Arizona Republic from Phoenix, Arizona • Page 54

FROM THE COVER E2 THURSDAY, JULY 13, 2006 THE ARIZONA REPUBLIC Colleen Hayes JXl 1 A Ftl Mrs. Robinson isn't the only older woman trying to seduce Bl6fHSCKG6l1 CCjUvl A.R.S a younger man in Hollywood. Here are other films that broke with convention in the romance department: (Jack Nicholson). In the end, everything returns to the conventional. Erica and Harry have each other and Paris.

Being Julia (2004): Famous London theater actress Julia Lambert (Annette Bening) begins an affair with an ambitious man (Shaun Evans) half her age. She falls in love with him but manages a masterful revenge when his affections stray to a younger actress much nearer his age. Prime (2005): Uma Thurman is 37-year-old Rafi, a divorced, career-driven New York professional who begins an affair with a 23-year-old painter, who also happens to be the son of her therapist (Meryl Streep). Rafi enjoys the fling but eventually breaks off the affair with a few regrets. The Arizona Republic comfort in bed with Hermie.

Grief-stricken and ashamed, Dorothy leaves the island, with only a note left behind for Hermie. The film and nov-elization were based on a true story in the life of writer Herman Raucher. White Palace (1990): Max, 26 (James Spader), meets Nora, 43 (Susan Sarandon), in a bar. The liaison pairs not only the younger man with the older woman, but Max is a successful advertising executive recovering from his wife's recent death and Nora is a waitress fixated with Marilyn Monroe. Tu Mama Tambien (2001): Two teenage boys (Diego Luna and Gael Garcia Bernal) go on a road trip in Mexico to discover life with a cousin's wife, who's 10 years older than they are.

They do learn about life and more from sexy Luisa (Mari- All That Heaven Allows (1955): Well ahead of its time, this bit of '50s social commentary starred Jane Wyman as Cary, a wealthy widow who falls for her young gardener, Kirby (Rock Hudson), and soon becomes the scorn of her children. Her social set withers as well. Her best "friend" (Agnes Moorehead) persuades her to dump the hunky Kirby. But in the end, Cary stands up for herself and returns to Kirby. Alfie (1966): What's it all about? Lady-killer Alfie (Michael Caine) is addicted to women, including the matronly Ruby (Shelley Winters), who doles out dough and sex until she finds someone even younger than Alfie.

The Graduate (1967): Anne Bancroft was actually just six years older than Dustin Hoffman, in his big-screen debut, when her lusty Mrs. Robinson lassoed his Benjamin Braddock in the Mike Nichols film based on Charles Webb's 1961 novel. In the end, Ben runs pff with Mrs. Older men are just no fun, said Colleen Hayes, who at 53 feels more like she's 38, 42 tops. She's blond and dresses young: hip hug-gers with a belt, heels and a little top.

Nothing too revealing. Nothing dowdy, either. But it wasn't how she dressed that wooed Steve Taniguchi, 10 years and three months younger than Hayes. He had hired her to work in a call center he ran in California. They became friends.

Divorced with two daughters, now ages 27 and 28, Hayes had just ended an eight-year relationship with a man 13 years her junior. "He was fun to hang out with, but he just wasn't relationship material for the long run," she said of her former boyfriend. Taniguchi was different. "He made me laugh. He's charming and very funny," Hayes said.

"We have things in common." The couple moved from California to Chandler a couple of years ago for his job: He's in charge of Frederick's of Hollywood's call center. She tried private detective work when they moved here and now works for a transcription business. "Steve's always liked older women," Hayes said. It was awkward a couple of years ago when he wanted to have children. They tried, but it didn't happen.

She was relieved. His parents like her. Her parents like him. Her daughter's boyfriend is the same age as Taniguchi: 42. "My daughter went for an older man," Hayes said.

bel Verdu). Something's Gotta Give (2003): At first, we get two May- Prime for 2 White '-iV halace C' December romances, Middle-age playwright Erica (Diane Keaton) dates a young doctor (Keanu Reeves) after Erica's daughter (Amanda Peet) brings home an aging swinger named Harry i ANDREW i A. SCHWARTZ Robinson's beautiful daughter. Harold and Maude (1971): Now we're talking age gap. Harold (Bud Cort) is a depressed 20-year-old until he attends a funeral and meets the lively 79-year-old Maude (Ruth Gordon), and announces to his family that he intends to marry her.

He gets the girl, but she makes her final exit on her 80th birthday. Summer of '42(1971): It was a good year for May-December romances. This one, with its haunting theme song, paired teen Hermie (Gary Grimes) and 30-something Dorothy (Jennifer O'Neill), who is living on Nan- tucket Island while her husband serves in World War II. On the day she discovers her husband has been killed, Dorothy finds UNIVERSAL PICTURES BOB MARSHAK Confident 'cougars' get satisfaction in relationships with younger men Mary Walsh (6 men approach me more man older guys do," said Mary Walsh, 59, a single nurse from Sun City. "When I tell them my age, they don't believe me." Walsh, who has a 31-year-old daughter, has dated men as much as eight years her junior.

"I want someone who can keep up with me," she said. "A secure man, whose ego is intact, doesn't care how old you are." As a nurse, Walsh takes Care of sick people all day. When she's off the clock, she doesn't want to find herself nursing a man who hasn't taken care of himself. Her daughter, who lives in Flagstaff, is supportive. "She tells me, 'You go, she said.

Financially, Walsh is independent. She doesn't need a man to support her. She usually offers to split the check on dates, but few men accept. She's not looking to marry again. "I would like a man, but I don't need one," she said.

Walsh was at a barbecue restaurant recently with a date her age. When he went to the men's room, a man about 35 approached her and said, "You look so hot. How about you and me hooking up?" She told him she was old enough to be his mother. "He couldn't believe it," she said. I 1 P.H..MWn ft I '0 7 -Krt -4 1 MICHAEL CHOWTHE ARIZONA REPUBLIC Jennifer Dagen, 41, and Dusty Edmonds, 23, were married in San Marcos Justice Court in Chandler earlier this month.

Age has never been an issue for the couple: "No one's had a problem with it," Dagen says. Of the younger guys Dagen has dated, age has never been a concern. "No one's had a problem with it," COUGARS Continued from El experience and good connections. "They bring something to the relationship," Schwartz said. "Their antennae are out." Part of the credit goes to the beauty industry, which has helped middle-age women remain youthful, Scottsdale psychotherapist Marjorie Schulte said.

"Women are feeling like, 'Hey, I look great and I can be with this young pup who turns me Schulte said. Cougar is no pussycat Married five times and organizing her fourth annual Cougar Cruise (there's a waiting list) on Lake Ontario on Aug. 18, Gibson considers herself a pioneering cougar. In her late 50s or early 60s (she declines to give her age), Gibson said being a cougar is an attitude, not a number. "They're professional, often entrepreneurs, corporate climbers.

They're very much in command, very independent," she said. Not all older women dating younger men are cougars, she said. "It doesn't really count if you are in your late 20s or early 30s because it's experience and wisdom that makes a cougar a cougar," she said. "Over-35 (women) have strength and control. If you're 40-plus, you have the condo, the car, and you're fit and together." Commitment also distinguishes cougars.

They aren't interested in permanent relationships. "They want to have fun with a good-looking guy on their own terms," Gibson said. It's what men have done for years. Susan Swartz, a relationship col-umnist for the Santa Rosa Press Democrat in northern California and author of The Juicy Tomatoes Guide to Ripe Living After SO (New Harbinger Publications, 2006, $16.96 paperback) said age isn't the bugaboo it used to be. "We have -choices.

And we think we should have as many choices as men," she said. And as baby boomer women enter their 50s and 60s, no one is going to tell them what to do. "This generation is not going to say, 'You don't get to do said Swartz, 61, whose husband is also 61. "They're going to keep pushing (the boundaries)." Forever young Women comfortable with a younger partner are usually attractive and self-confident. Many describe themselves as not looking their age.

Psychologist Spencer cites a survey showing that men prefer attractive older women to plain-Jane younger ones: Looks Linda Wiener Linda Wiener met her husband in college. They were married for 20 years. They had three children: a daughter and twin boys. In 2001, they divorced, and Wiener, in her early 40s, found herself in the market for a boyfriend. A hospital medical technologist for 24 years, Wiener worked mostly with women.

The Phoenix resident signed up for an online dating service and marked that she was interested in dating younger men. Many responded. Her boyfriend of five years was one of them. When he walked into the bar where they'd agreed to meet for a beer, there was an immediate attraction. That hadn't always been the case.

"Not all younger guys are good-looking," said Wiener, who at 49 is just six years younger than her 30-year-cld boyfriend's mother. Wiener isn't interested in murr's, but she does like the relationship. She doesn't want to date a string of young men. Her family and friends accept that Wiener likes younger guys. When the couple split up briefly two years ago, she dated younger men.

"Men at the age I am have physical problems. I'm in good physical condition. Everyone thinks I look like I'm in my mid 30s." Liiidu Vvkiiti -j old SC ddkyjikrj "Muii at the age I uin have physical problems. I'm in good physical condition. Everyone thinks I look like I'm in my mid-30s," she said.

Her boyfriend looks like he's 18 or 19. He gets carded when they go out. Sometimes people think she's his mom. She credits the relationship with making her feel a lot younger. She thinks younger men are interested in older women because women in their 40s and older know what they want in life.

She thh.ks that since the couple are not disuaelcd by raising children, they can foci-o Ccch Othc' "It's ju.st the tvG of uj. aic no childicu to ru-t. Yu'ie ignoring your partnci. You're ot tued and don't want sex," she said. We nave- wove in common and (for hiin), younger girls are just too immature and stupid." areas of the United States like the Midwest and the South.

"There's a kernel of resentmentcondemnation even now," Gibson said. "Older women having sex with younger men, it just didn't go down. An older woman shouldn't be sexual. She should be wrapped in a shawl and be knitting booties for the grandkids." Even though baby boomers as a generation have debunked many social mores, eliminating the raised eyebrow when an older woman pairs with a younger man will take lots of time, Gibson said. "Even baby boomers are not going to overcome that overnight.

The double standard still exists. It may not be as harsh or as condemning, but it remains," Gibson said. What's the future for these relationships? Many are of short duration, Schwartz said. Sex might be the initial spark that brings two people together, but it can't go the distance. "There has to be something else." What usually breaks up the couple is the man's desire to move on with his career or to start a family.

An older woman might have already raised hers and isn't game to try again. Taniguchi, a Chandler resident who supervises Frederick's of Hollywood's call center, said it was the baby issue that ended his relationship with a woman 12 years his senior. That woman had raised two children and wouldn't consider having more. It's one of the reasons he values his relationship with Hayes, because she didn't dismiss the possibility. Families can also intrude.

Winter, 51, says her former boyfriend's mother sabotaged their relationship. Some couples do click and take a trip down the aisle. As this story was being written, Edmonds proposed to Dagen, and the couple wed July 3. They plan to have children. Edmonds described the couple as "ecstatic." more freedom, but as you (men) get older it's not so much that anymore," said Taniguchi, who has been in a relationship for five years with Colleen Hayes, a 53-year-old grandmother.

When there is a wide age gap in a relationship, it can be difficult for couples to enjoy equal power, Schwartz said, but that can work to a woman's advantage. Although her gender might traditionally be a disadvantage, her age and experience balance it out, if not tip the scales in her favor. "Younger men see her as a said Gibson, whose last husband was 14 years her junior. Male peers often don't see women as equals but view their achievements competitively. "Older men find those achievements emasculating.

A younger man, he'll applaud an older woman's success. He'll celebrate them." It's their very independence that makes older women attractive to younger men, says James Basel, editor in chief of askmen.com, a Canadian-based Web site that attracts 7 million mostly American male readers monthly. Like the average visitor to the Web site, Basel is 28 years old. (He dates a woman his age.) He said there has been a steady appetite for information about finding and dating older women. Sexual experience is part of the allure, but the independence factor is also critical, Basel said.

"Older women have more of a male view (of relationships). They don't romanticize relationships anymore. They know the reality of relationships. She recognizes they are ephemeral and she doesn't need her man to define her." Social taboos Susan Winter, New York author of Older Women, Younger Men (New Horizon Press, 2000, $15.95 paperback), finds the taboos against these May-December relationships rapidly disappearing, but Gibson and Swartz said they remain, especially in Canada and she said. She enjoys teaching the men a few tricks in the bedroom.

Sex with a younger man, John C. Lincoln nurse Walsh said, is entic-iijg. In addition to bedroom vigor, he brings to the relationship "vitality, zest for life, (an) energy level." Older men, she said, can't keep up with her. Sex is no longer just about producing children, Spencer said. Women can choose partners just for fun.

"We've moved from procre-ational sex to recreational sex," she said. It's a myth that men and women peak sexually at different ages, psychotherapist Schulte said. It has been thought that a woman matures physically later than a man and is more compatible with a partner her junior. "Eroticism and turn-ons have a lot more to do with pheromones, looks, money, power, than age," Schulte said. "Age is just one of the determining factors." Physically, the genders mature at the same rate.

Women lag behind culturally. Said Spencer, "It takes a woman to a certain age for all her sexual inhibitions to be unlearned." It's that more relaxed, reality-based attitude that younger men find refreshing and seductive, Cougar author Gibson said. "You know what you want, and you know how to get it," she said. "Older women are more honest and more open, and if it's not rockets and roses today, that's OK. It will be." Sexual attraction Steve Taniguchi, 42.

said it was older women's sexual experience that initially attracted him in his early 20s and 30s. "For younger men. it (dating older women) is like a rite of passage. There's more experience and transcend age. Jennifer Dagen, a 41 -year-old bartender at the Vine Tavern Eatery in Phoenix, said she was immediately attracted to 23-year-old Dusty Edmonds when he came into the bar.

He thought she was 26 or 27. Just weeks later, they moved in together. 1.