August 19–26, 1999

20 questions

Sari Locker

interview by Brian Howard

At just 29, Sari Locker’s already been dubbed the Dr. Ruth of Generation X. The fresh-faced sexpert has always been ahead of the curve. Graduating from Cornell at just 20, and then earning her master’s degree in sex education at Penn, Locker has been educating on sex since she was just 18. She has hosted her own TV talk show (Lifetime’s Late Date with Sari), has been published in Playboy, Details and Sassy, is the relationship correspondent for New York’s WCBS-TV News 2 and appears regularly on CNN and MSNBC. Her just-published second book, The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Amazing Sex (Alpha Books) is a bit like Sex 101: It’s got all the basics, simply spelled out, plus some advanced stuff if you’re a quick study.

In your educating, have you found that there are any hang-ups specific to current 20-somethings?

There’s so much pressure for people to have amazing sex, I think that’s a big hang-up. They don’t think that they’re good enough.… people wishing that their sex life was better when really their sex life is probably fine.

You graduated from high school at 16. Did that force you to deal with sexual issues at an earlier age?

No, I grew up in an environment where it was very comfortable for me to talk about sex with my parents and my friends.

So how did you become interested in sex educating?

When I was growing up, I had two main interests: I was a professional actress and I loved working with animals. So I’d come home from school and I’d go to my job at a pet store when I was 9 years old for a dollar an hour and then I’d go off and I was in a professional theater play that night. As I got older, I decided that I wanted to teach people about animals.… But as I got more into my teen years I had so many pets at home and I got interested in breeding my animals. I bred hamsters and parakeets and eventually dogs, and so by the time I got to college, it should have dawned on me that my interest wasn’t just in animals, my interest was also in sexuality.

Is there anything that carries over from animals to humans?

Really just the biological basics.

You go on a lot of talk shows. I’ve read that celebrities sometimes hit on you?

I can tell you which talk show hosts have and which talk show hosts haven’t. I can tell you which celebrities I’ve been on talk shows with have and which celebrities I’ve been on talk shows with haven’t.

Can you name one?

Norm MacDonald. I was on Late Night With Conan O’Brien and Norm MacDonald was on the panel sitting next to me and during the commercial break we were talking about movies, and the movie Babe had just come out and I told him I hadn’t seen it yet and he told me that he saw it with his son, that he loved it and it was great. So then he asked me if I wanted to see it.

With all the tell-all TV shows and books like Sex In The City and Run Catch Kiss, how do you differentiate yourself?

The TV show and book that you just mentioned, those are both writers who decided to write about their sex lives… saying they decided to write about their sex lives because they knew that was a catchy topic. I’m a trained sex educator. It’s not constructive for someone to talk about his or her sex life in lieu of giving advice. I think they think they should measure up to that or they think that they might be doing something wrong if the advice-giver is using a personal example. I think if someone wants to write about her sex life, fine, write about your sex life all you want, but in terms of giving advice, I don’t think that that’s fair to the audience.

Sari Locker will sign books on Wed., Aug. 25, at 7:30 p.m. at Borders, 1727 Walnut St, 215-568-7400. She will also host a wine tasting sponsored by Wine Brats from 9 p.m. to midnight at Circa, 1518 Walnut St. The $25 admission includes wine, hors d’oeuvres and more casual conversation about sex. Call 215-731-2000 for reservations.

Sari Locker website