I’ve seen Waters’ movies and some I did and some I didn’t like (I’ll admit I’m more drawn to his mainstream movies than the underground ones) but I’ve always loved watching him on talk shows. He has a great habit of saying what others are thinking but won’t say (such as when Michael Fay was caned in Singapore: “And have you seen him? He’s a cute kid! I can’t be the only ones having bondage fantasies whenever they talk about how he’s going to be stripped naked and whipped on his butt with a cane!”).
But I didn’t realize until now that he’s an excellent writer. He’s only excerpted the first 2 sections of his 5 part essay on his friendship with Leslie Van Houten, but he has me yelling “POST DAMN IT! MORE! MORE!” What’s incredible is how as he writes about her he’s simultaneously non-judgmental but- just as importantly when one considers Van Houten’s crimes- non-exonerating. He discusses her crimes (Van Houten for those without their Manson Family scorecard was at the Labianca house but not the Tate [it can be hard to keep up with who was where]) as being exactly what they were: cold blooded, senseless, horrifying, savage, etc… As he points out this sweet middle aged lady has a bald-with-cross-carved-in-forehead statue of herself in the Mme Tussaud’s Chamber of Horrors. At the same time he portrays her as a human who he believes has changed.
I don’t know if he’ll call for her release in the articles. Personally I’d never want to see her released- among other reasons
There’s almost a sociopsychic need for her to be in prison
Had the law not changed she’d have long since been gassed (or electrocuted- can’t remember which California did)
She’d be easy prey for curiosity seekers/vigilantes/nutjobs
The shock of how the world’s changed in the 31 years since the last time she was free would probably undo any mental health she has
But mostly there’s just a heaping element of “Goddamn! Even as a commune hippy kid who was fucked up on drugs and with world class peer pressure I just don’t think I could have done what she did” angle, followed by it’s twin of “Goddamn! Even as a commune hippy kid fucked up on drugs I HOPE I couldn’t have done what she did”, because frankly who knows what we’re capable of (though Linda Kesabian does give hope).
That said, based on many psych profiles she apparently really has changed and perhaps would be better suited to a minimum security facility or halfway-house. What I like about the Waters interview so far is that he’s not shying away from that all, and weirdly- though I know that Waters is a geek extraordinaire by his own admission and far from a cultural touchstone of normality and ethics- his vouching for her comes across as more meaningful than that of “decent folk” or psychiatrists.
Anyway, worth a read. I can’t wait for part 3. I’m also probably going to pick up his book if this is any indication of the quality.
Sometimes I’m ashamed and embarrassed because of how being a guy makes me more sympathetic towards good-looking women, and Leslie Van Houten was (and in a more mature way, still is) a damn good-looking woman. I find myself thinking (and actually kind of hoping) from time to time that maybe she should be paroled, and yet I know that if she weren’t so good-looking I wouldn’t feel that way.
Well, other than that.:smack: I should have said “I don’t know if his articles are going to be an appeal for parole” (i.e. if it’s an argument piece by the end).
He’s going to be on Anderson Cooper tonight discussing his relationship with Van Houten.
I have always liked John Waters and just finished reading those two articles linked in the OP.
I think he has done a thoughtful piece of writing, not painting some picture of “poor girl, unfairly imprisoned” but also not painting her as some newly reformed lunatic.
One question that people often ask is if prison is there to rehabilitate to put prisoners back into society, or simply keep those people away from society forever?
In Charlie Manson’s case, I think it is safe to say society will be quite happy to see him stay there until the day he dies. It gets a little trickier with the Manson women…as Waters mentions, if any one of them had killed some ordinary Joe and wife in a drug crazed murder 40 years ago, they would most likely have been paroled by now. But few who were alive back then will EVER forget the Manson rampage. It does kind of make you think if that is particularly fair - that notoriety alone will keep you from parole, whereas “normal murder” will often allow parole at some late stage in life.
Waters does a good job in this article of bringing up a lot of different viewpoints. No easy answers.
And yeah - I think I would like to read his entire book as well.
It is really not about Waters. Van Houten spent 40 years in jail and appears to be rehabbed. Because she was involved in celebrity murder does not make it a more serious crime. She served plenty of time. How many murderers have served that much time?
It’s not even the only gruesome crime involving a celebrity.
Less than a year before Sharon Tate and her guests and the Labiancas were murdered, the silent film star Ramon Novarro (something like a lower key gay male Norma Desmond- rich, reclusive, and drawn to younger men on the make) was murdered in his homeby a hillbilly rent boy and his brother. It wasn’t just your “standard home invasion” gone wrong- a 69 year old man was tied to a chair and tortured for hours to reveal where he kept the huge amount of cash in the home (which as with he Clutters of In Cold Blood simply didn’t exist- he was well off, but his money was in bank accounts and real estate and investments and, ironically, in artworks by Picasso and Mattisse and others that the killers through around looking for wall safes). They got away with a few dollars and some electronics.
They were so stupid and inept as burglars that one had called his girlfriend and talked for hours on Novarro’s phone during the murder having no idea that the police would trace the call. Not that it was necessary: any number of people had seen the hustler brother leave the gay bar with Novarro on several occasions and then he told people about the crime afterwards.
So- senseless murder involving a celebrity, albeit a faded and gay one instead of “not quite there yet” rising starlet married to a famous director. It was as senseless and cold booded a crime as Hickock and Smith were (quite deservedly imo) hanged for in Kansas. Of course there was talk of Novarro being an evil old troll luring young boys into a life of sin and degradation but I don’t think even in 1969 any jurors were that naive (though the rumors that Novarro choked to death on a dildo made from a mold of Valentino’s penis may have been inspired to get some gay panic sympathy going). Both brothers were young but had criminal records (22 and 18 or thereabouts) but were tried as adults and both were sentenced to life in prison.
Both were free by the Bicentennial (that’s 1976 for any younglings reading). Both committed violent crimes (rape, battery, and armed robbery) after their release and wound up back in prison. Both were released AGAIN; one was finally killed in a fight, and the other is serving a life sentence for rape.
However, the Novarro murder didn’t have a major bestselling book, a hit miniseries, and damned near a press agent like the Manson trials. They just had all the right elements to become a Washington Monument of American true horror stories.
Sorry to threadjack this topic but HOW IN HELL did these two habitual violent criminals already responsible for one grisly murder end up back on the street after less than ten years? Given their background, was there any surprise those two losers would go back to victimizing other people soon after being released? Was the California penal system that much of a revolving-door during that time?
She’s suspected of doing a lot more than that. For a time she lived in a house with other members of the Manson Family (post Charlie et al’s arrest) that had a body in the basement (though she was never indicted for the murder). She was suspected (but again never indicted) of having been involved in the killing of Leslie Van Houten’s attorney Ronald Hughes midway through the trial (a killing which ultimately saw Van Houten’s conviction declared a mistrial and resulted in her being free for 6 months 1977-78). She also seems on interviews to be the batshittiest crazy of the Manson Family members who aren’t Charlie and was still singing his praises (literally) as of a few years ago, so I’m very surprised she got it.
Well, at least of all the Manson family members she’s the one who has a fictional impersonation with the prettiest song.
I did a bit of research on the case this afternoon and was wrong on one thing that seems minor but is important: the younger brother, Tom, was 17 rather than 18 at the time of the murder (he was 18 at the time of the trial). The reason it makes a difference is because [he claims] his family convinced him to take the fall for the crime since he was a minor and it was figured he would be tried as such and then released, so he confessed- he did the murder, his brother Paul (22 and with a record) was just an accessory. When it was announced that the court wasn’t going to split hairs over a few weeks- he was going to be tried as an adult, and they were going to seek the death penalty. Suddenly he remembered that he didn’t do it- that his brother Paul was the murderer and he (Tom) just an accessory.
During the trial the brothers gave conflicting testimony, each indicting the other and exonerating himself, attacking each other verbally and attempting to do so physically during each other’s testimonies. Also during the trial their defense attorney referred to Novarro as “nothing but an old queer”, while the Prosecutor took a more tolerant “Mr. Novarro was a homosexual and we have reason to suspect had been one for years” but also stated that whatever debt he owed society for that he had more than paid and after all he wasn’t the one on trial. (Hard to believe this was only 40 years ago.)
Anyway, the brothers were both found guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment. The quest for the death penalty was dropped was that while both brothers freely admitted they were there that night and that they watched while Novarro was tortured and murdered, it was never really clear which one had actually done the killing. Another slight error I made above: they weren’t both free by the Bicentennial, just the younger one [Tom], who was released when Paul actually confessed in a long document to his attorney while in prison. The bigger mystery is why after Tom was released Paul was released two years later (1978) in spite of being a self admitted cold blooded killer and thief.
Once out Paul openly bragged about having killed Novarro. He was a career criminal, returning to prison for a sex offense soon after, but somehow got released again and for a while actually did pretty well for himself financially with a construction and property management business. Then he got drunk, wrecked a car, and raped the woman who helped him. He was convicted, and appealed, and while out on appeal committed another rape. Swell guy.
Ferguson was also a gorgeous guy in his youth- there are nude pics of him online from the time he was hustling Novarro- blonde Nordic looking bodybuilder (though a bonafide Kentucky and West Virginia reared hillbilly). He got fat in prison (in which he joined the Aryan groups of course, because he might be a gay for pay rentboy who murders old men for $20 but by god he was a white man).
So for Tom it was the fact he was a kid and that Paul confessed in prison to the killing that got him out. (He didn’t go straight when released, but it was perhaps semi sorta reasonable if you closed your eyes that he had the potential to do so.) For Paul being released so early (and then again, and then again) it’s still a "WTF were they thinking?
Bringing that full circle, when asked about Anita Bryant, Waters supposedly once quipped “Squeaky Fromme, where were you when we needed you?”
Waters is writing a very interesting story, no surprise given that he’s such a good storyteller. I’m intrigued to see him thinking about the whole trashy aesthetic and its implications. I guess it shows how he’s changed in recent years. But I’m impressed how honestly and thoughtfully he’s examining what she has gone through. He doesn’t let her off the hook and to her credit, she’s not letting herself off the hook either.
He was good last night in his very brief segment on AC360.
Cooper himself wasn’t the host but a substitute who kept pronouncing Van Houton (rhymes with shoutin’) as Van Hooten (rhymes with shootin’). Waters did the gentlemanly thing of, instead of saying “my friendship with Leslie began such and such” or “she and I first met when”, he said “Leslie Van Houten”[pronounced correctly but without special emphasis] “and I first began…” and then again later after she pronounced it Van Hootin again he said “an interesting thing about Leslie Van Houten is that…” or whatever. I thought this was interesting because it was what I would have done, it’s an untaught etiquette that is conveying to them “the correct pronunciation is Van HOW-ton” without outright saying it, and eventually she caught onto it. (I’ll admit things like that irritate me, because while it’s not unreasonable to not know if it’s Van Howton or Van Hooton, or JK R-Owl-ing or JK Rolling, you should ask before going on nationwide TV.)
Anyway, on the interview the host said something to the effect of “members of the Labianca family obviously have much different things to say about Leslie Van Houten” and he said without pause or qualification “and they’re correct on every single one”. When asked his opinion on whether Tex Watson or the others should be paroled he said “I’m not here to talk about them, I don’t know them”. I was really surprised; usually I only see him talk abotu his movies or on light talk shows or as a campy host so it’s surprising to see him when he’s serious, and he seems like one of the most genuinely nice and effortlessly intelligent guys on TV.
I suspect Van Houten will eventually get out, if anybody does. Can you believe that Susan Atkins requested to get released cause she was “sick”? She and Charlie are indoors for the duration.
That third woman (name escapes me as I post) has a doppleganger, by the way. I went to High-school with her, and she is now married to a cop!
