20 Questions: Helmut Newton

Helmut Newton has been called the king of kink and described as the "dubious master of stylishly sleazy international erotica." Over the past 50 years, he has made a career of capturing disturbing and arresting images—a jodhpured model wearing a saddle, an undie-clad model dunking another model's head into a while porcelain toilet bowl. In fact, his meticulous compositions have been elevated to trademark status. Acknowledged for introducing rough sex into fashion photography, Newton grasped the ineffably strange fascination for sadomasochistic accessories— chains, whips and the spikiest of high heels—that would become commonplace on MTV decades later. He's always managed to transform his assignments into peep shows of a cool aristocratic otherworld, one inhabited by dauntingly self-possessed, oversized women caught in unforgettably curious situations. (Witness, for example, the series he shot for the September 1987 issue of Playboy—never before have milk-fed Playmates appeared so edgily pensive.) Moreover, his photographs are familiar because nothing is squandered by this shrewd product ecologist: Every shot begets an exhibition that begets a catalog, then a published collection. "Pola Women," the 12th of his books, is a 20-year compilation of preliminary Polaroids of nudes and other models. His biography will be published in 1993; until then, when talk gets personal, Newton turns sketchy. Here's what we know: He was born in Berlin in 1920. Emigrated to Melbourne, Australia, during the war. He has been happily married to actress-turned-pholographer June Newton since 1948. Time to change the subject.

Recently, we sent writer Margy Rochlin to do a little investigating. Says Rochlin, "We met at his winter home, a bright corner suite at the Chateau Marmont hotel in Los Angeles. Given the nature of his photographs, most people imagine Newton to be a shifty, nocturnal predator. But the 72-year-old who greeted me was witty, charming and, with the exception of an occasional glint in his brown eyes, positively wholesome. The evening before, his latest exhibition, 'Naked and Dressed in Hollywood,' had opened, which would account for the spectacular hedge-sized purple floral arrangement sent by Liz Taylor. Newton gets a lot of telephone calls. Throughout our chat, he'd break to gossip merrily with his friends, while I not-very-discreetly hung on every word. Audrey Wilder, wife of film director Billy Wilder, called. So did sculptor Robert Graham, whom Newton urged in paternal tones to use Angelica Huston, Graham's wife, as his next study in bronze. But the most educational eavesdropping highlight had to be listening to Newton cajoling the wife of a well-known California fine artist into posing nude for him. Other photographers might be interested to learn that Newton, who is known to be a smooth talker, lakes the laissez-faire approach. 'No, no, no. You didn't misunderstand me,' he soft-pedaled. 'Just think about it and let me know....'"

1.

[Q] Playboy: Who would you let put a saddle on you?

[A] Newton: [Withoutpause] Faye Dunaway. I find her very, very, very sexy. She's a big woman, which I love. The most sensual scene ever was in Barfly. Dunaway is sitting there in a dreadful old housecoat, a kimono, on the couch. And the director, Barbet Schroeder, had the camera on her legs for I don't know how long as she was talking to Mickey Rourke. I can describe her legs in detail. I've never seen Faye Dunaway in the nude, unfortunately, but she's got a fairly big behind, which I love. Her thighs are beautiful, they're strong, and they taper to extremely fine ankles, and you can see the indentation, the tendon, in the back of the heel, which drives me crazy. So I guess it would be Faye Dunaway I would let put a saddle on my back. I just hope the saddle would be very light because my back isn't all that strong.

2.

[Q] Playboy: There is a famous portrait of you taken by your wife. In it, you're wearing shorts, a straw hat and a fetching pair of ladies' high heels. What event inspired the purchase of that footwear? And what does a man look for when it comes to buying women's shoes?

[A] Newton: A friend of ours was giving a ball for her birthday and the theme was romance. And so I decided to wear my tux, a long Lorelei wig and to buy some high-heeled shoes.

So I went into a funny little old shoe store run by two elderly ladies in downtown Monte Carlo. I said to one of the owners, "I want to get a pair of high-heeled shoes. Size eight and a half." She didn't even bat an eyelash. She brought out a pair and I tried them on and said, "No, I'd like a higher heel and a sling back." Then she trotted out a pair of shoes that were very nice, with peekaboo toes. They were very comfortable. I could dance in them. High heels are very good for one's posture—you hold yourself more erect in high heels. My legs are great, aren't they? My mother had beautiful legs.

3.

[Q] Playboy: Nastassja Kinski cradling a Marlene Dietrich doll. Claus von Bülow in black leather doing his impression of Queen Victoria. Film director Tony Scott with his former girlfriend Tanja Coleridge, who is wearing only thigh-high boots and the result of what looks like one hell of a bikini wax. Do you know beforehand that your subjects will be receptive to your ideas?

[A] Newton: First of all, before I present any wild ideas, I try to find out whether or not they would be receptive to them. I don't generally have wild ideas unless I'm told that they're game. I'm quite timid myself—I can't force anybody into doing anything. I don't even persuade them.

4.

[Q] Playboy: Come on. Your reputation for persuading people to strike startling poses is legendary. When sweet-talking fails, do you have a standard surefire idea?

[A] Newton: You can do it only with very special and interesting people. I go in very, very close. As I did with the picture of Robert Graham smoking the cigar. The same goes for that picture of Debra Winger and the cigarette. You get a close-up like that and you don't have to see anything else. I'm not interested in the photographic grain; I'm interested in the pores, in the skin texture of the (continued on page 223)Helmut Newton(continued from page 117) person. It's a fact: what better portrait than an extreme close-up?

5.

[Q] Playboy: You've taken photographs of powerful people, everyone from heads of state to glamourous movie stars. Which portrait subject made your palms sweat?

[A] Newton: Margaret Thatcher was so totally in command that when I gave her aide-de-camp the release forms, he said, "Mr. Newton, we never sign releases. You may print anything that you have on film." Nobody has ever said that to me. It's just that she doesn't give a thing away. I wanted to take the photograph down at the pool of this hotel in Anaheim, where there was a bloody gale going on and where I thought that her beautiful blue hair, which was very carefully coiffed, would blow. I couldn't do that. She wouldn't have said yes. But I got a good picture—it was bought by [Britain's] National Portrait Gallery. In it, because of her slightly protruding teeth, she reminds me of a shark. And in those pale blue English eyes is steel. She's an extraordinary woman. A lot of women are attracted to men, regardless of what they look like, because they are powerful. I find that a woman who has a lot of power is sexually very interesting. I mean, what other living woman has held more power than she has? The Queen of England is nothing.

6.

[Q] Playboy: HOW big is big?

[A] Newton: Big can be very big. Last year I photographed a woman for a picture called The Smoking Nude. I saw her recently and she was three times the size of what she was when I photographed her. [Excitedly] She was enormous! She was as big as a locomotive! But she's still very beautiful. I would love to rephotograph her. She was massive! She was like a giant, like a ... a Mount Rushmore!

7.

[Q] Playboy: And what is the allure of the Amazon?

[A] Newton: A very early, very sexual childhood [memory] of mine is looking at copper engravings of Greek and Roman mythical and historical figures. Like Cleopatra wearing a breastplate and going down the Nile half-naked. You know how Amazons always have one breast out? One breast is covered so, I suppose, she can throw her spear. As a boy I found that alluring. In the Seventies I did many pictures of women who had on an evening gown with one shoulder strap dropped so that you could see one breast protruding. It's an image that's quite classical. In France you refer to it as à la Amazone. A wonderful expression that the French have for the whores who work in cars is Amazones—because they're riding on their horses. I just love big women, big, physically powerful women. I like how protected they make me feel. I also find it attractive when they are intelligent. I don't like bimbos.

8.

[Q] Playboy: Describe the attraction of a vivid scar.

[A] Newton: I love scars. I'm mad about scars. They show something of life that has left a trace. They're interesting. There's a picture in Sleepless Nights of a Berlin girl who had scars all over her body. I liked them so much I had them retouched a little bit, so that there was no doubt about them.

9.

[Q] Playboy: The women in your photographs are usually as scantily clad as possible, if not completely undressed. Why are the men always fully clothed?

[A] Newton: I'm not very interested in naked men. The only nude I've ever done of a man, a full-length frontal nude, was of Helmut Berger. Of course, I've done quite a lot of nudes of myself. When I'm in a hotel room by myself and I'm bored, I pick up a camera and photograph myself in the mirror. But I haven't shown that many. I'm getting a bit old for that.

10.

[Q] Playboy: On the Helmut Newton scale of beauty, rate the importance of a perfect body.

[A] Newton: I'm not that interested in the perfect body. In fact, I find that when stars such as Elizabeth Taylor are no longer at their zenith, when they've faded, gotten older, they're fascinating. Much more fascinating than young actresses. There are certain young actresses that are good on the screen, but they're not good in front of my camera. I photograph them and I find it's a bit of a waste of time. They're very boring for me because they haven't lived in any way. They don't have an aura, they don't have a past. Another thing is that they're totally ruled by their press agents. And to have these hysterical agents on the telephone saying, "Oh, you can't do that.... And she mustn't wear this...." I mean, who needs it? The big stars don't have axes to grind. It's the younger ones who are pains in the neck.

11.

[Q] Playboy: Which part of a woman's body do you look at first?

[A] Newton: I look at the legs. Legs are very important. Bosoms, whether they're little or big, don't make much difference to me. I'm not crazy about remade breasts—I find that very unsexy. I did find it interesting when I saw it for the first time, because I'm interested in Dr. Frankenstein. And I love the idea of a woman who is totally artificial, like the monster that Frankenstein created out of nothing. I think that's wonderfully fascinating. But now everybody, especially in this town, has remades. I find it boring. I find it more interesting to see breasts that are too small, by Playboy standards, which I think in many men's eyes is the ideal woman. I'm not very interested in that kind of beauty. I find [real bosoms] more interesting—even if they're not firm anymore, or if they don't exist. But mostly, when I look at a woman, I look at what she wears. Sometimes I will see someone I met four years ago and I won't be able to remember her name, but I can tell her what she was wearing.

12.

[Q] Playboy: Does June get ticked off when you scope the babes?

[A] Newton: NO, she's used to it. And it's all part of work. Even in the beginning, she was never jealous. In fact, when I was young, I used to find these girls in the streets of Paris and I would always be too shy to approach them. June would always go up to them and say, "My husband's a photographer and he would like to photograph you. Could I have your telephone number?" My wife's attitude is that if I started taking architecture pictures, which I like doing, or pictures of flowers, which I like doing, too, we'd starve. But if I take pictures of naked girls, I'm going to make a good living. Besides, she knows that models are not generally what I go for. I'm interested in writers; I like actresses very much. And I know exactly what kind of guys my wife likes. She likes them young and dark. Sort of Latin. She likes flamenco dancers and Gypsies. Dangerous types. She loves them because she's sort of square. A good girl.

13.

[Q] Playboy: Your wife has several different names. Which ones do you use and under what circumstances?

[A] Newton: First of all, her maiden name is Browne. Then as an actress she was called June Brunell. Then when she married me she became June Newton. Then she picked up her June, always. It's an old-fashioned Hollywood name, isn't it? Few girls today are called June and I like that name very much, so I call her June. But a lot of people call her Alice. And she loves being called Alice. She's always hated being called Mrs. Newton. She's got a thing about it. She wants to have her own identity and doesn't want to live in the shadow of somebody else. I'll tell you a funny story: About twenty years ago, when she started taking photographs and changed her name, there was a story going around Paris that Helmut Newton had left his wife and shacked up with a young photographer called Alice Springs. [Laughs happily]

14.

[Q] Playboy: YOU and your wife have been married for forty-four years. What are the praises of holy matrimony?

[A] Newton: Even after all this time, I couldn't imagine another woman who would interest and amuse me more. June still makes me laugh. She's a very good storyteller. She'll come back from whatever she has been doing and we'll sit down and have a drink and she'll tell me everything that happened in detail. She acts out all the parts, which I can't do because I'm too impatient. With her, a banal day becomes amusing, funny or dramatic.

15.

[Q] Playboy: DO you have any men friends?

[A] Newton: Not enough. I like going out with men and talking to men—it's nice, you know? When I was young I didn't care for men that much. All I wanted to do was to meet as many girls as possible. Obviously. But when I was in the army, I didn't mind being with guys. I liked that very much. I find women easy to talk to; they seem to confide in me. For instance, recently I had lunch with two successful businesswomen whom I hardly knew. Half an hour into the lunch, they were telling me their innermost sexual secrets. Maybe I inspire confidence, or maybe it's because I'm older. Maybe the pictures, or something like that. But I've never used a hard come-on with the women. Even when I was young I didn't go in for that.

16.

[Q] Playboy: What cliché about models do you find to be true?

[A] Newton: Often, as we say, they have not invented the gunpowder. But what if you take a million shopgirls? They're not all smart, either. Or a million secretaries—there are not that many smart ones. I know. I've been looking for a secretary.

17.

[Q] Playboy: HOW about a tip for the amateur fashion photographer?

[A] Newton: In my studio or at my sittings, it's like being in a toy shop: Don't Touch the Models. In fashion photography, when you go on a trip or on a shoot, generally you have two girls. If the photographer starts screwing the models, I think he will lose a lot of authority. Because his girlfriend will be able to control him. I never touch the models. Never, ever. I find that totally wrong. If I'm alone with a model and her hair is out of place, I may fix it. Even then, I'll excuse myself to the girl.

18.

[Q] Playboy: If women came from only one country, which country would you prefer that to be?

[A] Newton: It's not a country, it's a city—Berlin. Women from Berlin have certain attributes that I find exciting. They're blonde. They are tall and they have this skin that is transparent because the sun doesn't shine that much and the weather is pretty cool. Their skin is so transparent you can see the veins. I think it's exciting when you can see the veins in a woman's breasts. Then they also have high cheekbones and they have rings under their eyes. When a girl doesn't have rings under her eyes, I often have the makeup man put them there. Because I find them interesting, those black smudges. I think they're beautiful. They bring out the eyes and also give her a kind of mystique. You don't know what she's been up to the night before. She may have been up to all kinds of things—alone, or with other people.

That's not to say there's anything wrong with American women. I think American women are interesting in many ways. To me, America is the last exotic country. It's so different from Europe. For instance, I've never thought that French women were all that erotic. A lot of it is language. Although the French language is beautiful, a lot of the women have high-pitched voices, which I don't like. I love Texas. The Texan girls are knockouts. Very sexy. I love that slightly deep voice, which is a little bit masculine. The accent just floors me.

19.

[Q] Playboy: When yoû are composing an erotic tableau, how much of it is for the good of the photograph and how much is for the good of Helmut?

[A] Newton: I think only of myself. I never do anything for the public or for the magazine. But I never get a hard-on. Even when I look at [the photographs] later, they don't arouse me. All I can think about is the hard work that went into them. If somebody else does exciting pictures, then I get a kick out of them. I'm not worried about the hard work he went through.

20.

[Q] Playboy: Your celebrity portraits often seem to capture your subjects' more ominous sides. When it comes to snapping self-portraits, what are you trying to bring out in yourself?

[A] Newton: I'm trying to make myself as good-looking as possible.

the father of newtonian physiques focuses in on some of his favorite things—half-naked amazons, great-looking legs—and remembers the night he danced in high heels

"I love big women, physically powerful women. I like how protected they make me feel. I don't like bimbos."