Cookie made her debut in this film, John Waters' second feature length movie. It's the story of Lady Divine and her "Cavalcade of Perversions", where suburban couples are lured into tents to gawk at various freaks ("assorted sluts, fags, dykes, and pimps") before being robbed and sometimes murdered by Divine and her gang. Cookie plays a dual role. First as a shocked housewife looking in on the Cavalcade, then comes her jucier role as "Cookie Divine", Lady Divine's daughter. She makes her first appearance dancing topless to "Jailhouse Rock" while her Weatherman boyfriend Steve (Paul Swift, the "Eggman") looks on. She relates the past few days worth of rioting and dealing to her mother, who is nothing but supportive. Cookie shows within the first minute how perfect she was for the role. Her rioting stories are told in such a deadpan, tough-as-nails way, that the casual viewer might think this was a documentary. Cookie makes every role seem real.
