WEST HOLLYWOOD, Calif.—Hustler chairwoman Liz Flynt kicked off the Hustler 50: 50 Years of Freedom book tour Wednesday night with a book signing event at well-known Sunset Strip bookstore Book Soup. Flynt, the widow of Hustler founder and free speech icon Larry Flynt, was interviewed by comedian Kathy Griffin in front of a packed room.
The new book was authored by Flynt, with foreword by actor Woody Harrelson. The 208-page collectible edition is a curated collection of magazine covers, photos, articles, political cartoons, and editorial campaigns that includes archival material spanning the years between 1974 to 2024. Flynt’s assistant Daisy Fernandez confirmed the project took two years to complete.
The glossy volume also tells the story of Larry Flynt’s battle to expand freedom of expression, which ultimately helped redefine First Amendment rights in the United States.
Arguably the most controversial magazine publication of its time, Hustler championed extreme sexual expression as a protected First Amendment right, with Larry Flynt facing numerous obscenity prosecutions including the Hustler vs. Falwell case in 1987, which was later depicted in the 1997 movie The People vs. Larry Flynt, directed by Milos Forman, and starring Harrelson and Courtney Love (who played Larry’s fourth wife, the late Althea Flynt).
Larry Flynt’s societal role as a free speech firebrand was tragically punctuated by a shooting in 1978, which left the adult industry icon paralyzed from the waist down. The shooter was white supremacist named Joseph Paul Franklin, who was angered by the publication of an interracial photo spread in the magazine. The attempt to silence Flynt and Hustler had a devastating result, and Liz Flynt pointed out the incident as cautionary tale in today’s charged political climate.
After the attempt on Flynt, the suspect was later convicted of eight murders and executed in Missouri, in 2013. Regarding Franklin’s death sentence, at the time, NPR reported that Flynt said he thought life in prison would have been more just, in comparison to the rest of his life being spent in a wheelchair—albeit a golden wheelchair.
Attorney Paul Cambria, who defended Flynt on obscenity charges in 1978 in Lawerenceville, Georgia, was on the scene when Flynt was shot and spoke about the experience for the Book Soup crowd.
“So, anyway, we’re on trial in Lawrenceville and it’s lunchtime, and Larry’s going out to have lunch with our local counsel, a guy named Gene Reeves, who we had hired, who was a local guy. So, what happens is, they go out to lunch to a place that we’d gone to often, and I leave the courtroom and I’m gonna walk over to meet them, and as we’re walking toward one another—pow, pow, pow! Down Larry goes and I run over—he’s holding his stomach and rolling around,” he said.
He described the horror and that Flynt never lost consciousness despite sustaining a serious stomach wound. Cambria recalled that, at the hospital, former President Jimmy Carter’s sister, evangelist Ruth Carter-Stapleton, arrived and led a prayer circle in the waiting room while Flynt was in emergency surgery and, while praying, Cambria said he thought to himself, “You can’t write this stuff.”
Cambria also revealed that Flynt’s nickname for Liz was “Shorty,” referring to her diminutive size. Initially her husband’s nurse after he was paralyzed, Flynt talked about how, over 30 years, she learned about the empire he had built and they eventually married.
“When Larry asked me to come work for him at the company, at LFP, it wasn't easy because it was just a totally different element and I didn't think I could work in that company because first of all, it was all publishing and second of all, I didn't know anyone and I really felt out of place,” she said.
“He had faith and confidence in me and I just put my best foot forward and I listened to him because Larry had the wisdom. He's a very smart man and he mentored me for just about 30 years, and I am so glad that I listened to almost everything he taught me and would say to me because it prepared me for a role that I'm in today,” she added.
Flynt was proud to say, in addition to continued success with Hustler Casino (located in Gardena, California), Hustler Hollywood’s retail operation had expanded to more than 100 stores with the acquisition of Playboy’s retail division. After Flynt’s death in 2021 and eventually assuming her role as chairwoman, newly-designed corporate offices located in Century City crowned big changes for Larry Flynt Publications, which is valued at more than $500 million. Griffin quipped that she had wasted her life in comedy and should have been a nurse.
Several attendees at the book signing event had been present during the tumultuous decades, and mingled with longtime Hustler staffers and personal friends of the Flynts.
Adult industry luminaries in attendance included Honey’s Place CEO Bonnie Feingold, CalExotics CEO Susan Colvin, Hustler Editor-in-Chief Anne Denbok, Taboo magazine Editor-in-Chief and director Ernest Greene, AVN Hall of Fame director Will Ryder, adult starlet Selena Ivy, and veteran industry writer Tod Hunter, among others.
Griffin experienced her own free speech trial-by-fire in 2017, when the comic was “cancelled” after a photo pictured her with a bloody mask resembling President Donald Trump. The controversy that followed brought backlash from both sides of the aisle and took a toll on Griffin’s career. She said the Flynts had reached out to her at the time, in support. A copy of the infamous photo was held up by an event attendee, to laughter and a few cheers.
“The truth is that if it weren't for Larry's work with the First Amendment and winning the landmark Supreme Court case which stands to this day—Hustler magazine versus Jerry Falwell—I would be in jail, probably from Trump, term one. And that's for real. And so, if you know the film The People vs. Larry Flynt, which is an excellent film directed by Milos Forman, it still holds up today,” the comedian said.
One of the movie’s screenwriters, Larry Karaszewski, was there, browsing books after Flynt’s interview. He pointed out that while others had wanted to script a movie about Flynt, previous attempts had been focused on the glamour and grind of pornography—until the writers and director Forman realized the real story was about free speech.
Flynt introduced two former reporters, Cody Shearer and Rudy Maxa. Maxa, who was friends with Larry Flynt and had been working for the Washington Post at the time, recalled being assigned to write Flynt’s obituary immediately after the shooting, which then was never used. He also had a story about Carter-Stapleton, the President’s evangelist sister, who called Maxa one day, sobbing, from Flynt’s plane flying over Ohio. She claimed Flynt had accepted God. Maxa asked her to put Flynt on the phone, only to find the “Number One pornographer in America” overwhelmed with religious fervor.
Shearer, who had been a freelancer in Washington D.C., humorously recounted Flynt’s disdain for politicians and hypocrites. “We got Larry, every month, to send a copy of Hustler to every member of Congress and to the Supreme Court. So, what would happen is that various members on Capitol Hill would leave Larry messages and say, ‘Please, never send this garbage to my office again.' Larry, in turn, would print their letters in the magazine and make each Congress member that wrote a letter ‘Asshole of the Month.’”
The reporter recalled Flynt’s attempts to send free magazines to veterans’ hospitals and prisons. Shearer, who was also involved with Flynt’s 1984 presidential campaign (when he ran for the Republican nomination against Ronald Reagan), finished by saying, “What this country needs today, more than anything else, is a man like Larry Flynt... There wasn’t a door he didn’t knock on to try and change this country and we miss him dearly.”
Liz Flynt confirmed that copies of the magazine are still sent monthly to Capitol Hill and SCOTUS.
Hustler cartoonist Bob Muleady, whose work is featured in the book, told the story of the only Hustler party his wife ever attended during his long tenure at the company. An anniversary party, Muleady described a buffet of naked adult starlets displayed like erotic floral arrangements on a long banquet-style table. When his wife asked him what they should do, he advised her to have some pâté.
A very chic lady, Mrs. Stone, and her daughter were seated near the front to see Flynt. Stone revealed that her family owned the Four Seasons Hotel in Beverly Hills, where Larry Flynt famously ate lunch (and sometimes dinner) on a daily basis and was great friends with her uncle, who resided at the hotel.
One year, for her daughter’s birthday, Flynt had found out that the family was planning a trip to Las Vegas to celebrate on a weekend when he was also scheduled to be in Sin City. He graciously offered to fly Stone and her family to Vegas on his private jet, as well as a return trip to L.A. Her daughter agreed it was a very exciting weekend that included her parents, aunt and uncle, cousins, and two brothers.
“I have two grown sons,” Stone said. “You know how boys are when they’re growing up—you call, they don’t return your call right away. But when I left messages and said, ‘Hey, do you want to go to Vegas this weekend with Larry Flynt?’, they called right back right away.”
Hustler 50: 50 Years of Freedom was published by Radius Book Group, and retails for $37.99; it is available on Amazon, HustlerHollywood.com, and at all major booksellers (ISBN: 979-8895150269).
For a complete schedule of book tour dates, click here.
For general information and more, visit Hustler50.com.
