All-Sex Talk Show Wins Audience

From tiny KFOX-FM in Redondo Beach, JoAnn Woodward--no relation to Paul Newman--tells Los Angeles whatever it wants to know about sex every Wednesday morning on “South Bay Sex.”

Although other programs feature doctors or psychologists who dispense advice about sex and other topics, hers is the only radio talk show in the Los Angeles Basin devoted exclusively to sexuality.

Woodward, a certified nurse practitioner, said she began the show, which is oriented toward women, three years ago because “women have a lot of questions that they need answered.” Since then, the program has attracted a small but devoted audience that includes counselors who advise their clients to tune in.

The program is aired from 8:30 until 9 a.m. on KFOX (93.5 FM), a station that sells time to people who want to produce their own broadcasts. The eclectic mix on KFOX has included a feminist businesswoman’s program, fundamentalist religion and a dating service.

The station, with offices just off the Redondo Beach Pier, reaches an area stretching from Malibu to Laguna Beach and inland as far as downtown Los Angeles, the San Fernando Valley and Pasadena.

Although Woodward’s breezy presentation, intermixed with advertisements for her nursing practice, is not the polished professional format found on larger stations, she has dealt with topics many others would not touch.

Some recent programs have been devoted to masturbation, the role of the clitoris in society, sexually transmitted diseases (with graphic descriptions of symptoms), and the latest in condoms, a model designed for women.

“I swear I’m not making it up,” she said of the last topic. “They call me the Dr. Ruth of the South Bay.”

Although she speaks frankly on the air, Woodward said she has not been a target of obscene or abusive phone calls, even after a program devoted to the subject of abortion. “I have never gotten calls from fundamentalists,” said Woodward, who described her program as a “pro-choice show.”

This week, Woodward’s guest was Shelley Lessin Stockwell, a former airline stewardess and author of the forthcoming book “Sex and Other Touchy Subjects.”

“We’ll keep all the flight attendant jokes out of this,” Woodward told Stockwell in opening the program. “What got you interested in the field of sexuality?”

“I was raised in the school of the double standard,” Stockwell said. “It was very clearly brought home that my job in life was to remain a virgin, go to college, snag myself a nice, professional man using my sexuality as the bait and have lots of children and live happily ever after.”

Stockwell said that plan was derailed in the 1970s “when people were going hog crazy wild.” She recalled once going with her gynecologist to “some people’s house, and they were having an orgy. I was horrified. It was so opposite to the way I have been raised. That was my first sexual eye-opener to how people were behaving in the 1970s.”

Some time later, she said, she made love to her boyfriend “in a very loving relationship.”

Afterward, she said, “all I could think of is, ‘They lied to me. They told me-- they meaning society, my parents--that if you made love before you got married, that a man would use you, he wouldn’t respect you and the relationship would end, basically, because you had to be a virgin.

“And what I found was that we were closer and more bonded and more intimate, and I felt so cheated that I had wasted all that time when I could have been intimate because of that obscure rule that didn’t make any sense to me.”

At this, Woodward interjected: “However, we don’t recommend that you have sexual activity until you are ready for it.”

A few minutes later, Stockwell took a call from a woman identifying herself as Camille.

“I’ve been involved in a monogamous relationship for years, for well before AIDS became a household word,” Camille began.

“And recently that relationship ended and I started to date again. I would like your perspective on how to approach the subject of AIDS with a prospective lover . . . how soon in a relationship it should be approached, and in a way that it is not calculating.”

Stockwell responded: “Well, I don’t think at hors d’oeuvres at your first dinner date would be appropriate. ‘Gee, it’s so nice to meet you. What a lovely suit, and by the way, do you have AIDS?’

“But somewhere early on, maybe after the first smooch or something. I don’t know. What do you think, JoAnn? You’re an expert on this.”

Woodward advised posing the question early in the relationship.

“It’s never too soon to approach it,” she said. “It’s important for you to talk about it because it’s on everybody’s mind. I think that a person who hears you talk about it will have a lot of respect for your self-esteem and how highly you value your health and safety.”

Camille seemed a bit dubious about this.

“Well, I’ll give it a wing,” she said with a sigh.

Stockwell took one more call, from a woman who wanted to know how to put aside workday worries when she gets home from the office.

The answer: Visualize a shelf attached to the outside of your house and imagine yourself making a tidy package of “work.” Place the package on the shelf and ignore it until it’s time to leave for work the next morning.

In the early days of the program, Woodward confided in an interview, she asked friends to call in questions, but she said that is no longer necessary.

“When I first did this show three years ago, I had ‘prepped’ callers, but my friends have long since stopped calling. You can’t ask someone every Wednesday morning, ‘Do me a favor. . . .’ It ended a long time ago.”

Although KFOX does not subscribe to the Arbitron radio audience rating service, Woodward and others say “South Bay Sex” has a devoted audience.

Brooke McIntyre, South Bay Free Clinic’s services director, said Woodward is serving a useful purpose.

“A lot more people are coming in for checkups as a result of her show,” she said.

She added: “People I know as friends comment about her show and how informative it was and how wonderful it was for them.”

Cam McCarthy, a licensed marriage, family and child counselor in Manhattan Beach, advises her clients to tune in to Woodward.

“She will answer things over the air that everyone wanted to know but never had the guts to ask. You can listen to it while you are washing the dishes or driving a car or whatever. . . . It reaches people who aren’t going to be reached in other ways.”