427: Computer Dating 2 - Robert Censoni

“Playboy”, May 1969
Robert Censoni

In this cartoon, almost contemporary with the last sketch, Censoni presents the standard late 1960s America homosexual – when not actually a man in drag. Overly dressed-up, fluttery-eyelashed, blithely smiling, pretty and blond. The idea of the homosexual with dyed-platinum-blond hair is very much the cliché of the times – lots of other Playboy cartoons in the 60s, the character portrayed by Rod Steiger in “No Way to Treat a Lady”, and the central character in the book of cartoons “My Son the Daughter” by Mort Drucker.

396: Assortment of Castaways

And in similar vein to the last of the Anita Bryant cartoons, what can be made of the cartoon’s cliché of the castaways on a desert island? Particularly since these are all from “Playboy” readers would normally expect a little cheeky sexual chasing. Funny things can happen to a man when isolated from civilisation.

“Playboy” March 1965
B. Kliban

A spectacularly early carton from Kliban – the style is much different from his unique surrealism, even the illustrative style is different. No desert island romance here: “masacara” does all the heavy-lifting here so that man and woman trapped on an island expectations are reversed.

“Playboy” May 1970
Cliff Roberts

“Playboy” April 1973
Robert Censoni

The boredom of being trapped, with language more suitable to a love’s tiff.

“Playboy” July 1976
Herb Green