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Noir Harlots and Mad Doctors

These days, with the triumph of digital media and the Internet, adult magazines of all stripes are on the wane. They are harder to find on the ever-vanishing newsstands, and many periodicals have ceased print publication and only remain as brand websites. But just a few years ago “men’s sophisticates” (as they are called in the trade) were a fertile market not only for the writer of sexy fiction or porn star interviews, but for those of us who also liked to write about other subjects.

Swank is a magazine to which I’ve contributed since 1977, and I’ve written every type of piece for a long array of editors there. The last editor for whom I worked at Swank was the pseudonymous Jeremy McSandal, who encouraged me to examine topics I was passionate about, and who paid me very decent fees too. I’ll always be thankful to Jeremy that I was able to intensively tackle these themes and also pay my rent in the process!

Two pieces I wrote for McSandal’s Swank are below: “Hardboiled Harlots of Hard Case Crime,” an interview I did with Charles Ardai about his acclaimed line of paperback noir fiction, and “Attack of the Mad Doctors,” a survey article about the amusing and disturbing characteristics of insane movie medicos of the 50s and 60s. The Harlot interview was for the September 2007 #125 issue of Swank, and the Mad Doctors piece was for the March 2008 #135 issue. The art direction for both pieces was by the pseudonymous Alex Andres. I wrote both pieces under my Neil Wexler byline.

Simply click on the pages to enlarge to full size and read. I hope you enjoy my forays into noir harlots and mad doctors!

First come the Harlots…