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| Joe Sarno poses with wife Peggy Steffans for a promotional photo. |
It’s the JOE SARNO CENTENARY! That's right: Joseph W. Sarno, who revolutionized the Adults Only movie market by taking it above and beyond nudist colony romps and adolescent daydreams about X-ray vision, was born 100 years ago today, on March 15, 1921. In another month or so, it will be 11 years since his passing on April 26, 2010.
As you may have heard, I’m dedicating all of my free time to preparing a book about Joe's mind-boggling filmography, which includes such titles as SIN IN THE SUBURBS (1964), MOONLIGHTING WIVES (1965), INGA (1967), YOUNG PLAYTHINGS (1971) and ABIGAIL LESLIE'S BACK IN TOWN (1974). The IMDb credits him with 125 films in all, but I will only covering in detail the software side of his career, the movies he was proud to sign with his own name - some 56 titles, which is far more than most directors get to make in a career. The others will be covered in thumbnail form, but even his hardcore work generated a few gems and those will be given special focus. While reviewing one of my Sarno commentaries, CineSavant Glenn Erickson mentioned my book-in-progress and wrote, "if the information he’s compiled for this commentary is what can be expected, it might be a major work." This is very much my goal.
At the moment, I am slightly more than 600 pages into my manuscript. I imagine there’s still at least another 400 pages still to write, so we’re probably talking about something in the neighborhood of another Bava book. There's no contract yet but it looks like the book will be published by Strange Attractor - the UK company behind Stephen Thrower’s beautiful books devoted to Jess Franco. They have expressed strong interest, and we've got a verbal agreement, so the end product should be attractive and pleasant to handle.
In my view, Sarno wasn’t just America’s greatest and most prolific avatar of erotic cinema; he was also our first and perhaps only genuine dramatist of human sexuality - not in terms of explicitness (that didn’t really interest him, and it doesn’t interest me) but in terms of how all human life is affected by the mysterious forces of sexual orientation, sexual will, and sexual need. His best films depict how people, as individuals or in groups, communicate and express themselves sexually, how such expression can be either fulfilling or self-deluding and destructive, and how the complex nature of sex can impact private homes, apartment buildings, neighborhoods, businesses, cities, society as a whole. This is an entire side of human nature than most other drama - especially American drama - ignores.
I’m blessed and fortunate to have the support of Joe’s wife, muse, assistant and occasional actress Peggy Steffans (“Cleo Nova”) - whom I’ve known by phone for many years; she is supplying me with information, stories, and materials - and his good friend Michael Raso, who is actively working with Film Movement to locate and restore Joe’s films and make them more commercially available. I knew Joe himself by phone for several years and hope that, wherever he is, he knows he’s still a hot topic of conversation and very much still alive and appreciated in the pages I’ve been piling up.
So... Happy Birthday, Joe - and here’s to your next 100!
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