Stupid Heavy-Petting Tricks: What David Letterman Could (and Should) Have Picked up from Classic Movie Nude Scenes

Some may wonder what advice I, Mr. Skin, the world’s foremost authority on celebrity nudity, can provide to amorously adventurous, married—and now, no doubt, harried—attempted-blackmail victim David Letterman.

Well, for one, I can tell him where to find the greatest women-in-prison shower scene of all time (29 minutes into 1983’s Chained Heat, where new fish Linda Blair gets a taste of queen jailbird Sybil Danning).

But, more practically, I can offer guidance to Dave via lessons I’ve gleaned from vital naked movie moments. In fact I can even give him:

Mr. Skin’s Top 10 Extramarital/Interoffice Nude Scenes (and What David Letterman Can Learn from Them)

10. Secretary (2002)

Time: 1 hour, 15 minutes

Nude: Maggie Gyllenhaal

Scene: Maggie leans forward on a desk for boss James Spader, who removes her undergarments and spanks that assistant.

The Lesson: Love hurts. So much, sometimes, it can leave you black and blue and read (on the very gossip sites you’ve forever struggled to avoid) all over.

9. The Last King of Scotland (2006)

Time: 1 hour, 15 minutes

Nude: Kerry Washington

Scene: In the afterglow of lovemaking, Kerry enjoys pillow talk with physician James McAvoy. She’s married to the doctor’s employer, who happens to be notorious Ugandan dictator Idi Amin.

The Lesson: Hell hath no fury like a crazed cannibal despot or a 48 Hours producer scorned.

8. Revolutionary Road (2008)

Time: 23 minutes

Nude: Zoe Kazan

Scene: Connecticut businessman Leonardo DiCaprio gets dressed to head home after a daylight dalliance with Zoe Kazan as his bosomy new (and nude) secretary.

The Lesson: Famously lead-footed commuter Dave can already attest that his road home to the Constitution State is paved with speed traps—but they don’t all involve the Highway Patrol. At least not if they’re dudes.

7. My Boss’s Daughter (2003)

Time: 42 minutes

Nude: Carmen Electra

Scene: While pursuing his crusty millionaire supervisor’s lovely offspring (Tara Reid), hapless Ashton Kutcher must resist temptation in the form of Carmen emerging from a pool in a sopping-wet, see-through shirt that leaves no lusciousness to the imagination.

The Lesson: Let others publicly handle all props when prepping the bit “Will It Float?”

6. Little Children (2006)

Time: 54 Minutes

Nude: Kate Winslet

The Scene: Patrick Wilson plays a dad who works from home and, here, mom-next-door Kate treats him to a hot cycle atop a washing machine.

The Lesson: All laundry, when it belongs to neither you nor Mrs. Lasko-Letterman, is dirty.

5. An American Affair (2009)

Time: 40 minutes

Nude: Gretchen Mol

Scene: Gorgeous Gretchen portrays one of JFK’s Washington staff mistresses during a joyful coupling that embodies the naughtiest notions of Camelot.

The Lesson: A powerful man with a penchant for cigars, a wide-eyed ingenue enamored of his status, strings pulled to secure an internship, closed-door confabs . . . as Dave might recall, circa 1998 to 2001, some punchlines just write themselves.

4. Working Girl (1988)

Time: 1 hour, 18 minutes

Nude: Melanie Griffith

Scene: While pretending to be investment magnate Sigourney Weaver, topless Melanie merges with power player Harrison Ford.

The Lesson: When scaling the heights of corporate power, you come across all kinds of boobs. Just don’t let a pair turn you into one.

3. Boomerang (1992)

Time: 50 minutes

Nude: Robin Givens

Scene: Eddie Murphy hunkers down with Robin, who’s his office superior, and wisely allows her the upper position.

The Lesson: In love and war, there can be good reason to lay low. And in extortion, that number can go as high as two million.

2. Unfaithful (2002)

Time: 52 minutes

Nude: Diane Lane

Scene: After rare-book dealer Olivier Martinez beguiles Diane with his well-stocked private study, she can’t help but expose herself to passions beyond the confines of marriage vows to Richard Gere.

The Lesson: While an office-cum-swing-pad always packs potent allure, the price of discovery may mean enduring more public mockery than even Gere has suffered, and there’s no truth to the rumors about him. Just ask any gerbil.

1. Fatal Attraction (1987)

Time: 18 minutes

Nude: Glenn Close

Scene: Following flirtations at a company meeting, Glenn and Michael Douglas erupt into animal exuberance, wildly intertwining while riding a freight elevator, atop a kitchen sink, and then, finally, in bed.

The Lesson: The grand bunny boiler of them all, Fatal Attraction demonstrates the literally insane dangers of mixing business and pleasure, secrets and sex, and Larry “Bud” Melman gags with Larry Flynt’s libido.

So there you have it, Dave (and everybody else). The message laid bare in each of these skin-driven movie parables is nakedly simple: Don’t keep a pullout sofa where you eat.