Everything I know about being a man I learned from women, and especially when we were stoned and in bed, f***ing and/or talking.

Men approaching the AARP age, if my conversations with my brethren are at all typical, do not think this way. We're above sex now—or at least above talking about it. When we take the measure of our lives, we speak of mentors and character and hard work, and if we can stand to offer a reason to explain the good things we've got without beating the drums for our personal excellence, we may even throw in luck. … Read More

Intellectually and cosmetically, Jocelyn’s at least a nine. But she lives alone, and her deepest relationship with a male is with her dog. Worse yet, when we meet her, that dog has died, and she is marking the event with both a funeral and a tear-stained reception.

Even among the cast of The Jane Austen Book Club—the new film that burdens the genre of chick flicks with actual ideas—Jocelyn is an extreme case. Which makes her an ideal role for Maria Bello, the actress who, in her real life, is addicted both to reading and her independence.

For women who aspire to … Read More

Esther Perel looks like the New York couples therapist from Central Casting. Married for a zillion years, mother of two, trim as an arrow—if you have to talk to a stranger about your sex life, she’ll do just fine.

And she's got pop credentials: Her recent book, Mating in Captivity: Reconciling the Erotic & The Domestic, got warm reviews. But woe be to couples who bring her their problems without reading her first. They ask: If novelty is the key to hot sex, doesn't Read More

The passionate detective has one solace: his four young children. And that is unfortunate, because his wife recently decided to divorce him. Never anybody's idea of laid-back, he's now in a permanent funk, a darker rage. His partner, Olivia Benson (Mariska Hargitay), can't seem to help him. It was no surprise, late in the season, that one case unhinged him so totally his boss sent him home. Stabler was, finally, about to crack. Yes, Law & Order: S.V.U. is a TV series, not a reality show. Yes, what Christopher Meloni does so convincingly is called "acting." But, although I knew … Read More

It's one long red carpet at Desperate Housewives these days. That’s how it goes on a mega-hit—everywhere you look, you see the trappings of success. Fashion shoots. Feuds. Rumors. Confessions. It’s a sweet time for the network, the creators, and the actors. And it’s especially sweet for Doug Savant, whose character, Tom Scavo, is married to Felicity Huffman’s Lynette.

No, he’s not the guy with “hunk status” and women across America dreaming of him without his shirt on—he’s just the cute married guy who tries to make his partner happy. Who’s going to lust after a man like that? His real-life … Read More

James Denton panicked when the new script for the ABC hit Desperate Housewives had him taking his shirt off. The 41-year-old actor wasn't unaware of the plotline involving his character—in which more than one of the women on Wisteria Lane were hot-blooded, lonely, and oh-so-susceptible to the charms of the neighborhood's only tall, rangy bachelor, a mysterious plumber named Mike Delfino—but Denton had assumed that the topless moments would go to the buffed kid who played the gardener. Now he had less than two weeks to turn himself into an object of desire.

 Denton devised his own training regime: "Stop eating." … Read More