He funded all kinds of amazing things other than pornography. And then he also had the largest private art collection in the U.S. "But when you start scratching away at it, you realize that, 'All right, well wait a minute, it wasn't just Penthouse, it was 100 magazines.'. I think they all thought it would be the same story: guy starts porn magazine. "I don't think any filmmaker or biographer tackled Guccione because I think they thought they were going to get the same thing as Hugh Hefner, and if you want to take it down six levels into the dirt, Larry Flynt. "This was a huge opportunity to tell the world about a man that was infinitely fascinating," he says. Montreal-born Avrich embarked on the project after realizing no one had done "anything on Guccione - nothing." "This was one of the few businesses in the '70s and '80s in corporate America that was completely run and managed by women - another pioneering thing for Guccione." "You'll meet his lovers, you'll meet his family, you'll meet the dream team of women that ran the magazine," says Avrich. Interviewees include his sons as well as Victoria Lynn Johnson - a former Penthouse Pet of the Year who had an affair with Guccione - and Lynn Barber, editor of Penthouse from '67 to '74. "Filthy Gorgeous" also includes loads of archival and home-movie footage of Guccione, who always had a swagger and a burning cigarette. "People aren't going to watch this film expecting to see - well mind you, there's tonnes of nudity, but not in a gratuitous, salacious way. In 2010, after battling throat cancer, he died in Texas at age 79. With his massive fortune, Guccione lived a life of luxury (his art collection in his ornate home included works by Matisse, Renoir and Picasso) with third wife Kathy Keeton, who helped run his business.īut in the late '90s and early 2000s, the magazine's circulation dwindled due to competition from Internet porn sites, and Guccione's company was forced into bankruptcy. He also made major investments in lofty ventures, from nuclear reactors to casinos and the infamous '79 historical pornographic film "Caligula" starring Malcolm McDowell, Helen Mirren, and Peter O'Toole. It was while in London with his second wife that he began a mail-order business selling pinup posters and set out to create an equivalent of Playboy for a British audience - a mag with high editorial standards that captured "real women" and their sensuality.ĭespite the controversy his idea created across the pond, the first issue of Penthouse in '65 was a hit and led to an empire of many magazines, including the science-based Omni and music-focused Spin. He then tried to make it as an artist around Europe. "He didn't feel that he had to have a girl or two girls on either arm to perpetuate the brand."Įarly in his life, Guccione's career goals were also the polar opposite of those he eventually achieved.Īs the film shows, the Brooklyn-born mogul studied to be a priest at a teen. He was reclusive, he didn't go to parties.
He was interested in building brands, but not brands themselves. "Guccione wasn't interested in being a brand. 9 at the Toronto International Film Festival. "Unlike the brands of (Hugh) Hefner, and Larry Flynt for that matter, Guccione was the polar opposite," says Barry Avrich, director of the doc that premieres Sept.
TORONTO - With a mass of gold chains as thick as a plate of spaghetti on his hairy chest, a deep bedroom voice, leather pants and title as publisher of the pornographic magazine Penthouse, the late Bob Guccione seemed a one-dimensional character to many.īut beneath the tanned, lady-killer facade was a solitary intellect and artist who had a deep interest in science, according to the new documentary "Filthy Gorgeous: The Extraordinary World of Bob Guccione."
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