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[[quoteright:340:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Hairspray_340.jpg]]

1. The first film JohnWaters made that got PG. It was released in 1988. It starred Ricki Lake as Tracy Turnblad, Divine as her mother, and John Waters's usual repertory cast.

Tracy Turnblad is a ''[[IncrediblyLamePun huge]]'' fan of the Corny Collins Show, which is similar to AmericanBandstand. She also is a fan of big hairstyles which require hairspray to stay in place - a trend the adults disapprove of. When one of the old dancers has to leave because of pregnancy, an audition is held for a new female dancer, and Tracy gets the spot because of her talent and her exuberant personality. This leads to a chain of events that will change Baltimore forever...

2. The film eventually inspired a Broadway musical. The music was changed for this production. The original film was for the most part not a musical ''per se'', just full of music, and its songs were all DanceSensation songs of one sort or another. The musical had songs tell the story more directly. The storyline is similar to the original, but some details and some emphases were adjusted (for example, most references to Velma Von Tussle in the tropes below are from the Broadway musical or second film, as her role was greatly expanded from the original). It won eight Tony Awards, and introduced the world to Marissa Jaret Winokur (who previously was more known as the fast-food girl with Kevin Spacey in ''AmericanBeauty'').

3. The musical was successful enough that it itself was [[RecursiveAdaptation made into a film]] around 2007. It starred Nikki Blonsky as Tracy Turnblad and JohnTravolta as her mom, among an ensemble cast.

Not to be confused with ''{{Hair}}''.
----
!!Tropes
* {{Acrofatic}}: Tracy. Edna, too--she does a fair amount of fleet-footed dancing in the 2007 version. While John Travolta isn't overweight, he's wearing a lot of foam rubber padding, so his dancing is doubly impressive. 
* ActingForTwo: Divine played both Edna Turnblad and Arvin Hodgepile. Waters had to give Glen Milstead a male role because he was getting sick of doing drag for film roles. (Milstead insisted that he wasn't a drag queen in ''Hairspray'' because what drag queen would dare be so ''frumpy''?)
* ActorAllusion: Face it, Ruth Brown ''was'' Maybelle Motormouth.
* AerosolFlamethrower: Link breaks Tracy out of prison with this method in the stage show
* AlliterativeName: loads: Tracy Turnblad, Penny and Prudy Pingleton, Velma Von Tussle, Corny Collins, Link Larkin, Motormouth Maybelle, Seaweed J. Stubbs.
* AlphaBitch: Amber Von Tussle.
** LovableAlphaBitch: Although she only seems to be like that because her mother holds very high standards to her. In the end, she [[GracefulLoser accepts defeat]] and (in the musical at least) Tracy and the others are happy to invite her to [[HeelFaceTurn join in the final number]].
* AmericanAccents: If you've ever wondered what a Baltimore accent sounds like, just watch either film. Edna has an extremely strong one.
** In fact, several critics wondered why John Travolta was doing such a weird voice when his accent was fairly authentic.
* AwesomeMomentOfCrowning: [[spoiler:Inez winning Miss Teenage Hairspray]] This only happens in the movie, however.
* BeehiveHairdo: And how!
* BetaCouple: Penny and Seaweed.
* BigFun: Tracy's a rare female example.
* BigEater: Tracy, Maybelle, and Edna all fit this trope to a degree, although it's only portrayed in an unrealistically over-the-top manner in Edna's case.
* BillingDisplacement: It was advertised starring John Travolta (in drag!). Nikkie Blonsky gets an "And introducing" after the long list of all the other celebrities "starring" in the movie.
* BlondeBrunetteRedhead: Mentioned in the song "(It's) Hairspray."
* BlondesAreEvil: Velma. Amber is arrogant, but not evil.
* TheBrainlessBeauty: Link Larkin is a light, male version
* BrokenSmile: [[spoiler:Velma Von Tussle displays a perfect example when the show is finally integrated.]]
** [[spoiler:In the play anyway. In the second movie, she stays pissy throughout, probably due to losing her job.]]
* ButNotTooBlack: Nicely averted, since following the trope would have destroyed the point.
** A lot of people objected to Music/QueenLatifah's casting in the film musical because of this. But considering she's the most famous plus-sized black actress in Hollywood and her skintone is middle-ground.
* CaliforniaDoubling: Many of the Baltimore scenes were shot in Toronto.
* TheCameo: The 2007 film features several. JohnWaters, director of the 1988 film, appears as a flasher, and director Adam Shankman, composer/lyricist Mark Shaiman, co-composer/lyricist Scott Wittman and Ricki Lake (Tracy from the 1988 film) all play talent agents. The associate choreographers also make apperances.
** Not to mention, in the 1988 film, John Waters plays the psychiatrist that hypnotizes/tortures Penny.
** Also in the movie musical, Jerry Stiller, who played Wilbur Turnblad in the original movie, played Mr. Pinky, who ran a plus-sized boutique and wanted Tracy to do commercials for him when she became a hit on the Corny Collins show.
* CastingGag: In the 2007 film, Jerry Stiller plays fashion store owner Mr Pinky. Stiller played Wilbur Turnblad in the original 1988 film. Several other actors from the original and the director appear as well, see "The Cameo".
** Brittney Snow in the 2007 version essentially fulfilled the same role as Tracy in her show ''Series/AmericanDreams'' except she actually danced on AmericanBandstand.
* TheCastShowoff: Several members of the cast were picked either because their musical talents were largely unknown to the general public (Marsden, Walken, Bynes) or had simply been forgotten about in recent years (Travolta, Pfeiffer)
* CavalierCompetitor: Amber after losing; quickly in the 2007 film, gradually as "You Can't Stop The Beat" goes on in the musical. Also counts as GracefulLoser.
* CivilRightsMovement: Maybelle and the black dancers' plight.
* ClimacticMusic: "You Can't Stop the Beat", the climactic number that coincides with the climactic dance showdown.
* {{Cloudcuckoolander}}: Penny, somewhat. Tracy can come off as this too.
* ConspicuousCGI: Many of the buildings in the opening shot are CGI recreations, and it's not hard to tell that.
* ContinuityNod: The 2007 film makes several references to scenes from the 1988 movie that don't happen in the new version. During one song montage, Tracy is knocked in the head during dodge ball. One of the nasty rumors Amber tries to start is about Tracy getting put into Special Ed.
* CreatorCameo: Jon Waters as "...the flasher who lives next door." 
* CrosscastRole: Edna is always played by a man.
* CurtainClothing: An extremely subtle one: In the film, the dress Penney wears during "You Can't Stop The Beat" is made from the curtains in her room (see "Shout Out" below).
* CutSong: "The New Girl in Town" was cut from the stage musical, but put into the 2007 film. Some songs from the stage version were cut from the film, too.
* DarkHorseVictory: [[spoiler:In the 2007 film, Little Inez's victory in the Miss Teenage Hairspray contest.]]
* DarkReprise: In the Broadway musical, Tracy sings a reprise of "Good Morning Baltimore" after she finds out she won't be granted any bail.
** And while "[[VillainSong Miss Baltimore Crabs]]" was already dark, "Velma's Revenge" is much darker.
* DeadpanSnarker: Corny, big time.
** Penny has her moments as well:
--->'''Maybelle'''(after seeing that Penny and Seaweed were in love): So this is love. Well, love is a gift, but a lot of people don't remember that. So, you two better brace yourselves for a whole lotta ugly comin' at you from a neverending parade of stupid. \\
'''Penny''': So, you met my mom.
* {{Deliberate Values Dissonance}} : Many tongue in cheek examples in the 2007 film, particularly during "Welcome to the Sixties." Two pregnant women smoking and drinking martinis, a carful of children standing up on the seats, and so on. Also, the circular pins worn by a couple of the girls, that indicated a girl was a virgin. Brenda was wearing one in the "Just nine months" scene, made even more ironic by the possibility that Corny is the father (look closely, you'll see them arguing in a Funny Background Event). 
* DemotedToExtra: Poor Link doesn't get to shine in the 2007 film as much as he did in the stage show.
* DirtyCop: The lead police officer who's working for Velma in the 2007 film.
* TheDogBitesBack: The cameraman who lets the Turnblads use his camera for Velma's EngineeredPublicConfession in the 2007 film is the same one that she had belittled and threatened in the beginning of the movie.
* EngineeredPublicConfession: In the 2007 film, Velma admits to cheating to ensure her daughter the crown, to find out a camera has been on her the whole time.
* FatAndSkinny: Tracy and Penny are a gender inversion.
* FoodPorn: "Big, Blonde, and Beautiful" is this trope in song form. Then we see Maybelle's soul food spread in the movie...
* FreudianSlip: Velma von Tussle: "We've got to lead kids in the white direction...I mean...you know what I mean."
* GenkiGirl: Tracy.
* GenreSavvy: In the stage musical, Velma realizes that someone is hiding in the [[spoiler:giant hairspray can and she orders her guards to prevent anyone from touching it]]. It turns out that she is [[spoiler:WrongGenreSavvy because Edna is in the can and Tracy just comes in through the front door while the guards are distracted by guarding the can. It helps that the guards are really Motormouth Maybelle and many of the other black cast members in disguise.]]
* GettingCrapPastTheRadar (''e.g.'', "Hey, baby! You look like you could use a ''stiff'' one!" During a hairspray plug.)
** Every word that comes out of Velma Von Tussle's mouth.
** "I'm sorry, Prudy, but some of your ''personal stains'' need poundin' out with a rock!"
*** In one scene, Velma takes padding out of one girls top. ''Then'' she proceeds to reach down to a guys crotch, he then says that he can "take that out himself."
*** In the stage show, just before that, "We do NOT touch ourselves ANYWHERE while on camera!"
** The reasoning for the need for a new member for The Corny Collin's Show.
-->'''Corny:''' So how long are you going to be out?\\
'''Brenda:''' Just [[TeenPregnancy nine months]].\\
'''Corny:''' We need a girl who's just as fun lovin', but maybe not as free wheelin'! ''(wink)''
** From Velma's villain song-
-->"Those poor runners up might still hold some grudges, they padded their cups but I screwed the judges!"
** How about Velma's title as [[WhiteDwarfStarlet Miss Baltimore]] ''[[TheDiseaseThatShallNotBeNamed Crabs?]]'' Considering that she screwed the judges, she might have... ''picked up something'' from one of them.
*** From the 2007 film: "I risked communicable diseases, she'll definitely risk prison." 
** One of the lines of music from the HIGH SCHOOL script of the stage show, though oddly, not on the album.
-->'''Velma:''' (to Tracy) With your form and your face, well, it isn't your fault. You're just caught with a case of Miss... Baltimore Crabs!
** There's one in the "New Girl in Town" song.
-->"We're kinda sad and blue,\\
yes it's true girl\\
We'd like to say... [two {{Beat}}s]\\
to the new girl in town"
** The chorus of Seaweed's song is entirely about this, with tons of WhereDaWhiteWomenAt implications.
** In "Timeless To Me", the final line on the album's version is Edna saying "Wilbur, honey, let's take this upstairs". In the script, the reprise includes the lines "You're rounding third base now" / "Holy cow!".
** In the dodgeball scene, Seaweed comments on how Peny's gum-chewing must "make the muscles in [her] mouth mighty strong".
** Just before "Run And Tell That", Seaweed has this little gem, which somehow made it into the high school version of the script:
-->'''Penny:''' The nurse is out sick, but look what Seaweed found!\\
'''Seaweed:''' Band-aids and Q-tips! And a rubber. No, I guess that's mine.
** From "Ladies' Choice":
-->'''Link:''' Hey little girl take me off the shelf/'Cause it's hard having fun playing with yourself'
*** That whole song is really just one DoubleEntendre.
-->'''Link:''' I'm the prettiest package you ever did see/Take me home and then unwrap me...
** In the 2007 musical, there is a shot of Penny's mother reading aloud from the Bible during the opening of the pageant. The passage she's reading happens to be about Lot's daughters conspiring to get him drunk and have sex with him.
* GirlishPigtails: Penny.
* GracefulLoser: In the second movie, Amber was surprisingly mature about her defeat, indicating CharacterDevelopment.
** She and her mother ''both'' become graceful losers in the stage show as well, after much sulking, they give in and realize that they "can't stop the beat". See HeelFaceTurn below.
* HappilyMarried: Edna and Wilbur
* HeelFaceTurn: Amber and Velma in the musical; just Amber seems to get one in the film (walking out on her mother and getting along with a black dancer), even after the unnecessary HumiliationConga.
* [[HenpeckedHusband Henpecked Boyfriend]]: Link is henpecked by his girlfriend Amber.
* TheHeroDies: Definitely doesn't happen in the musical or the movie, but the final lines of the song "New Girl in Town" imply that the new girl mentioned in the lyrics (Tracy?) was ran over by a moving van and died:
-->Hey, look out for that moving van\\
Look out, look out, look out, look out!\\
[{{Beat}}]\\
She was the new girl in... town!
* HistoricalInJoke: When Penny rushes to show the Turnblads Tracy's TV debut, Edna misunderstands and thinks she's trying to show them the footage of John Glenn's space trip. She chastises her, saying "Oh, I've seen it! It's all some studio out in Hollywood. Do they really expect me to believe he's up there?"
** In the stage version, it's "Oh no, don't tell me Khrushchev has his shoes off again!"
* [[HotGuyUglyWife Hot Guy, Average Wife]]
* HumiliationConga: In the 2007 movie, [[spoiler:Amber has Tracy steal her thunder and her boyfriend, gets hoisted above the set, tears her dress getting down, and loses her crown to a child on live TV]]. And then she's surprisingly good natured about it in the end, possibly making this a subversion. Played straight with Velma, though, whose humiliation is more thorough and ''not'' taken well.
* ITakeOffenseToThatLastOne:
-->'''Link Larkin:''' I shoulda been there, beside her. I can't sleep. I can't eat...\\
'''Edna Turnblad:''' You can't eat? Well, come on in and worry with us. I'll make you some pork.
** Or, in the stage version,
-->'''Link:''' I couldn't sleep, I couldn't eat, I couldn't even concentrate!\\
'''Tracy:''' You couldn't eat?
* IWantSong: "Good Morning Baltimore" and "I Can Hear The Bells".
* ImplausibleDeniability: Edna refuses to believe that First Lady Jackie Kennedy's hairstyle has anything to do with hairspray.
-->"I believe it is just naturally stiff."
* ImprobableHairstyle
* InformedAbility: Inez's dancing in the 2007 movie. [[spoiler:She's not appreciably better than the rest of the talented cast, yet we're supposed to believe that she alone was impressive enough to win Miss Teen Hairspray after just one (short) dance. It's implied she won because she was the only black contestant (ever) and the whole community voted for her, even though there'd still be alot of racism in the community, making this very improbable.]]
** [[spoiler:Inez's age could may have been a factor. She can hold her own with kids significantly older than her. Plus, she is adorable and people like kids.]]
* {{Jerkass}}: Velma Von Tussle in the musical and even more so in it's film adaptation (where she's less LaughablyEvil), and Amber Von Tussle for a good while due to emulating her mother.
** The whole Von Tussle family takes this to ridiculously extreme levels in the original 1988 film. Tracy and (especially) Edna have their moments there too, in stark contrast to the kind people they are in the musical and 2007 film.
* JerkWithAHeartOfGold: Corny Collins is very smarmy and egotistical ("The only thing better than Hairspray...that's ''me!''), but his [[ReasonableAuthorityFigure heart is shown to be in the right place]].
* LaserGuidedKarma: Velma Von Tussle get struck by this at the end of the 2007 movie.
* LeanAndMean: "[[VillainSong I never drank one chocolate malt / No desserts for Miss Baltimore Crabs]]..."
** "[[HoneyTrap I bet you're tired of heavy lifting / Get your hands on something small]]."
* TheMakeover: Tracy and Edna get one in "Welcome to the Sixties"; Tracy gets another [[spoiler:when she crashes the beauty contest.]]
** Penny gets one in the finale as well, and Edna [[spoiler:comes out of the Hairspray Can in the musical with clothing she made herself.]]
* MorningRoutine: The 2007 movie starts with one. The musical too, but in less detail.
* [[NiceGuy Nice Girl]]: Tracy, of course. Plus Penny too.
* NiceGuy: Link.
* NiceJobBreakingItHero: When Tracy participates at the march and hits a cop on the head with her sign and runs away, it gives Velma a good opportunity to stop Tracy from participating in the pageant by having the same police guard the entrance,[[spoiler: making Tracy and the others devise a plan to sneak into the pageant. If Tracy had been bailed out along with Maybelle, she wouldn't have had to hide from the cops and sneak into the pageant!]]
* NiceJobFixingItVillain: After Amber [[spoiler: loses the Miss Teenage Hairspray Competition, Velma then admits to Amber that she rigged the votes. Edna then informs Velma that her confession was broadcasted on camera, which causes Velma to lose her job.]]
* NoCelebritiesWereHarmed: The Dynamites (The Supremes), Corny Collins (Dick Clark)
** Actually, Corny Collins was ''explicitly'' based on [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddy_Deane_Show Buddy Deane]].
* NotSoDifferent: Tracy, Penny, and Amber all have radically different personalities, but are the same when it comes to their mother issues, as shown in the "Mama, I'm a big girl now" number.
* OneHeadTaller: Inverted with Penny and Seaweed. She is noticeably taller than him.
* ParentalHypocrisy: In the 2007 version, Penny's mother, Prudy, forbids Penny from watching the Corny Collins Show, yet Prudy watches the show herself.
* ThePlan: How the main characters get Tracy into the Miss Teenage Hairspray pageant in the end of the stage musical and newer movie.
* PoliticallyIncorrectVillain: Velma Von Tussle is quite blatantly racist in the second movie, where she seems to revel in her own misdeeds. In the first film, she's more of a [[SelfishGoodSelfishEvil Lawful Selfish]] StageMom who's willing to court segregationist attitudes to look respectable.
* PopularIsDumb: The openly embraced creed of the Nicest Kids in Town:
-->''Who cares about sleep, when you can snooze in school?''\\
''You'll never get to college but you sure look cool!''\\
''Don't need a cap or a gown''\\
''When you're the Nicest Kids in Town!''
* ReasonableAuthorityFigure: Corny Collins, the dance show host, who is very open to bending the rules and doing away with segregation.
* RecursiveAdaptation: From movie to Broadway musical and back again.
* RoseTintedNarrative
* RunningGag: In the first film, the kids run into a beatnik couple, and the woman says she uses a straightening iron to get her hair so silky. This leads to a couple scenes where the girls are using a ''[[LiteralMinded clothing]]'' iron to straighten their hair complete with laying their heads on an ironing board [[hottip:*: the electric flat iron wasn't available commercially to buy until the 1990s, so women in the [[ShownTheirWork sixties did use their clothing iron to straighten their hair]].
** This is given a subtle shout-out in the second movie at the end, where Tracey and Penny have straightened their hair for the big show as if out of protest.
* SassyBlackWoman: Motormouth Maybelle, the Dynamites
* SavvyGuyEnergeticGirl: Link and Tracy.
* ShallowLoveInterest: Link in the original 1988 film, and to a lesser extent in the 2007 film. Delibarately subverted in the stage musical, where his CharacterDevelopment is about stopping being a shallow tool and doing things for himself.
* ShoutOut: For the 2007 film, director Adam Shankman included several homages to and winks at the films that were his inspiration. The opening shot is a mix of the opening shots for ''Film/WestSideStory'' and ''TheSoundOfMusic''. Penny's dress at the end of the film is made from her curtains, just like the Von Trapp childrens' play clothes that Maria makes out of old curtains in ''The Sound of Music''. Several of Tracy's scenes - such as her ride atop the garbage truck - are taken from the Barbra Streissand film version of ''FunnyGirl''. Link singing to Tracy's photograph, which sings back, is directly inspired from ''The Broadway Melody of 1938'', in which JudyGarland sings to a photo of Clark Gable.
** The stage musical contains a few references to {{Gypsy}}. In the beginning, these references were quite timely, as Hairspray premiered on Broadway in the same season as a revival of Gypsy starring Bernadette Peters. By the time Hairspray closed, these references would again become timely, as a new revival starring Patti [=LuPone=] had just started its run.
* SidekickSong: "Run and Tell That" and "Big, Blonde, and Beautiful"
** Depending on whether or not you think of Wilbur and Edna as leads, "Timeless To Me", as well.
* SingleWomanSeeksGoodMan: A {{gender inverted}} version with Link and Tracy.
** Similarly inverted with Seaweed and Penny
* SmallNameBigEgo: Amber,[[spoiler: at first]] and Velma.
* SmarmyHost: Corny is a borderline example.
* SmugSnake: Velma in the 2007 film.
* StigmaticPregnancyEuphemism: Dancer Brenda must take time off from Corny's show, thus prompting the audition. How long will she be gone? "[[TeenPregnancy Just nine months...]]"
* TakeThat:
-->'''Tracy:''' Where do you go after special ed?\\
'''Everybody:''' Congress!
* ThemeTwinNaming: Noreen and Doreen (who only appear in the 2007 movie)
* TheThemeParkVersion: Of TheSixties, particularly the anti-segregation movement. [[TropesAreNotBad Doesn't mean the movie's bad, though]].
* TookALevelInKindness: Tracy and Edna could be pretty surly and offputting on several occasions in the original film (Edna in particular due to being played by Divine, the inspiration for [[Disney/TheLittleMermaid Ursula]], and it shows), but are very nice people in the musical.
* UglyHeroGoodLookingVillain: The Turnblads and the Von Tussles, except that Tracey's not exactly ugly.
* WeightWoe: Edna has to work through this.
* WhatCouldHaveBeen: James Marsden beat out his X-Men co-star HughJackman and [[NSync Joey McIntyre]] for the part of Corny Collins.
** Queen Latifah won out over Aretha Franklin.
** Christopher Walken was chosen over Billy Crystal.
** Mamie Van Doren was originally picked for Velma in the original film.
* WhereDaWhiteWomenAt?: Seaweed and Penny.
** Implied with [[spoiler:Amber at the end of the film. She can be seen making eyes at one of the black dancers and then, after walking away from her mother, chit chatting coyly with him in the finale.]]
* WhiteDwarfStarlet: Velma Von Tussle, who never lets anyone forget that she was once [[VillainSong Miss Baltimore Crabs]].
* WoundedGazelleGambit: Velma pulls this when she's trying to hit on Wilbur and Edna walks in.
* WritersCannotDoMath: According to the script, the show begins in "early June" on a Monday and ends on June 6th, 1962. Schools did not run into June in 1962, especially in Baltimore, because there was no air conditioning and it was oppressively hot and humid.
* VillainSong: In addition to Velma's "Miss Baltimore Crabs" above, Amber gets "Cooties" or "New Girl in Town". The other members of the Corny Collins Show council contribute to all of these, as well.
----
<<|TheatricalProductions|>>
<<|{{Film}}|>>

15th Dec '12 4:43:24 PM captainpat

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zero context examples and questionable examples for this trope are being purged. Please remember a Big Beautiful Woman a female character who is fat and portrayed as attractive. Examples must make both of those things clear.

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14th Dec '12 7:28:22 PM IlVit

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Removing a subjective example and fixing a typo

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14th Dec '12 7:27:21 PM IlVit

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29th Nov '12 8:55:48 PM SparkyYoungUpstart

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