 | |
 The December 2009 American issue ofPenthouse | |
| Categories | Men's, lifestyle |
|---|---|
| Frequency | Monthly (1968–2018) Bi-monthly (2018–2023) |
| Total circulation | 109,792[1] (2012) |
| Founder | Bob Guccione |
| Founded | March 1965; 60 years ago (1965-03) (UK) September 1969; 56 years ago (1969-09) (U.S.) |
| Company | Penthouse World Media |
| Country |
|
| Based in | Los Angeles,California |
| Language | English |
| Website | penthouse |
| ISSN | 0090-2020 |
Penthouse is amen's magazine founded inLondon by AmericanBob Guccione, with the first UK issue appearing in March 1965. An American edition was launched in September 1969 and became Guccione's flagship. Other national editions, published under franchise, came and went. Guccione challengedPlayboy with a more provocative editorial line and more revealing nude photography.[2]
Unable to compete with the internet, the UK edition folded in 1999 (an attempt to revive it in 2001 was short-lived).[3] The U.S. edition tried to adapt by switching tohardcore content between 1997 and 2004. Returning tosoftcore under new ownership in 2005, it continued to appear with diminishing frequency (there were five issues in 2020). The last printed issue of the U.S. edition appeared in 2023, although the current owner of the masthead,Los Angeles–based Penthouse World Media, said a year later that it would return.[4] It remains in limbo.
Penthouse magazine began publication in the UK in March 1965.[5] Its symbol was askeleton key, or three keys in some applications.[6] The magazine started on a shoestring, and its future looked far from certain — it took Guccione twenty months to produce his first twelve "monthly" issues. By the late 1960s, however, it was firmly established in the marketplace: "the all-time, biggest selling quality magazine in the history of British publishing" (according to Guccione),[7] and "the best-selling erotic magazine in Europe" (according toDian Hanson).[8] The magazine sold well on theContinent — especially in France — as well as in the UK.[7] It was this success, and especially reports that BritishPenthouse was outsellingHugh Hefner'sPlayboy among American troops in Vietnam,[9] that inspired Guccione to produce a U.S. edition, with the first issue appearing in September 1969.
Guccione offered editorial content that was more sensational than that ofPlayboy, and the magazine's writing was far more investigative than Hefner's upscale emphasis, with stories about government cover-ups and scandals.
Writers such asSeymour Hersh,James Dale Davidson, andErnest Volkman exposed numerous scandals and corruption at the highest levels of the United States Government.[citation needed] Contributors to the magazine includedIsaac Asimov,James Baldwin,Howard Blum,Victor Bockris,T. C. Boyle,Alexander Cockburn,Harry Crews,Cameron Crowe,Don DeLillo,Alan Dershowitz,Edward Jay Epstein,Chet Flippo,Albert Goldman,Anthony Haden-Guest,John Hawkes,Nat Hentoff,Warren Hinckle,Abbie Hoffman,Nicholas von Hoffman,Michael Korda,Paul Krassner,Michael Ledeen,Anthony Lewis,Joyce Carol Oates,James Purdy,Philip Roth,Harrison E. Salisbury,Gail Sheehy,Robert Sherrill,Mickey Spillane,Ben Stein,Harry Stein,Tad Szulc,Studs Terkel,Nick Tosches,Gore Vidal,Irving Wallace, andDr. Ruth Westheimer.[citation needed]
Due to Guccione's lack of resources, he personally photographed most of the models for the magazine's early issues.[10] Without professional training, Guccione applied his knowledge of painting to hisphotography, establishing the diffused,soft focus look that would become one of the trademarks of the magazine's pictorials. Guccione would sometimes take several days to complete a shoot.
The magazine's pictorials offered more sexually explicit content than what was commonly seen in most openly soldmen's magazines of the era. It was the first to show femalepubic hair, followed by full-frontal nudity, and eventually, the exposedvulva andanus.Penthouse has also featured a number of authorized and unauthorized photos of celebrities, such asMadonna andVanessa Williams. In both cases, the photos were taken earlier in their careers and sold toPenthouse only after Madonna and Williams became famous.
The September 1984 issue ofPenthouse magazine would eventually becomecontroversial because of its centerfold,Traci Lords. Lords posed nude for this issue at the beginning of her career as an adult film star. It was later revealed that Lords wasunderage throughout most of her career in pornography and was only 16 when she posed forPenthouse.[11]
The same issue also caused controversy with nude pictures ofVanessa Williams that caused her to be stripped of herMiss America crown.[12]
In 1997,Penthouse changed its format and began featuring sexually explicit pictures (i.e., actualoral, vaginal, and anal penetration), beginning with photos from theStolen Honeymoon sex tape featuringPamela Anderson andTommy Lee. It also began to regularly feature pictorials offemale modelsurinating, which, until then, had been considered a defining limit of illegal obscenity as distinguished from legal pornography.
In a desperate attempt to boost sales, the magazine began to feature hardcore material, including women urinating and couples engaged in real sex.[13] When this was featured, companies no longer wanted their products associated with or featured inPenthouse and quickly had their advertising removed. For the magazine, once respected and successful (and would outsell Playboy beginning in the late 1970s and continuing for several years there after), it was inevitably the beginning of its decline. Observers have commented that Guccione created an empire and also destroyed it.
A different approach to restoring sales was attempted by the UK version of the magazine in 1997. Under the editorship ofTom Hilditch, the magazine was rebranded as PH.UK and relaunched as middle-shelf "adult magazine for grown-ups". Fashion photographers (such asCorinne Day ofThe Face magazine) were hired to produce images that merged sex and fashion. The magazine's editorial content included celebrity interviews and tackled issues of sexual politics. The experiment attracted a great deal of press interest, but failed to generate a significant increase in sales. PH.UK closed in late 1998.
In 1975, Guccione was honored byBrandeis University for focusing "his editorial attention on such critical issues of our day as the welfare of theVietnam veteran and problems of criminality in modern society".[14]
In March 1975,Penthouse published an article headlined "La Costa: The Hundred-Million-Dollar Resort with Criminal Clientele", written byJeff Gerth andLowell Bergman. The article indicated that theLa Costa Resort and Spa inCarlsbad, California, was developed byMervyn Adelson andIrwin Molasky using loans from theTeamsters Pension Fund and that the resort was a playground for organized crime figures. The owners, along with two officials of the resort, Morris B.Moe Dalitz and Allard Roen, filed a libel lawsuit for $522 million against the magazine and the writers. In 1982, a jury absolved the magazine of any liability against the lawsuit from the owners. The plaintiffs appealed, but in December 1985, before a new trial could begin, the two sides settled.Penthouse issued a statement that they did not mean to imply that Adelson and Molaskey are or were members of organized crime. In turn the plaintiffs issued a statement laudingPenthouse publisher Guccione and his magazine for their "personal and professional awards". Total litigation costs were estimated to exceed $20 million.[15][16]
In December 1984, a group ofradical feminists began a civil disobedience campaign againstPenthouse which they called a National Rampage. Led byMelissa Farley andNikki Craft, they went into stores selling copies of the magazine and ripped them up, and they also burned an effigy ofBob Guccione in front of a bookstore in Madison, Wisconsin. In late 1985 the group began to focus on the printer ofPenthouse,Meredith Corporation. They bought shares in the company and attended their annual stockholder's meeting. The women were not allowed to speak, but they removed their coats, revealing images from aPenthouse shoot aboutJapanese rope bondage—among which two poses were construed by Farley to evoke dead bodies—ironed onto [their] shirts.[17]
An April 2002New York Times article reported Guccione as saying thatPenthouse grossed $3.5 billion to $4 billion over the 30-year life of the company.[18]
However, in the late 1990s, Guccione made poor business decisions — from failing to embrace new digital opportunities to changing the content of the magazine — and publishing control gradually slipped away from him.
In 1999, hoping to raise cash and reduce debt,Penthouse sold several automotive magazine titles from its large portfolio Peterson Automotive, raising $33 million in cash. However, two of their retained publications, science and health magazinesOmni andLongevity lost almost $100 million, contributing to financial problems.[19]
On August 12, 2003, General Media, the parent company of the magazine, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Immediately upon filing,Cerberus Capital Management entered into a $5 milliondebtor-in-possession credit line with General Media to provide working capital.[20][21] In October 2003,Penthouse magazine was put up for sale as part of a deal with its creditors. On November 13, 2004, Guccione resigned as chairman and CEO of Penthouse International, the parent of General Media.
In 2006, Guccione sued Penthouse Media Group for fraud, breach of contract, and conspiracy, among other charges. Some of the people named in the case included Marc Bell, Jason Galanis, Fernando Molina, Charles Samel, and Daniel C. Stanton.[22]
Starting with the January 2005 issue, the new owners significantly softened the content of the magazine.Penthouse no longer showed male genitalia, real or simulated male-female sex, nor any form of explicit hardcore content (it does still feature female-female simulated sex on occasions). While this change was followed by the return of a limited number of mainstream advertisers to the magazine, it did not significantly raise the number of subscribers; total circulation is still below 350,000.[23]
Penthouse filed forbankruptcy protection on September 17, 2013. The magazine's then-current ownerFriendFinder's currentcommon stock was wiped out and was no longer traded on the open market. In August 2013, FriendFinder's stock was delisted fromNasdaq because it consistently failed to trade for more than $1.[24]
As of 2015, General Media Communications, Inc. publishes entertainment magazines and operates as a subsidiary of FriendFinder Networks Inc.[25]
In February 2016, Penthouse Global Media – a new company headed by Penthouse Entertainment managing director Kelly Holland – acquired thePenthouse brand from FriendFinder Networks.[26] Holland overhauled the brand and its properties, with guidance from then-publisher ofPenthouse's Australian edition, Damien Costas.[27] Costas had acquired the masthead in 2013, repositioning it away from adult content toward commentary on cultural and political issues.[28]
Penthouse Global Media filed forChapter 11 bankruptcy on January 11, 2018, to address debt-related issues.[29]
Penthouse Global Media, Inc. were acquired by WGCZ Ltd., operators ofXVideos,[30] on June 4, 2018, after winning a bankruptcy auction for US$11.2 million; other companies, such asMindGeek, also participated in the auction.[31] Penthouse Global Media, Inc. was later spun off from WGCZ and renamed Penthouse World Media.
In January 2016 it was widely reported thatPenthouse was ceasing print publication.[32][33] The company quickly clarified that this was not the case, blaming a "weakly crafted press release" for the confusion.[34] In fact the difference between the two announcements was semantic. The first had said print would end when the transition to digital was complete; the second said the print edition would continue as long as it was profitable, which did not necessarily guarantee it a longer life.[35]
The nominal publication frequency of the magazine had been reduced in 2009 from twelve to eleven issues a year. It was reduced again in 2019 to six issues a year. The fourth issue of 2023 (July-August) was the last to appear in print. On a web page last updated in September 2024 — a year into the print hiatus — the company said that it would continue to produce print magazines and that new publication schedules forPenthouse andPenthouse Letters would be revealed by the end of 2024.[36] As of fall 2025 — two years into the print hiatus — there had been no further announcements.
The company published a digital-only "annual" edition ofPenthouse at the end of 2023 to round out that year (it featured the four Penthouse Pets for September through December). In January 2024 it launched a new digital-only product combiningPenthouse andPenthouse Letters. It retained the look and feel of the print magazines, along with their most notable features, and it appeared with reassuring regularity each month until December 2024, when it, too, ceased publication.[37]
Since then, the company has continued to nominate a monthly Penthouse Pet, adding photographs of the model to the Penthouse website during her four-week reign.[38] For now at least, this is its only nod toPenthouse's origins as a print periodical.
