Years ago, I had picked up a $5 used copy of My Super Ex-Girlfriend (2006), because the trailer mentioned a librarian (see below). And then I forgot about the movie. But one night recently, we finally dug this DVD out. Uma Thurman plays Jenny Johnson as well as her superhero alter ego G-Girl. She starts dating Matt (Luke Wilson), but goes crazy when he breaks up with her — like throwing-a-shark-into-his-apartment-kind-of-crazy. An odd movie all the way around. It’s like the idea for the movie was pitched back in the early ’90s, but it didn’t get the green light until over a decade later.
Oh, and there’s no librarian in it, making it a Class V film. However! Not all is lost. There are some interesting references to librarians and libraries throughout.
About 5 minutes in, we get introduced to Matt, who’s on the subway with his friend Vaughn (Rainn Wilson) and they spy Jenny across the way.
Vaughn’s the first one to notice her:
Oh, dude, check her out. Wow. What do we have here? Kind of uptight librarian on the outside. Ready to rumble on the inside. Go ask her out.
Fast forward to their first date, we learn that she’s NOT a librarian, but rather an assistant curator at an art gallery. And here’s how Matt describes his work:
I’m a project manager at a design firm. We design and build, like, private estates, libraries, hotels. That sort of thing.
Also, in the scene that introduces Luke Wilson’s work environment, there’s yet another library reference. (Also interesting that the references to libraries came mostly in introductory scenes).
Matt and co-worker hottie, Hannah (Anna Faris), are shelving some books. Or rather, Hannah is on the ladder, shelving, while he’s checking out her rear end when his boss, Carla (Wanda Sykes), walks in.
Carla: What are you doing?
Matt: Oh, nothing, just reshelving some reference material, trying to stay ahead.
Carla: You were staring at her butt.
Busted!
The design firm’s reference library — and library ladder! — even make it into the credits:
I wouldn’t have been surprised if the filmmakers had decided to go the librarian route for Jenny’s occupation — and they still managed to sneak in a Naughty Librarian kind of reference, with the whole prim-librarian-on-the-outside but a wild-woman-on-the-inside remark at the beginning. Which they TOTALLY cash in on in the film’s trailer:
It actually was refreshing to hear several compliments regarding Jenny’s appearance in her “real life” disguise. For example, Matt says in a later scene, “You look nice without your glasses. You look good with them, too.” So why the decision to not make her a librarian in real life? Maybe skipping in and out of the library regularly for superhero quests would have been more noticeable than in an art gallery.
And bonus! This shot — when Jenny strips off her glasses to reveal her “true” identity as G-Girl to Matt — could have totally been a promo for a Naughty Librarian, eh?
Ooh, I am going to get so many misdirected hits off of this post.
When visiting our families down in Texas last month, my in-laws held a fun birthday party for all of us August and early September babies (there are a lot of us, plus a few anniversaries sprinkled in around that time, as well). One of my gifts from my sister-in-law’s family was this adorable “Little Miss Naughty” bag. So perfect!
Here’s a close-up of the bag:
So, I guess it’s official — with this bag, I am the Naughty Librarian.
Little Miss Naughty
And here’s a shot of my original “Little Miss Naughty” book from when I was a kid. I loooooved these square-shaped books, and I still have a lot of these Mr. Men and Little Miss books by Roger Hargreaves. Please click here for more on this fun series. (Mr. Tickle was the first! And that’s Mr. Tickle, below, about to tickle Little Miss Naughty! Umm, yeah, sooooo many misdirected blog hits. )
We have come to my final post in this series of reel librarian character types (see here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here for previous posts). The male counterpart to the female Naughty Librarians, this type was originally entitled “The Sex-obsessed Male Librarian” in my undergraduate thesis.
Striking differences do separate the two varieties of Naughty Librarians. There are not as many examples of the males as there are females; obviously, the female Naughty Librarian fantasy reigns supreme (see here for a related post). The male charaters are more focused on actual sex, not a diluted vision of love, as sometimes seen in the female equivalent. Also, the female Naughty Librarians turn to violence more often due to repressed feelings, while their male counterparts almost never do.
The male Naughty Librarian, although a sexually charged character, is one who attempts to act out his desires because he is professionally and/or personally unsuccessful in some way. This marks the biggest deviation between the two sets of Naughty Librarians. The females are usually young to middle-aged, and quite attractive (after they let their hair down after work, of course), whereas the males are usually middle-aged to older, and usually viewed as a bit creepy or otherwise sexually unappealing to others.
The father in You’re a Big Boy Now (1966), I. H. Chanticleer (Rip Torn), illustrates the male Naughty Librarian type. While his son, Bernard, experiments with fantasies — in the film, they are expressed in Day-Glo ’60s colors — the father acts out by sexually harassing his pretty young secretaries. One scene, see above, involves Bernard’s landlady, Mrs. Thing (Julie Harris), who assumes that the father must want to rape her after she accidentally locks them both into the archives vault. She freaks out when she realizes the archives are full of “dirty” pictures of Ovid and ancient literature “pornography” (her perspective, not mine). In this instance, Chanticleer, the Curator of Incunabula at the library, is NOT sexually interested in Mrs. Thing; he is more preoccupied with saving the rare books. And let’s be blunt, she’s not the same type as the secretaries he’s used to going after.
Michael Habeck as Berengar in The Name of the Rose
In The Name of the Rose (1986), Michael Habeck plays the assistant librarian Berengar, a homosexual monk prone to staring and giggling. His white skin and googley eyes do stand out, and not in a good way. And then we find out that Berengar has caused a brilliant young monk to commit suicide after being forced to partake of the “sins of the flesh.” Knowing his sin, Berengar whips himself and becomes the third victim in the film because he has read the “forbidden” book, Aristotle’s second book of the Poetics.
Perhaps the most realistically lecherous of all the male Naughty Librarians, Peter Sellers plays John Lewis in Only Two Can Play(1962), a Welshman vying for a promotion of Sub-Librarian by embarking on an affair with the wife of a library board member (see below).
Still from Only Two Can Play
The beginning of the film sets up John’s character, saturating his vision with glimpses of women’s legs, breasts, and hips. He groans in frustration after he discovers a book he has dropped is called Is Sex Necessary? His obsession with the female sex is compounded by the fact tht he has a young, desirable wife — but also faces the realities of two messy kids at home. John never actually consummates the affair, and in the end, he agrees with his wife to work on his sex addictive behavior. I must note that the film does not reveal to us at the end if he has mastered his womanizing ways.
So there you have it! I hope you’ve enjoyed this series of reel librarian character types. For all the types I’ve identified thus far, please see the Role Call section of this site.
A rose by any other name… the Naughty Librarian. We’re down to the final category of exploring reel librarian character types (see previous posts here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here). And I know I’m going to get a lot of hits out of this post, as “naughty librarian” — and similar phrases like “sexy librarian” or “tomcats librarian” — are the MOST POPULAR search terms that lead to my blog. It’s a classy joint I’m running here, this Reel Librarians blog.
This category originally began as “The Sex-Obsessed Librarian” in my undergraduate thesis. The male and female portrayals of this character type are quite different, as you’ll see. The guys will have their turn next week. It’s time now for the ladies.
The female Naughty Librarian serves as a sexual fantasy, which comes as no surprise, I’m sure. She’s usually either an attractive librarian obviously “on the prowl” or she’s like a young Spinster Librarian who “lets her hair down” outside the library (click here for a previous related post about that). The Naughty Librarian portrayal is all about contrast, inner desires juxtaposed with a more conservative, restrained exterior or library setting.
But be warned — if their romantic or sexual desires go unfulfilled, these Naughty Librarians often to turn to violent, or otherwise criminal or manipulative, means to get what they want. But that’s probably all part of the fantasy, right?
The two sides of a Naughty Librarian
Let’s take a peek. *SPOILER ALERTS*
One of the most textbook examples of this category is Jennifer O’Neill as Heather Moore in the 1990 TV movie Personals. Heather combines sex with murder, as she plays a meek and button-up librarian by day and a knife-wielding serial killer at night (see left). After arranging dates with married men through newspaper personal ads, Heather then kills the men because of their infidelity — exercising her own brand of vigilante justice. This television movie illustrates the Naughty Librarian at her most vicious.
In Tomcats (2001), “bad boy” Michael Delany (Jerry O’Connell) sets out to seduce Jill, a seemingly timid librarian (Heather Stephens). He boasts, “This is almost too easy” when he first spots her, pushing a library cart full of books (see clip below). They bond over The Scarlet Letter – wink wink — and he walks her home, which has a white picket fence, of course. Jill looks like the perfect prototype of a young Spinster Librarian, with her prim bun, pretty pink cardigan, and tortoiseshell glasses. But once inside her house, Jill’s inner dominatrix comes out to play — literally — as does her librarian grandma! Gotta admit, they’re super organized with those toys, whips and handcuffs, just like real librarians would be.
And for the second half of their date, see below. Warning: Due to, ahem, racy content, you may need to authenticate your birthdate to watch the following clip. The following clip is definitely adult-themed and probably NOT suitable for viewing at work. Depends on where you work, of course, but still, just trying to give you fair warning.
Valerie Curtin as Ophelia Sheffer in Maxie (1985) also reveals her inner Naughty Librarian. An attractive, thirtyish brunette who works in the San Francisco Public Library, Ophelia makes a pass at fellow librarian Nick (Mandy Patinkin), who rejects her not-so-subtle advances. And after an embarrassing moment at a library fundraiser, she attempts to blackmail him into sex by threatening to fire him.
Other examples of not-so-exemplary behavior exhibited by Naughty Librarians include revenge and blackmail that ultimately lead to a man’s suicide (Weird Woman, 1944, also see this post) and participating in a sinister island ritual to sacrifice an innocent man’s life (The Wicker Man, 1973).
But not allNaughty Librarians are bad girls at heart (see Hammett, 1982; The Man Who Never Was, 1956). In the immortal words of Jessica Rabbit, “I’m not bad, I’m just drawn that way.” For example, in Hammett, the perpetually underdressed Kit (Marilu Henner) helps out hard-boiled Hammett (Frederic Forrest), who tells her that the only person he trusts in the world is “a librarian with a smart mouth.” Early in the film, she shares a flirtatious scene with Hammett’s friend, Jimmy (Peter Boyle). After spying her lingerie hanging up, he asks, “Is that what you wear to the library?” and Kit vamps it up in response, “That’s what I wear underneath what I wear to the library.” Too bad we never get to see her in a library setting. But you can catch a glimpse of her in a blue silk nightie in the trailer below.
Click to view Hammett trailer in a new window
Next week, the male Naughty Librarians round up this series on reel librarian character types. Stay tuned!
During my research of librarian films, I have come across two erotic films, Debbie Does Dallas (1978) and Alice in Wonderland: An X-Rated Musical Comedy (1976) that reportedly include librarian characters. I haven’t seen either film yet, and I don’t intend to include straight-to-video adult films that include librarians on this site — that’s a whole other subset of Naughty Librarians that I won’t get into. But these two films were both highly successful at the time and considered classics of their kind, produced during the so-called “Golden Age of Porn” where adult films became more mainstream. Just telling it as it is, folks.
The plot of Debbie Does Dallas is quite simple: a group of cheerleaders try to earn enough money to send Debbie to try out for the “Texas Cowgirls” squad (obviously a riff off the Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders). How do they earn that money? There’s a reason it’s called the oldest profession in the world, of course.
As I detailed in a earlier post about how I find new titles to watch, I routinely check my Master List against various sources. And imagine my surprise when I found a copy of Debbie Does Dallas in my local community college consortium — not the film, alas, but the play! I had no idea that the film had been adapted for the stage, but indeed, Debbie Does Dallas: The Musical was created in 2001 by Susan L. Schwartz for the New York International Fringe Festival. It was adapted by Erica Schmidt, with original musical numbers by Andrew Sherman.
And indeed, there is a librarian in the play, a Mr. Biddle. Here’s how he’s described in the script notes:
Mr. Biddle works at the high-school library. He is repressed and reserved. Biddle is of a forgotten generation in his principles and etiquette. (He is a male character in a porno and he does not want sex.) He is smart, rash, quick to anger and passionate about poetry.
From that description, I immediately thought Anti-Social Male Librarian, the male equivalent of the Spinster Librarian. This type of reel librarian tends to hoard knowledge, exhibits poor social skills, dislikes people, and focuses on rules. Makes sense, right?
Mr. Biddle is definitely a minor character, turning up in only a few scenes. In Scene 8, “Girls Get Jobs,” the poet cheerleader Donna asks if she can work at the library. He is reluctant, but is convinced by Donna’s scintillating argument: ”I could help by watching books and stamping and stuff.” (Sigh.) His response? ”Oh, ok.” (Double sigh.)
Getting spanked in Debbie Does Dallas the Musical
His biggest and final scene comes in Scene 20, “The Library.” Mr. Biddle catches Donna and her boyfriend Tim fooling around. Angry, he shouts, “You know the rules here. How could you so wantonly break them?” Afraid he will tell her parents, she allows him to spank her (see right). And then he asks her to spank him: ”I always wanted to be bent over and spanked by a cheerleader ’cause I’m a bad and nasty boy.” Donna readily agrees, calling him “Bad Biddle.” This sets him back $105.
And with that, he also serves as a Naughty Librarian — the males of this type, unlike the female Naughty Librarians, are generally unattractive (check) and interested in deviant or unusual sexual acts (check).
So is the play successful? The scenes are extremely short, with repeated occurrences of inane dialogue. I lost count of how many times I read, “Oh, ok” and “Ok, bye.” The sex acts are hinted at or simulated or played with bananas (not kidding, see below). In truth, I rolled my eyes at the self-described tone of the play, as set out in the introductory notes:
The style of this piece is: rodeo-porno-football-circus. Every performer must be willing to go over the top and yet NOT BE CAMPY. The performances are meant to be big in size but never winking at the audience.
Debbie Does Dallas on the stage
Does Mr. Biddle’s character in the play mimic his reel counterpart? Apparently so, as according to Frank Vigorito’s review from the 2001 New York International Fringe Festival, “Debbie’s plot and script are word-for-word faithful to the original 1978 film.” And the scenes feel so short because of the removal of the sex scenes, so scenes “seemingly occur about every 30 seconds.” I agree with Vigorito’s final verdict:
Essentially, the play moves from one pointless scene of dialogue to the next, with the audience left waiting for something to look forward to, but that moment never arrives, unless you consider the final curtain.
The play is available from Dramatists Play Service, where you can also listen to music samples.
Matt and co-worker hottie, Hannah (Anna Faris), are shelving some books. Or rather, Hannah is on the ladder, shelving, while he’s checking out her rear end when his boss, Carla (Wanda Sykes), walks in.
I wouldn’t have been surprised if the filmmakers had decided to go the librarian route for Jenny’s occupation — and they still managed to sneak in a Naughty Librarian kind of reference, with the whole prim-librarian-on-the-outside but a wild-woman-on-the-inside remark at the beginning. Which they TOTALLY cash in on in the film’s trailer:
