Divine (performer)

His father, Harris Bernard Milstead (May 1, 1917 – March 4, 1993), after whom he was named, was one of seven children born in Towson, Maryland, to a plumber who worked for the Baltimore City Water Department.

Divine's mother, Frances Milstead (April 12, 1920 – March 24, 2009), was one of 15 children born to an impoverished Serb immigrant couple who had grown up near Zagreb (in today's Croatia) before moving to the United States in 1891.

When she was 16, she moved to Baltimore where she worked at a diner in Towson where she met Harris, a regular customer.

After marrying in 1938, they were both hired at the Black & Decker factory in Towson.

Due to muscular dystrophy, Harris was not required to join the U.S. armed forces in the Second World War; instead, he and Frances worked through the war years in what they considered "good jobs".

Frances suffered two miscarriages in 1940 and 1943.

Harris Glenn Milstead (October 19, 1945 – March 7, 1988), better known by the stage name Divine, was an American actor, drag queen and singer.

Closely associated with independent filmmaker John Waters, Divine was a character actor, usually performing female roles in cinematic and theatrical productions, and adopted a female drag persona for his music career.

Born in Baltimore, Maryland, to a conservative middle-class family, Milstead developed an early interest in drag while working as a women's hairdresser.

Divine was born as Harris Glenn Milstead on October 19, 1945, at Women's Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland.

By the time of Divine's birth in 1945, the Milsteads were affluent and socially conservative Baptists.

Describing his upbringing, Divine recollected: "I was an only child in, I guess, your upper middle-class American family. I was probably your American spoiled brat."

His parents lavished almost anything that he wanted on him, including food, and he became overweight, a condition he lived with for the rest of his life.

On his request, his parents and friends called him by his middle name, Glenn, to distinguish him from his father.

By the mid-1960s he had embraced the city's countercultural scene and befriended Waters, who gave him the name "Divine" and the tagline of: "The most beautiful woman in the world...almost."

In the mid-1960s, Milstead befriended John Waters through their mutual friend Carol Wernig; Waters and Milstead were the same age and from the same neighborhood, and both embraced Baltimore's countercultural and underground elements.

Along with friends like Waters and Lochary, Milstead began hanging out at a beatnik bar in downtown Baltimore named Martick's, where they associated with hippies and smoked marijuana, bonding into what Waters described as "a family of sorts".

At age 12, Milstead and his parents moved to the Baltimore suburb of Lutherville, where he attended Towson High School, graduating in 1963.

Bullied by other students because of his weight and perceived effeminacy, he later reminisced that he "wasn't rough and tough" but instead "loved painting and [he] always loved flowers and things".

At age 15, Milstead took a part-time job at a local florist's shop.

Several years later, he went on a diet and slimmed down from 180 to 145 lb, giving him new confidence.

When he was age 17, his parents sent him to a psychiatrist, where he first realized his sexual attraction to men as well as women, something then taboo in conventional American society.

He helped out at his parents' day care business, including dressing up as Santa Claus to entertain the children at Christmas time.

In 1963, he began attending the Marinella Beauty School, where he learned hair styling and, after completing his studies, gained employment at a couple of local salons, specializing in the creation of beehives and other upswept styles.

He eventually gave up the job and for a while was financially supported by his parents, who catered to his expensive taste in clothes and cars.

They reluctantly paid the many bills he ran up throwing lavish parties where he dressed in drag as his favorite celebrity, actress Elizabeth Taylor.

Milstead developed a large coterie of friends, among them David Lochary, who became an actor and costar in several of Divine's later films.

Along with his friend David Lochary, Milstead joined Waters' acting troupe, the Dreamlanders, and adopted female roles for their experimental short films Roman Candles (1966), Eat Your Makeup (1968), and The Diane Linkletter Story (1969).

Again in drag, he took a lead role in both of Waters' early full-length movies, Mondo Trasho (1969) and Multiple Maniacs (1970), the latter of which attracted press attention for the group.

Milstead next starred in Waters' Pink Flamingos (1972), which was a hit on the U.S. midnight movie circuit, became a cult classic, and established Milstead's fame in the American counterculture.

After starring as the lead role in Waters' next film, Female Trouble (1974), Divine moved on to theatre, appearing in several avant-garde performances alongside San Francisco drag collective The Cockettes.

He followed this with a performance in Tom Eyen's play Women Behind Bars and its sequel, The Neon Woman.

Continuing his cinematic work, he starred in two more of Waters' films, Polyester (1981) and Hairspray (1988), the latter of which represented his breakthrough into mainstream cinema and for which he was nominated for the Independent Spirit Award for Best Supporting Male.

In 1981, Divine embarked on a career in the then-wavering disco industry, performing on a number of Hi-NRG tracks, most of which were written by Bobby Orlando.

He achieved international chart success with hits like "You Think You're a Man", "I'm So Beautiful", and "Walk Like a Man", all of which were performed in drag.

Divine had a condition called cardiomegaly.

Stress on his enlarged heart led to a heart attack that killed him shortly after the release of Hairspray.

Described by People magazine as the "Drag Queen of the Century", Divine has remained a prominent figure, particularly within the LGBT community, and has provided the inspiration for fictional characters, artworks, and songs.

Independent of Waters, he also appeared in a number of other films, such as Lust in the Dust (1985) and Trouble in Mind (1985), seeking to diversify his repertoire by playing male roles.

Various books and documentary films devoted to his life have also been produced, including Divine Trash (1998) and I Am Divine (2013).