Gahan Wilson 50 years of Playboy Cartoons

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In other words, in the book, the characters were lying down, and probably not just kissing. It’s funny that this is observed by a rather frumpy woman. Cole is exploring women’s sexual fantasies as well as men’s.

Markstein, Don (2001). "Little Annie Fanny". Don Markstein's Toonopedia. Archived from the original on April 16, 2012 . Retrieved December 28, 2014. In short, the Enquirer, by my estimation, was having the time of its life making up stuff about the man the tabloid doubtless secretly salivated over for his satyric lifestyle, details of which might’ve crammed the paper with juicy copy for years. But didn’t.Hefner said he chose the rabbit for its "humorous sexual connotation," and because the image was "frisky and playful.” Marilyn (who, when asked by a “spectacularly unobservant” reporter what she had on, famously replied: “The radio”) was then a struggling actress desperate to pay the rent. The presence during the shoot of Kelley’s wife, acting as his assistant, rescued the adventure from any salacious interpretation. Absolutely not!” she said in an interview with the Hollywood Reporter’s Jeanie Pyun. “The central theme of my wing of pro-sex feminism is that all celebrations of the sexual human body are positive. Second-wave feminism went off the rails when it was totally unable to deal with erotic imagery, which has been a central feature of the entire history of Western art ever since Greek nudes.” Not everyone was quite so vitriolic. But Katha Pollitt at the Nation came close, calling Hefner “a creep” and a “toxic bachelor.... You have to ignore a lot of human suffering to buy the notion that ‘Hef’ was a fun-guy genius who brought us sexual liberation.” It was Playboy itself (and that probably means Hugh Hefner writing) that provided perhaps the best appreciation of Cole’s women. In the November, 1958 obituary referred to earlier in this article, they eloquently wrote:

Some comic artists cater to several specific fetishes, such as feet, high heels, leather boots, nylon and rubber. Italian artist Franco Saudelli (together with his artistic wife Francesca Casotto, who often modelled for him) was a master at depicting feet in such a way, that even the ones that have no sexual interest in them, start to understand the fascination some others have. When I told the blonde at the fourth floor desk my errand, she summoned someone by phone. Another blonde appeared, looked over my drawings, and then asked me to wait. I did. She returned shortly and escorted me to the office of Jerry White, one of two assistants to art director Arthur Paul. When they returned to the mansion, they’d all retire to Hef’s bedroom, which was equipped with various amusements for sexual entertainment. While they’d all watch a pornographic movie, one of them would give oral sex to Hef to get him erect. Then, he’d have sex with one or more of the group. If a girl didn’t want to have sex with Hef that night, she’d wear panties. Makes me wonder what would happen if they all showed up wearing panties some night. In yet another maneuver to give the magazine cultural heft, Playboy featured extensive (usually several thousand-word) interviews of public figures—artists, architects, economists, composers, conductors, film directors, journalists, novelists, playwrights, religious figures, politicians, athletes, and race car drivers. Note how Cole suggests a tree with a few scant lines, and a turban with the woman’s hair. The horn points directly at what the woman wants, and the fact that it’s a phallic symbol in her mouth doesn’t hurt the joke, either. Visual wit.

What brought us whatever sexual liberation we now possess,” said Pollitt, “was reliable contraception, legal abortion, and, yes, feminism. It was feminism that encouraged women to consider their own pleasure, cut through the Freudian nonsense about vaginal orgasms and ‘frigidity,’ mainstream female masturbation as a way to learn about one’s body, and pointed out, insistently, that women are not objects for male consumption...

Early Hef had a pipe and suit and a highbrow reference for every occasion; he even claimed to have a philosophy, that final refuge of the scoundrel. But late Hef was a lecherous, low-brow Peter Pan, playing at perpetual boyhood—ice cream for breakfast, pajamas all day—while bodyguards shooed male celebrities away from his paid harem and the skull grinned beneath his papery skin.” Twice a week—on Tuesdays and Thursdays, as I recall; always the same days, week after week—Hef and his girlfriends (4-6 of them) would go out for dinner and a few hours at a night club. An hour before they left, Hef would take a Viagra pill that would enable him to achieve an erection later. (Viagra takes an hour to become effective.)I retreated to the minor class magazines (bless them all), where I should have started in the first place, and delved into the task of learning basic gag craft.” Despite the incomprehensible brevity of my introduction, I remember vividly the cover of the first issue of Playboy I ever saw, described in The Playboy Book as having “achieved notoriety when a strategically placed strand of seaweed mysteriously slipped out of place sometime during the printing process.” Below is the incriminating evidence, a copy of the salacious cover itself. Now, the Enquirer had the opportunity to make up about Hef’s last days whatever lurid poetic justice it thought appropriate. So it did.