Tom DeSimone, Director of ‘Chatterbox,’ ‘Reform School Girls,’ Dies at 87
by Pat Saperstein · VarietyTom DeSimone, who transitioned from directing adult films into helming a host of B-movies including cult pic “Reform School Girls” and talking-vagina comedy “Chatterbox,” died Oct. 17 in Cathedral City, Calif. He was 87.
His brother Bob confirmed his death and said he chose to die with medically assisted end of death after a terminal cancer diagnosis.
Born in Revere, Massachusetts and raised in Newton and Weston, DeSimone earned a master’s in film at UCLA and directed the low-budget 1968 adventure film “Terror in the Jungle.”
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DeSimone directed numerous adult films including “Lust in the Afternoon,” “Gay Guide to Hawaii” and “Prison Girls,” often under the pseudonyms including Lancer Brooks.
In 1977, his career went somewhat more mainstream with the comedy “Chatterbox,” about a woman who discovers her vagina can talk. “Tom DeSimone’s ‘Chatterbox’ which stars the game Candice Rialson as Penny, a beautician who discovers that her vagina can talk and that it isn’t always tactful. A genuinely funny comedy, ‘Chatterbox’ is about a vagina that spouts the most politically incorrect things at the most inopportune times, much to the chagrin of the dubious assortment of men who want to bed Penny,” wrote the film blog The Passionate Moviegoer.
He went on to direct “Hell Night” and “Savage Streets,” both starring Linda Blair. DeSimone left “Savage Streets” early, moving on to direct “Angel III: The Final Chapter.” After helming “Concrete Jungle” with Jill St. John and Tracey E. Bregman, his campy 1986 “Reform School Girls” became a cult classic of the women behind bars genre, and later in the 1980s he directed four episodes of “Freddy’s Nightmares.”
His other TV directing gigs included “Swamp Thing,” “Super Force,” “Dark Justice,” “The Big Easy” and all the episodes of soap opera “Acapulco Bay.”
He is survived by his brother, Bob, sister-in-law, Lisa DeSimone, nieces Amanda and Gianna DeSimone, and grandnephew Ori DeSimone.