Hollywood film producers Rob Cohen and Todd Garner have optioned the book “Big Bosoms and Square Jaws: The Biography of Russ Meyer, King of the Sex Film," which was written by Jimmy McDonough, Daily Variety reported today.
Meyer, who died in 2004 at the age of 82, was the infamous director of sexploitation romps such as The Immoral Mr. Teas and Beneath the Valley of the Ultra-Vixens and Faster Pussycat! Kill! Kill!
All of these films boasted women with bodacious ta-tas. Meyer wrote, directed, produced and shot many of his films himself.
In 1970, he directed Beyond the Valley of the Dolls.
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“Most importantly, this is a love story about Meyer and his centerfold wife and the way they worked together to create themselves as much as the movies they were making,” Cohen told Daily Variety.
“It is a love story couched in the staid quality of the 1950s, when this guy came along and had a new vision of what movies could do. Ultimately he was begged by Richard Zanuck and David Brown at 20th Century Fox as a savior to direct Beyond the Valley of the Dolls."
AVN book reviewer Irv Slifkin wrote, “Author Jimmy McDonough underlines in his book that throughout Meyer’s career, the filmmaker was often credited with being a pioneer of the adult film industry, which he eventually loathe, and would lash out at anyone that categorized his soft X sex-coms as porn."
Slifkin continued, “McDonough delves into the filmmaker’s sex life in detail, quoting many of his conquests, allowing little to the imagination while discussing Meyer’s sometimes idiosyncrasies (a friend relates Russ’s view of sex as getting the semen out of his system, akin to an enema).
“The final part of the book details the last dozens years or so of Russ’ life, and his sad demise. Those who know Meyer will find these pages particularly disheartening and difficult to read.McDonough paints two sides to the difficult situations in which a few of Meyer’s close associates function as either caregivers, looking after an unstable Meyer, or opportunists, looking to cash in on the filmmakers still thriving film library (he owned all of the films he personally produced) and assets at the expense of Meyer’s declining emotional and physical abilities.
McDonough, who was well into working on the book before Meyer died of Alzheimer’s in 2004, never spoke to his subject.
Producer/director Cohen “brushed shoulders” with Meyer when Cohen was a 23-year-old at 20th Century Fox.
“I never met (Meyer), but I’ve been a fan for years,” Rob Cohen told Daily Variety.
