OUI (MAGAZINE)

'''Oui''' is a men's pornographic magazine published in the USA and featuring explicit nude photographs of models, with full page pin-ups, centerfolds, interviews and other articles, and cartoons.
It was originally published in France under the name ''Lui'' by Daniel Filipacchi, (first French issue January 1964), as a French equivalent of Playboy. In 1972, Playboy Enterprises purchased the rights for a U.S. edition, changing the name to ''Oui'', and the first issue was published in October of that year. Jon Carroll, formerly assistant editor at Rolling Stone magazine and editor of Rags and later editor of The Village Voice, was selected as the first editor. Arthur Kretchmer, the editor of Playboy, however, had a role in assuring that editorial choices would be in line with Hugh Hefner's vision ^{[1] [2]}.
The intention was to differentiate the audience in mass-market men's magazines, in an attempt to answer the challenge brought by ''Penthouse'', with its more explicit photography, and therefore compete on multiple fronts. Indeed, at first ''Playboy'' considered to respond by following ''Penthouse'' in a nudity escalation (Pubic Wars), but Playboy management was hesitant to alter the magazine's philosophy, based on a more 'mature' and 'sophisticate' audience (one-third of Playboy's readership at that time was estimated to be over 35 ^[3]), so instead ''Oui'' was intended to be more explicit to capture younger readership, offering a combination of ''rambunctious editorial slant with uninhibited nudes pictured in the Penthouse mood'' ^[4].
The original idea was to introduce an ersatz European flavor to men's magazines, using original French edition photographs and translating the articles, but immediately it became clear that direct translations had little appeal to an American audience.
In the late seventies, ''Oui'' published some interesting articles, including "Is this the man who ate Michael Rockefeller?" (April 1977) by Lorne Blair (lately famous for the Ring of Fire documentaries), beginning with a photograph of a grinning New Guinea native, told by the intrepid anthropologist/reporter who journeyed to New Guinea, interviewed people who had known Michael Rockefeller, then ventured into the jungle and talked to members of the tribe from whom Rockefeller had bought native art artifacts, including totem poles. In the end, he found a man who claimed he had eaten the unfortunate collector.
''Oui'' also hosted several reportages about Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) activity, like the article "CIA vs. USA - The Agency's Plot to Take Over America" by Philip Agee, about an alleged Operation PBPrime, whose leaders were the top four men in the Central Intelligence Agency and whose target was the control of the U.S. government. Even if most of the matter can be regarded as scandalistic and controversial in nature, the fringe status of adult magazines, like ''Oui'', tends to make their editors involved in civil liberty and political anti-establishment arguably creditable investigative journalism, printing what other mass-circulation publications won't.
On the somewhat more humorous side, ''Oui'' also published the essay "The 3 Most Important Things in Life" by Harlan Ellison in its November 1978 issue. The three things in question were sex, violence and labor relations, each illustrated by anecdotes from Ellison's life. The sex anecdote involved a less-than-successful assignation with a young woman; the violence anecdote was about witnessing a murder in a movie theatre during a screening of ''Save the Tiger''; and the labor relations anecdote was Ellison's version of the story of his being fired after only one morning at The Walt Disney Company for jokingly suggesting making a pornographic cartoon using the primary Disney characters. The piece has since been republished in Ellison's ''Stalking the Nightmare'' and ''Edgeworks 1''.
''Oui'' also published some interesting short fiction, including a story called "Rock Wars", which is arguably a precursor to the rock band in "The Restaurant at the End of the Universe", by Douglas Adams.
A 1977 interview with the magazine by the then 29-years-old emerging actor Arnold Schwarzenegger (interviewer Peter Manso) on critical issues like sex, drugs, bodybuilding and homosexuality produced some embarrassment to the running candidate to the 2003 gubernatorial campaign.^[5]
In June 1981 Playboy Enterprises ended the ''Oui'' experiment. The magazine was sold to Laurant Publishing Ltd. in New York. The new president and chief operating officer was Irwin E. Billman, former executive vice president and chief operating officer of the Penthouse Group^[6].
In terms of celebrity nudity, ''Oui'' peaked in 1982 with pictorials of Linda Blair, Demi Moore and Pia Zadora. The magazine has since declined greatly in circulation. As of 2006, ''Oui'' is still published by Laurant Publishing Ltd.

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Notes and References

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External links

Notes and References

1. Carroll, Jon: Windy City legend hangs up his cleats ''San Francisco Chronicle'', September 16, 2002
2. Carroll, Jon: Arthur Kretchmer tried to warn me ''San Francisco Chronicle'', September 17, 2002
3. Hefner's Grandchild ''Time'', August 28, 1972
4. Adventures in the Skin Trade, Time, Jul. 30, 1973
5. Schwarzenegger has 'no memory' of lewd 1977 interview - Candidate says he never lived 'to be a politician' Thursday, August 28, 2003 CNN
6. Dougherty, Philip H. ''New York Times'', June 12, 1981

See also

★ List of men's magazines

External links

★ [1]