Wise Guy: Bill Maher

Dear Ann Coulter, Glenn Beck, and Sean Hannity: Bill Maher has an opinion.

Sasha Eisenman/Trish South Management/Trunk Archive

Locating le mot juste to describe Bill Maher can be taxing, like trying to order a pizza with your two buddies, the vegan and the Teamster. The 54-year-old Maher's loyal fans might label him provocative visionary, perhaps even prophet. Others—namely George W. Bush and the evangelists Maher taunted in his 2008 God-denying documentary Religulous—might start with putz. We'll just take the easy way out and refer to the host of HBO's Real Time With Bill Maher as controversial. But here are a couple of indisputables: Though he might not admit it, Maher costarred with Mr. T and Gary Busey in 1983's D.C. Cab. He's also logged many an hour partying at the Playboy Mansion. Starting this month, his show—with its psychedelic mix of guests, including Salman Rushdie and Ashton Kutcher—will air Fridays on HBO (an hour earlier, at 9 p.m.). Another big change is afoot: That commitment allergy of his seems to have been cured, and all it took was some love and heavy metals.

ELLE: What famous woman did you fantasize about the most as an adolescent?
BILL MAHER: Barbara Eden from I Dream of Jeannie. You didn't see bare midriffs in the late '60s on TV. I think it was only allowed because she wasn't human. She was vapor, and of course you can't fuck vapor.

ELLE: What's the angriest you ever saw a woman?
BM: I was engaged to a woman who whizzed a pool ball right at my head. It could have killed me.

ELLE: Yikes. Was this in public?
BM: No, this was in my dining room, where I had my pool table at the time.

ELLE: I suppose the fact that you had a pool table in your dining room might explain why your fiancée was so angry.
BM: Well, that's true.

ELLE: If you had a do-over with any event with a woman, what would you try again?
BM: There was a girl I was crazy about my senior year of high school, and I visited her at college. We slept in the same bed, but I was intimidated by her, so I didn't try anything. I was too young and dumb to understand that women want you to take the lead. I never made that mistake again. I think with women, once you blow it once like that, you're out. And if you watch any of those old shows like Elimidate, you see that it's the asshole who wins or comes close. The shy one's always eliminated first.

ELLE: You seem like a guy who wouldn't be shy about asking for what he wants. Could you trace that quality back to that college girl experience?
BM: No. I was never a guy who had the facility to cold-talk to a girl. Even up to age 30, I was still making friends with guys who could do that. I think one of the reasons people want to be famous is that it's finally a solution to that problem. At a certain point, you no longer have to say, 'Hi, I'm so and so' to a girl.

ELLE: But does it bother you at all to think that women approach you because of what you are, rather than who you are?
BM: No, because I think who I am is what I am. If a woman wanted someone for superficial reasons, there are people younger, cuter, and richer than me.

ELLE: What male celebrity had the kind of game that you've always been in awe of?
BM: Warren Beatty was the hardest-working. If he wanted to get a woman, he'd just work at it endlessly. He never acted like he was great looking, rich, or famous, which of course he was. He acted like a guy who had to work really hard.

ELLE: You've been single long enough to have developed serious game. Explain your most trusted methods.
BM: I've never been a worker. If it doesn't happen easily, I've never had the patience to be there for the long haul, especially when women withhold sex. If you're attracted to a man and you're having a good time with him, take it to the next level. To me, when a woman withholds sex, it's like she's saying, "I have nothing else that could possibly interest you, so I have to embargo my vagina." All this is moot now that I have a girlfriend. Hopefully I'm over ever having to date again.

ELLE: Holy crap! Bill Maher is spoken for?
BM: I'm not saying I'm getting married. I'm just saying I have a steady girlfriend—and you have to think it's going to last. And we share the same beliefs: We don't believe in God, marriage, or living together.

ELLE: I saw photos of this Cara Santa Maria. She's beautiful, but isn't it awkward kissing a woman with a lip ring?
BM: No, I like piercings. I find them sexy almost everywhere they are. And if you've never been blown by a girl with a tongue ring, you're missing something. There's just something about metal.

ELLE: I'll seek a special dispensation from the wife. Has a woman ever said anything mid-sex that made you unable to continue?
BM: This didn't make me stop, but years ago when I was on Politically Incorrect, a very attractive girl on the road ended up in my hotel room. While we were doing it, she said, "Will you sing something to me?" I realized she thought I was a singer.

ELLE: Which singer? You think she mistook you for Glen Campbell?
BM: I don't know exactly. Apart from that instance, women wouldn't typically go to bed with me just because I was famous without any idea what I was famous for.

Don't Miss