Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast - Mini #128: "The History of the Playboy Clubs" with author Patty Farmer

Episode Date: September 7, 2017

This week: Jim, Jake and Joan! Charlie Callas hops a flight! Hef goes to bat for Dick Gregory! And Gilbert visits the Playboy Mansion! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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And this is, let me see if I'll fuck up the title, Gilbert and Frank's Amazing Colossal Obsession. You are a pro's pro. That's what you are. And who do we have here today, Mr. Godfrey? Today, with us, we have Patty Farmer, whose new book is Playboy Labs. That's it.

The comedy, comedians, and cartoons of Playboy Labs. That's it. The comedy, comedians, and cartoons of Playboy. Colossal Obsessions. Patty, welcome. Hi, thanks for inviting me. Of course. Now, we were talking. By the way, off the record, and it's on the mic, Patty said that she worked with the singer Julie Budd.

Oh, yes. She interviewed Julie Budd for the book, and Julie Budd worked with a million comics. And what did Julie Budd say about comedians? Julie Budd said, you're all very peculiar. How do you respond, Gilbert? Oh, I'm totally normal. How can you respond?

That's exactly. She made that face. You know, they're all very peculiar. She says they're not a laugh a minute off stage. Oh, that's so untrue in his case. Peculiar. And what was some of the things she was saying? Like, well, number one, the insecurity.

Exactly. She talked about Charlie Callis and opening for him and then looking at him over breakfast. And, you know, he was like, well, is this funny? You know, the way I eat my cereal, is that funny? Could I do something with this? And she's like, I'm 13 years funny? You know, the way I eat my cereal, is that funny? Could I do something with this? And she's like, I'm 13 years old, you know, leave me alone. I had an experience on a plane where I was sitting toward the back of the plane and the stewardess, like an Asian stewardess, came up to me and she goes, oh, you know, she recognized me.

And she goes, oh, you're Gilbert Caffrey. She goes, Charlie Karras is on the play. Go up and say hello to Charlie Karras. And I said, well, I've never met him before. I don't want to. And she walks away and comes back and says, oh, Jerry can't say, tell Godfrey Gale's fucking ass up here. And I witnessed this. It was great. And I mean, the flight was terrific because he was joking. You rode on a plane with Charlie Gale.

You flew on a plane with Charlie Kell. You flew on a plane with Charlie Kell. It was like, and it was like LA to New York, which is like six hours. And he's joking and doing voices. Wow. Sound effects. It's like the greatest flight ever. And then we're talking, we're carrying our luggage and he goes, hey, where are you from? And I go, Brooklyn. And he goes, hey, where are you from? And I go, Brooklyn.

He goes, yeah, me too. Typical childhood, playing stickball in the street and making the kids laugh. And then them telling me I should be in show business. And first time you're on stage is the greatest feeling in the world. And then there's a pause. Callis looks at me and he goes, and then you wake up one day and you go, I'm not funny. Wow. Out of the blue. Yeah. Yeah.

So after an hour, it's five hours of entertaining you, the insecurity comes to the surface. Yes. Fascinating. Yeah. So Julie was right. Yeah. Absolutely. They were all case studies. So Patty, how did you become a showbiz historian? Kind of like us. Well, I've always loved it and my background's business, but about 10 years ago, there was no

business all of the sudden, you know, the big recession or as my people, the Irish say, you know, the trouble years. We hit the recession and I didn't have anything to do. So I was able to feed this obsession of mine. And I realized I was living over at the plaza and there used to be a nightclub there, the Persian room. And I was curious, you know, I loved history, went to the management, wanted to look through their archives, and they said they had no archives. And now the plaza turns 110 this year and they don't have any archives. And they told me that was because, you know, Conrad Hilton and Zsa Zsa Gabor owned it at one time and President Trump and Ivanka owned it at one time. And when each owner

left, they took whatever they wanted with them. You know, the Marilyn Monroe photographs, the Beatles memorabilia, you know, all this history. So having nothing to do, I just put it back together and started calling people, Diane Carroll, Leslie Gore, Patty Page. You just picked up the phone and started calling people and you put this history together. Yeah. Wow. And you were living in the plaza like that girl in the children's book, Eloise. Eloise. Yes.

Yes. So this was a, you are a real life Eloise. Eloise. Yes. Yes. So this was a, you are a real life Eloise. Well, I don't know about that, but talking to Diane Carroll, she claims her daughter was the black Eloise. That's interesting. And this was your first book. Right. And I was really surprised how many people agreed to talk to me.

And it wasn't, you know, husbands. It was not that anybody is a husband, but, you know, it was Jack Jones and Diane Carroll and Polly Bergen and Celeste Holmes, all these people sat down and, you know, spent the afternoon. A lot of them became friends and told me stories. That's cool. Yeah. Yeah. Well, we're always surprised when people agree to do our show. We're similarly surprised. You can walk out any time.

We're used to it. And then you decided to do a book about the history of the Playboy Clubs. I did, only because I was doing all this other history, and people kept telling me stories. You know, when I was at the Playboy Club, you know, I did this and did that. And I had never really thought much of Playboy other than, you know, the first thing that pops into everybody's minds, you know, bunnies and centerfolds. But once I did some research, what surprised me was that in over 50 years of people writing about Playboy, writing about the bunnies, writing about the Centerfolds, writing about Hugh Hefner, the Girls Next Door, everything else,

nobody ever wrote about the entertainers, the musicians and singers and comedians that came out of the Playboy TV shows and the clubs. And there's a lot of history there, so it's surprising that nobody really ever... Gil, did you ever play any of the Playboy clubs no your travels no never interesting did a playboy club and and you said that there was like basically a law at the playboy clubs that the comics couldn't date any of the bunnies absolutely that was the big uh the big rule uh but you know, put comics and bunnies together and what do you think is going to happen?

You know, you have Lou Alexander getting a trophy at the Chicago Club for dating the most bunnies and Rich Little telling stories. He told a story in the book about dating the bunnies. Tom Dreesen, too. Exactly. There's a couple of different stories in the book of comics breaking the rules. If I worked at the Playboy Club, I'd be back in my hotel whacking off. You wouldn't have pursued any of the bunnies? No, I'd failed miserably.

So this is interesting, too. The first club opened in Chicago in 1960, and it was based on another club in chicago on the gaslight club right that was the the genesis of it that was uh playboy magazine wrote an article about the gaslight clubs and heff's second in charge went to him and uh told him we have all these letters you know which we're talking 1958 59 and the letters you guys you know, which we're talking 1958, 59. And the letters, you guys, you know, would actually write letters pre-internet. You'd write them out, address an envelope, put a stamp on them and send them in. And it was Playboy's custom. They would answer every one. But Victor said to

Hef, he said, you know, I'm going to have to hire more girls to answer all these letters because they had gotten over 3,000 letters about this Gaslight Club. So Hef and Victor were just kicking back and they kind of looked at each other the same time and said, you know, why the hell are we promoting another guy's club? You know, I wish we had our own club. And it was really as simple as that. You know, they kind of said, well, yeah, we know about entertainment and we know about waitresses, but we don't know bumpkiss about the restaurant business. And Victor said, I know a buddy down the street who does. And so they went down to Arnie Morton's place and, you know, all young guys in their twenties at this time. Of the Morton Steakhouse place. And, you know, all young guys in their 20s at this time.

Of the Morton Steakhouse fame. Right. You know, later on, he opened the steakhouse chain. But at that time, they're in their 20s, sitting around, said, let's do it. They each threw in $10,000, and they started the Playboy Club. Imagine that, Gil. And have you ever posed for Playboy? And why would you ask that?

Because I want to see how familiar I am with you indirectly. Just because you saw the previous guest naked. Bill Macy. But I thought you read it for the articles. Yeah, he does. He does. And it was the

rabbit-headed, the metal key became a status symbol. It really did. And Dick Gregory, one of the early comedians that performed there, unfortunately, yeah, we're losing a lot. Irwin Corey, too.

Irwin Corey was the first comic to play the Playboy Clubs. Yeah. I met Dick Gregory at the you have no roast i bet that was fabulous were you there in person yeah i i was there i was sitting with him and and i did the aristocrats there and afterwards dick gregory came over to me and complimented me, and he shakes my hand tightly and he goes, and I want to thank you for your beautiful mind.

Isn't that nice? Yeah. What a nice compliment. And we never got Dick Gregory on this show. No. Well, I didn't want to rush it. I wish I could kick myself more. It's interesting, too, the stuff about in the book about Hefner being

so progressive when it comes to somebody like Dick Gregory. Definitely. Well, that was really Hef for he was all about civil rights, you know, First Amendment rights, even women's rights, which, you know, he gets a bad rep there, but he was all about freedom to do whatever you wanted, gay rights, whatever. But concerning Dick Gregory, we were operating in segregated America, 1960, pre-Civil Rights Act of 64. And he put Dick Gregory in front of an all white audience. And not only that, it was meat packers from Alabama. Yeah, it's one of the book's best stories. And I don't want to ruin the story, but a 40-minute act turned into three hours.

Yeah, it's a great story. I remember at the roast, every other comic's roasting him and tearing him apart, Hugh Hefner. And when Dick Gregory got up, he didn't have anything bad, even jokingly, to say about Hugh Hefner. He was just honoring him. Yeah, he looked out for him. He publicly credits him with helping to break the color barrier. But that was Hefner. He did that even before the clubs on his TV show. He put Nat King Cole on the TV show and had a lot of blowback, you know, 1959 to have a black man, even at the height of his popularity, sit down, which he did on the TV show. On Playboy's Penthouse? Yeah. The first show. Before Playboy, after Dark.

Right, right. He sat down with Rona Jaffe, who was a white woman, and they talked literature. And the next day at Playboy, the networks and the sponsors threatened to pull the show, pull advertising, and Hefner didn't back down. Well, these are the days when people went insane because Harry Belafonte touched Petula Clark on primetime television. We will return to Gilbert Gottfried's amazing colossal podcast after this. With new Olay Indulgent Moisture Body Wash, you can lather and glow. The 24-hour moisturizing body wash is infused with vitamin B3 complex and has notes of rose and cherry creme for a rich indulgent experience.

Treat your senses with new Olay Indulgent Moisture Body Wash. Buy it today at major retailers. Hey Ontario, got any plans? How about a trip to the casino right here, right now? at major retailers. the excitement of the casino floor right on your phone. Download the app and play whatever, wherever, and whenever. Your options for fun are endless. On DraftKings Casino, your way is the only way to play. Join the fun on your time, in your space, and within your means. The best part is it's safe, secure, and reliable. So deposits and withdrawals happen when you're ready.

Go all in on fun with DraftKings Casino. Head to the app store to download. Explore a full suite of games and find your favorites today draft kings casino the crown is yours gambling problem call connex ontario 1-866-531-2600 19 and over and physically present in ontario eligibility restrictions apply see casino.draftkings.com for details please play responsibly and now back to the show uh i remember it's like back then like the late 60s and the feminist movement was at its peak and and they all i mean the one person they all hated of course was you hefner that's right but you know hef in the early 60s in the magazine was the first one to champion women's rights, to champion pro-choice. He wrote about pro-choice. He wrote about making

the pill available, probably had some nefarious thoughts there. But, you know, he really was for freedom of choice, women's rights, and he gets a bad rep for that. That's interesting. And also, as far as the civil rights and him being active, he bought two of his clubs back. Exactly. At a huge loss to Playboy. Right. And just to explain to our listeners, because the clubs were run by the franchise, the people who manage them. Right, right. Or own them, I guess. It was a franchisee arrangement, which was a brilliant idea of Heff's.

You know, that was not something that was common in 1960. That was a brand new concept. And he wanted to expand the clubs rapidly, the circuit of clubs. So he opened Miami and New Orleans with partners, with franchise partners, not even thinking they would enforce the segregation laws. But they did. And Hefner was shocked and dismayed and bought them back within months of them opening for triple what they had purchased the rights for. Yeah, that's fascinating. It's one of the fascinating things in the book. And Dick Gregory never forgot him for it, for helping him. And another guy he championed was Lenny Bruce.

Definitely. The first comic on his TV show. Lenny was hysterical. I'm sure you saw that bit, you know, about the tattoo and his aunt. But, you know, he tried to help him. You know, I don't think anybody could save Lenny from himself. But nevertheless, he sent his playboy lawyers around the country defending defending his First Amendment rights. Now, I just got a flashback of, and I don't remember anything of it, of course, where when they were cracking down on Hugh Hefner, I guess the government or whatever, and there was a young woman who worked for Hefner, whose life was destroyed. Right, right. And I'm going to get her name totally mixed up.

But it was his personal assistant. And they came after her on drug charges and wanted to flip her into ratting on Hefner, which she didn't. Which she claimed until she committed suicide. He had no involvement with drugs. But that really destroyed Hefner, and some credit it with bringing on his first heart attack. So they basically drove her to suicide. What about the mob? He had to sit down with a mob too early on in the game because the mobs were so entangled and involved with nightclubs. Definitely. And how did he handle that? Nobody really believes that Playboy could

stay out of the mob world. You know, the mob, 1960s, Chicago, New York, Miami. Of course, you're in bed with the mob. But the way Hef and Victor Lowndes tell it was that early on, when they started expanding, Hef did have a visit from certain family members. And they sat down and put forth the idea that Hef should be partners with them. And Hef, in that calm way, you know, if you've ever spoken to him, he's just very, reduces everything just down to the simple. And he looked at them and he said, I have the eyes of the federal government, all local government, and the Catholic Church on me constantly trying to close me down.

Do you really think I'm the best partner to be involved with? And that was something they understood, and they said, you're totally right, and they left. How about that, Gil? Yeah. He managed to keep them out of the equation. How many clubs in the heyday? There was Miami, New Orleans, New York. How many more? Atlanta heyday? There was Miami, New Orleans, New York. How many more?

Atlanta. There's a prize. There's a prize for naming them all. No, there was 42 worldwide, worldwide, which was a great circuit. The comedians loved it. Jerry Van Dyke told me he worked for years just doing the circuit 40 weeks year, until he was good enough to move up to the next level. And, you know, he got discovered at a Playboy Club, at the Miami Playboy Club. Earl Wilson came in, saw him, wrote a column. Earl's Pearls. Yep. Yeah, yeah. The list of comics that did the clubs is just, you know, and I was saying some of the people we've had on this show,

Shecky, Rich Little, Larry Storch, but also you'll love these names, Jackie Vernon, Jackie Gale, Shelley Berman, John Beiner, who we had here, Howard Storm. And they loved the clubs. They loved performing for, working for Hefner. Definitely. There were different groups. You know, you had the up-and-comers, you know, and even Joan Rivers starting out. She told me, she said, you know, I wasn't hatched out of an egg as a headliner.

She said I started at the Playboy Club as part of a trio. Did you know that she was part of a trio, Joan Rivers? I mean, I had just read that recently. Isn't that interesting? I didn't know. In my book, right? Yes. Yes.

That actually is the case. And the book, again, is Playboy Laughs. What was the name of the trio that she was in? Jim, Jake, and Joan. And what happened to Jim and Jake? They got kicked to the curb. Okay. They got kicked to the curb.

Jim, Jake, and Joan. I can't believe I didn't know this. Joan told me she was the glue that held them all together. And finally, the infighting, she said she didn't need it. And she moved up to stand-up, and then she moved up to headliner, all the while staying with Playboy. She came back at all different stages. She loved Playboy. Now, I've only been in my career to one Playboy party. And about as far as I can explain the party, about the most wild thing was girls in body paint.

Were you at the mansion? Yeah. Okay. You didn't see them Were you at the mansion? Yeah. Okay. You didn't see them swimming naked in the bar? No, nothing. I mean, I don't remember much going on. Was James Caan there? Wait a minute.

Wait a minute. James Caan wasn't there. Peter Sellers wasn't there. Tony Curtis. Robert Culp wasn't there. Bill Cosby. Bill Cosby? Bill Cosby? That makes a whole other person.

That's a different kind of party. Now, I heard at one time, like the year I went and those years around it, stuff had quieted down at the Playboy parties. Was that during the years that Hef got married? Maybe. Might have been, you know, because he got married to Kimberly Conrad. Right. And those kids are actually running Playboy now. They're all grown up. But during those years, the bunny crossing was changed to, you know, kids at play. I remember reading that. The people would go to the match and they'd be disappointed to see a stroller in the corner.

Yes. Or a big wheel. Timing. It's bad timing. At one time, it really was wild. Oh, definitely. Definitely. What was going on at the Playboy parties?

What wasn't going on? From what everybody tells me, it was the swinging 60s. You know, and everything you thought that would be. You know, naked girls, later on girls on roller skates. Are we talking about the mansion now or some of the clubs? The mansion. Okay. Was that what you were asking?

Yes. The mansion. And conversely, Hef kept the clubs very clean. Because you allude to that in the book. Was there a second floor in the clubs? No, definitely not. He kept them clean, even like George Carlin was there and a good friend of Hef's until he got to the seven words you couldn't say on TV. Oh, yeah, that's one of the interesting things in the book, Gil.

They were encouraged to work clean. Yes, yes. And then Carlin and Richard Pryor and people like that were coloring outside the lines and they had to go. And Heffner said to Carlin, you know, you're my best friend. I love you, but you can't work in my clubs anymore. Exactly. He said, I'll come and see you somewhere

else. But, you know, he wanted to keep the clubs clean. He wanted the three martini lunch generation to be able to come and do their business deals and then bring their girlfriends back on Friday night, maybe their wife on Saturday night. But, you know, have it a clean place where people just came and had fun, looked at the bunnies. They were a novelty. Right, Disneyland for adults. Exactly. They had to get dressed up.

I mean, it's already pretty common knowledge now, but Gloria Steinem became a Playboy bunny for a while. Yeah, she wrote an article about it. Yeah, she went undercover to expose the terrible conditions the bunnies lived under. But I have to tell you, I interviewed scores of bunnies and nobody complained about it. They loved working it. They loved the money. Interesting. It was a lot of college girls, a lot of young mothers. Oh God, what's her name? I forget her first name, Bon Jovi. I used to bring her little son to work with her. She was a young mother and when her babysitter flaked on her, she would bring her child to work and he'd

sit in the kitchen, grew up to be uh john bon jovi you know that's oh interesting his mom was oh i i know the one you're talking about and i forget her name too yeah her first name john bon jovi's mom was a playboy bunny in new york waitress i picture her in my head interesting and a former marine so uh you know a former marine young mother and explain what a bunny mother was too a bunny mother was uh you have to realize we're back in the day when you could tell girls they uh were too old and too fat and you know all the other things so once you had a few years on you uh and it was deemed that you could not be a bunny anymore and you were well thought of by the management and the girls, you moved up to be the bunny mother.

And more or less, she enforced the rules, made sure your stocking seams were straight and your uniform was clean and monitored the bunnies. And Victor Lown's girlfriend was the one that came up with the idea of the bunnies in the first place? One of his girlfriends. Yes. Yes. And well, she came up with the outfit. Victor Lowns, who, as you said, was Hefner's second in command.

Right. Now, I heard James Caan, when he got a divorce, got over his heartbreak. We can all sympathize with him. got over his heartbreak. Yes. We can all sympathize with him. The only way he could deal with his heartbreak by living at the Playboy Mansion. Yes. And to top things off, he had his little boy with him.

And I heard he would say to his little boy, you know, he'd look out the window and say, you know, get me that redhead by the pool. Really? Say I want to talk to her. Is that the guy that's on Hawaii Five-0 now? I think so. Wow. We need to talk to him.

We've got to interview him. We need to talk to him. Wow, we need to talk to him. We've got to interview him. We need to talk to him. I heard he used to have his boy as a messenger, and the bunnies would say, oh, that's so cute. And then, of course, he was Sonny Corleone. I mean, my God. Yeah.

There's also some great stories. What I gravitated to in the book was the stories about the comics and the heckling and the great heckling stories. I mean, and Dick Gregory was abused to the point where, how did he practice before he went to the club? Well, every night before he went to the Playboy Club or any other club, while his wife was, you know, ironing his shirt, she would heckle him, but heckle him with the most vile racial slurs you could imagine. You imagine that, Gilbert? Just so that he was warmed up.

To prep him. To prep him. He would scream racial slurs and indignities and things at him while he was prepping at home. Oh, my God. You and Dara should try that. Yeah. Dara does scream anti-black remarks to me. No, she just says you're so odd.

She would do that. She just says you're peculiar. She yells racist things at me. So eventually, you know, the heyday starts to come to an end, and the end is near. And the last club winds up closing in, what, 1988? Right, right. The last American club, U.S. club.

Personally, I think they went longer than they really should have. Right. They were really great to be that bridge from the nightclubs of the 50s that were waning to the comedy clubs of the 70s, you know, that were coming up, the Improv and Comedy Club. But they went a little bit longer than that because Playboy had more money than God, and they could keep them going for as long as they wanted. Yeah, they really didn't want to give it up, to give up the ghost.

I mean, if you read the book, they just keep doubling down, even though kind of the time is working against them. You know, Playboy and Disco, they were kind of the time is working against them you know playboy and disco they they were kind of uh they didn't mix and and and would you happen to know the name of the person recently who decided let's have playboy without the nudity wasn't that crazy i mean yeah yeah that was uh cooper brought it back oh cooper yeah cooper brought it back uh just a couple months ago right yeah but i was good for publicity anyway it sounded very much like new coke yeah they changed the recipe then everyone's going my God, we want our classic Coke back. And then when they came back, it was like Jesus returning. It could be.

But they were gone for a year. And they also did away with the comics, you know, the cartoons, which was a big part of the magazine. And also, whose idea was it to put in that old lady cartoon? Oh, that was. The what? That grossed me out. There was old lady cartoon. Oh, that was. The what? That grossed me out. There was a recurring card. Annie Fanny, right?

Granny Fanny? Yes. No, no, Granny. Granny, right, right. They turned Little Annie Fanny into a granny? No, Little Annie Fanny. My mistake, right? Little Annie Fanny was one of those cartoons.

The great Harvey Kurtzman. I whacked it too. Now, which I think you should know. Way too much information. Yes, but they had the granny ones with like an old lady with sagging breasts. I don't. And I found it so gross. Wow, shame on me for not knowing that.

But Little Annie Fanny, I like. Little Annie Fanny is iconic. Right, right. And that was Harvey Kurtzman. The great Harvey Kurtzman. But it turned out to be I like Little Annie Fanny. Right, right. And that was Harvey Kurtzman. The great Harvey Kurtzman. But it turned out to be actually like an assembly line. He couldn't get it done. That's right.

It was such a work of art that he couldn't get it done. And in the book, I tell, you know, some hysterical antics trying to get it done. Hefner brought in Arnie Roth. That's right. And Al Jaffe and Davis and a bunch of them just get out this cartoon. Well, and Hefner wanted to be a cartoonist himself. So he had a fondness for these people. He did.

And for cartooning. And that's part of your book. I mean, it's not just about – it's the history of the clubs, but it's also about – it's Playboy's really, the history of humor in Playboy. So there's a section of the book where you go into the cartoon, it's like Roth, like Jaffe, Jack Cole we were talking about before we turned the mics off. Antonio Vargas. Antonio Vargas, Dane Wilson. Yeah, Al Jaffe. But, you know, Hefner did want to be a cartoonist, and he was good, but he wasn't good enough. He submitted his work around Chicago.

And what a different world it would have been if he had been successful. Strange. Strange turn. So we've been asked this question a million times. I mean, what was the reason, do you think? I mean, maybe there were several. We talked about the end of the Borscht Belt and what the reasons for that were. Remember, Gil?

Oh, yes. We had Marissa here. Why did the Playboy Clubs, was it the changing culture? Was it they weren't hip anymore? They were losing money all along. Well, from I'd say the mid-'70s to when they finally started closing them all. But the London Club was also a casino, and it was the largest revenue producing casino in the world over any Vegas

casino on over any Caribbean casino and that just floated all the other clubs and kept them going and that shut down that got shut down by the government and when you know the goose that laid that was it the golden bucks got cut off. There was no money coming in. Were they a victim of their own success in a way? They were. Playboy? You hit it. The club specifically, not the magazine.

I agree with you totally. They started making money. They started making way too much money in the very, very early years that no one paid attention to deadlines. You know, if it cost them, you know, $10,000 more to miss a deadline or $100,000, it didn't matter. You know, Hefner wanted the very best. He paid for it, whether it was, you know, editors or writers or singers or comics or or buildings? So they were. The answer is yes. I also remember getting back to Little Annie Fanny.

That then penthouse did Wicked Wanda as a total ripoff of Little Annie Fanny. The things you store in your brain never cease to fascinate me. I'm an intellectual.

Penhouse came on the scene and started the pubic wars. Right, the pubic wars. That's what we confuse with the punic wars. Several people were killed in the pubic wars. I love that. Well, they say that that made Playboy look quaint.

It did. Where it was once shocking, and now it was cute. I remember the first time I noticed pubic hair in Playboy. Yeah, that's a big thing. And I thought, oh, my God. Yeah. It was probably Victor Lowndes' wife, because she was the first full frontal model in response to these wars

that were going on. Gilbert's now going to write a book about the pubic wars. Yes. Where do I enlist? You can do the field work, all right. I wouldn't mind dying on the battlefield there just you're lucky before f yes and the other thing too that you talk about in the book and we and you touched

on it briefly is the television shows is playboy's penthouse and then playboy after dark and wasn't playboy originally going to be called Penthouse? It was. It had a couple different names. It was going to be Stag Party. Oh, yeah, Stag Party. And that was already copyrighted. They played around with Penthouse and discarded that and came up with Playboy.

And everybody kind of agreed on that. You could write a whole book, too, about Trump. Not the president, but the magazine. The magazine. Yeah, the Playboy's failed attempt at a humor magazine. I love the line, it only went as far as two issues. Right. And Harvey Kurtzman was in charge of it, and he robbed Mad Magazine of all the great cartoonists.

cartoonist and when asked about the failure of trump uh hugh hefner said he gave harvey an unlimited budget and he surpassed it yes he exceeded it that's one of my favorite lines the book goes into detail about a lot of things there's a lot of stuff about the tv shows the tv debut of burns and carlin by the way oh my. Which you would find interesting. And Moms Mabley singing Abraham, Martin, and John, which also happened on that show, which we've talked about. I'm still looking for a copy of Moms Mabley singing Shamus of the Shul. Well, I'll see if Whoopi can hook you up.

Yes. But there's so much in that book, and there's so much good stuff. I didn't know Tom Dreesen and Tim Reed were a comedy and tim reed were a comedy duo oh yes did you know that tom and tim i did know that and uh on on his show uh wkrp yes uh tom dreeson did a guest appearance oh how about that yeah i didn't know joan rivers was a trio i didn't know tom dreesonen was a duo. I didn't know David Brenner was the guy that told Steve Martin to cut off his hair and put on a suit. Stick with me. Stick with me.

I'll teach you things you never knew. And there's even Pat McCormick. Oh, of course. In the book. So you guys have to get this book. And Gilbert, here's names. Kelly Monteith, Lonnie Shore. You remember these names?

Yes. Our friends Stewie Stone and Dick Capri turn up in the book. Lou Alexander, who we talked about. So it's really a comprehensive history. There's so much in there. And then there's the whole section about the cartoonists, which we didn't even really get into in depth. And I heard the grotto to this day, they can't kill the germs that are grown in that place. That's not in the book.

There's a story in the book about the cartoonists when they went to the mansion to do Little Annie Fanny and the grotto and how they got it all backwards. They didn't realize beautiful girls were supposed to be swimming in there, and they took turns swimming and watched each other. Oh, wow. Well, there's, and the, the, the second part of the book where you get into the cartoon is, and we talked about Jack Cole and we didn't talk about Shel Silverstein and all of these other people, but it's really fascinating. It's a fascinating history. And you're working on another one? Playboy thinks about, uh, what you all told your wives and girlfriends and mothers, you know, that you only read it for the articles. We're going to cover the writers and the interviews and editors. I remember The Fly came out in Playboy first.

That later became the movie with Vincent Price. Really? The Fly was a novella or something. Do I have some memory of you appearing in Playboy or doing a bit or an article? I wrote a couple of articles for Playboy, and you could see my pubic hair. Really? Some early issues. Yeah, I didn't know that.

I thought it was airbrushed out. I thought it was airbrushed out. Yeah, I wrote a couple of articles. And one, I remember they were going to take pictures of me. And I was thinking, oh, this is going to be my chance to be with like a thousand playmates. But at the last second, they didn't. Oh, if your parents could see you in Playboy magazine, if they could see you now. So people can get the book on Amazon, and I assume wherever books.

Barnes & Noble, any good bookstore. Playboy Laughs, the comedy comedians and cartoons of Playboy by Patti Farmer. A fun read. Patti, thanks. Well, I have to find naked pictures of them. Now, by the way, we started the show by you suggesting and putting out there

this idea that comics are a little strange and a little bit weird. What's your verdict now, 35 minutes later? I'm going to go back and talk to Julie and tell her my stories.

Thanks for doing this we appreciate it thank you for inviting me bye bye Colossal Obsessions Colossal Obsessions