(Toronto) With her wire-rimmed glasses and benevolent granny face, Sue Johanson seemed an unlikely candidate to become the leading “sex guru” of Canadian and American television.
But his straightforward language about anal, oral or solitary sex attracted a loyal following to his call-in lineup, first on radio and later on Canadian and American television.
Director Lisa Rideout, who made a documentary about her last year, confirmed Thursday that Sue Johanson had died at the age of 93.
People took delight in calling the Sunday Night Sex Show and its American counterpart, Talk Sex with Sue Johanson, with borderline ribald questions about obscure sex acts and various fetishes, hoping to shock this old nurse, recalled her daughter Jane in an interview before the launch of the documentary Sex with Sue.
But her wide openness was in service of an even greater mission: “unstuck sex.” Ms. Johanson believed that being educated about sex was safer. She spread this message widely by writing three books on sexuality and touring Canada giving talks in schools.
Sue Johanson got her start by founding a birth control clinic in a Toronto high school in 1970. Four years later, she began visiting schools in Ontario to offer sex education classes. A decade later, she made her radio debut in Toronto.
After the American version of her show began airing, she quickly became a darling of the American late-night talk show circuit.
“What people don’t realize is that the size of the penis doesn’t matter, because the upper two-thirds of the vagina has no nerve endings – there’s no one home there. -high,” she once said at David Letterman, prompting thunderous applause in the studio.
