite being close to his late father, John knows little about his background. So the thespian is tracing his family history from the UK to the Caribbean in an episode of Who Do You Think You Are? that airs this week.
Waters now counts a family heirloom that has travelled across continents as his most cherished belonging. Here he tells us about that prized possession, as well as the stories of two other important objects.
What I’d save from my house in a fire
My father was a Scotsman who loved his homeland. A family heirloom I value greatly is the antique shepherd’s crook that belonged to him and came back into my possession in New York.
I was there in 2014 for work and my cousin Larry came to visit me from Montreal. Larry turned up with this five-foot-tall crook. When my uncle emigrated to Canada in the 1950s, my dad told him he should take the crook to keep a memory of Scotland. It is a beautiful briar wood topped with a ram’s horn handle, with a Scottish thistle engraved on it. Larry told me it should return home to Russell’s oldest son.
I was delighted but I wondered how to get it on to a plane. Larry said just carry it – that’s what he had done when he flew from Montreal. I did just that and, not only did the crook get through security, but I was ushered past all queues to go straight into the cabin. Without me saying a word, they had assumed I was disabled in some way and needed a five-foot walking stick!
My most useful object
A capo. When I first appeared on stage for a paid gig, I was 16, and I played bass in a west London blues band called the Riots. Later in life I loved getting back on the instrument whenever singing gigs called for it.
Throughout my playing, the extraordinary thing is that I never used a capo. I knew what a capo was – a clip-on to the frets that changes the key of the chord you are playing – and I was well aware that all guitar players used them as part of their equipment. But for some unknown reason I kept going for over 40 years with difficult chords. It just never occurred to me that I could stop struggling and make my life so much easier if I used a capo. Derrr!
I now use a capo when I play certain songs. Some chords and keys that I used to avoid because they were too damn tricky, I now play with ease. What the hell had I been thinking all those years?
The item I most regret losing
When I come across pictures from my youth, I am invariably shown wearing a Levi’s jean jacket made of buckskin or raw hide with a brown leather collar. As far as I know, Levi’s only made them for a very short time. I bought mine in London in 1966 and it stayed with me (almost always on my back) until sometime in around the middle 70s.
This jacket always drew admiring comments. It was a funky jacket – very “cowboy” – and it was indestructible. Over the years it became supple and graced with the patina of ageing that can’t be faked.
Then one day, when I went to a cupboard to reach for my jacket, it wasn’t there. I shrugged it off, thinking it would be thrown over a chair somewhere. But it wasn’t. At someone else’s house? In the TV studio where I had been working? Nope. It was gone. And nearly 50 years later it is still gone. I can’t think of another item of clothing that I could even begin to care about as much.
Who Do You Think You Are? with John Waters will premiere on SBS on Tuesday 20 June at 7.30pm and will be available to stream on SBS On Demand
