Mister Penis

Penis Power is the name of Dr. Danoff’s new and successful book. The author finds it hard to believe that in liberal, progressive America, “penis” is still considered a dirty word. “What is a penis?” he asks. “It’s just an ordinary organ. The penis is to a urologist exactly what the heart is to a cardiologist and the stomach is to a gastroenterologist. But for some reason, even medical TV show hosts almost choke before managing to utter this word. Precisely because so many people feel self-conscious and intimidated, I decided to name my book Penis Power, and it got me into all kinds of trouble. I had to try really hard to find a publisher for it.

“My dream is to reach a point where people will buy my book without hiding it in a backpack or a brown paper bag. What’s so embarrassing about buying a popular science book that teaches you how to make friends with your penis to ensure its longevity? Is this a sin? I’d like to summon all the world’s men to a rally in which we’d call the penis out of the closet. Why does The Vagina Monologues show run all over the globe, in countless versions, and no one thinks that ‘vagina’ is a dirty word? Even professional male strippers in clubs or at bachelorette parties don’t take off their underwear. A woman stripper goes all the way, but a man always keeps a little strip of cloth over his goods.”

Make sex a high priority

Danoff has been married for 40 years to singer Hedva Amrani, from the duo Hedva and David. They met 43 years ago when Danoff, an American Jewish doctor, was training at Columbia University in New York and she arrived on Broadway in the musical The Best of Israel.

“I went to see the show with the woman I was dating back then,” he recalls. “She knew the show’s director, so we were invited to a party honoring the artists. This was where Hedva and I talked for the first time. A few months later, while skiing in Austria, I accidentally met Hedva’s manager, and he told me that she had a crush on me.”

“When my son was little, he asked, ‘Daddy, when will my penis be as big as yours?’ I put my hand on his hand and said to him, ‘It will happen when your fingers are as long as mine.’ It’s been years since we compared. I hope it did happen.”

“When the manager returned to New York, he told Hedva that I had a crush on her, I was planning to ask her out to dinner, and she had to go out with me. This is how he set us up. When I called her, we went out to dinner—accompanied by the manager because she didn’t want to go out with me alone—and I ended up leaving my girlfriend for her.”

This was during the Vietnam War. Danoff was serving at an air force base in Mississippi, Amrani was running around the world performing, and they talked daily on the phone. “In one of my visits to the base, I discovered he was having an affair with a military nurse, and I told him he badly disappointed me,” Amrani says. “His response was a marriage proposal.” Shortly thereafter, when Amrani took off to Japan to represent Israel at a music contest with the song “I Dream of Naomi,” Danoff caught a military flight to Tokyo in order to be with her, and when she won the contest, they decided to get married in Israel.

The match was not received too enthusiastically by Danoff’s family. “My father was very direct with me: ‘A singer and an Israeli? And a wedding in Israel? I’m not coming!’ So I said to him in the most straightforward way: ‘Dad, I promise you that if you don’t come to our wedding, your grandchildren won’t love you.’ My father listened, smiled, and came to the wedding. We’ve lived in the US ever since.”

How important is sex in marriage?

“My grandmother used to say that a woman’s way to a man’s heart is through his stomach, but I maintain that she’ll get better results through the penis. I’m not saying women should always act like sex kittens, but those who manage to keep their men are usually those who give sex a high priority in marriage. My father used to say, ‘When I’m hard, I’m soft, and when I’m soft, I’m hard,’ and this is how it still works. A smart woman will ask her man for a diamond when he’s erect and hard and not when he’s soft and limp. Some might say I’m politically incorrect or impolite, but based on my vast professional experience, I dare say that this is true: man comes out of the vagina and then spends his entire life wanting to get back in.”

“I’ve never met a woman who said to me, ‘Doctor, could you please make my hubby’s penis longer or harder.’ On the other hand, many women have asked me if I could associate the penis to a bigger heart.”

“At the beginning of a relationship, wild sex is on the top of the list. After a few years, when you are absorbed in your career, home, and children, the sex calms down and other things fill you up. Even today’s young people, who think they invented the wheel, will reach an age when they’ll enjoy a hug and a kiss. Still, there is no reason to complain about age—it has a significant advantage: ejacu­lation is slower. When you understand that the changes you’re going through are a natural evolution rather than a punishment, you can accept them with love. It seems that there is hardly any man who doesn’t use erection pills. In the US alone, we’re talking about a market of over a billion dollars annually.”

And is that a good thing?

“In a certain way, it’s great. Erection problems are associ­ated with aging—at 19 you are a walking erection and can have sex five times a day, and as you age, testosterone and libido decrease, and you can do it five times a month or perhaps only five times a year. Some men are crazy about these pills that provide them with miraculous results, and others would gladly give them up—they prefer to relax. They don’t want to be like the cartoon in which the man has one foot in the grave and his wife is running after him with a blue pill. Other men get carried away and forget that the ‘magic pill’ can improve the tool but not the desire. The decrease in desire is not the end of sex; it can be treated with hormones, but that’s a more complex treatment.”

And where do women stand on all this?

“Some of them get really stressed because of the erection pills. After a woman comes to terms with the fact that her partner has been sexually inactive for 10 years, he suddenly takes a pill and wants to have sex twice a week. Some women suffer from vaginal dryness, a characteristic of menopause that gets worse if they haven’t had sex for a long time, and they are unable to satisfy their man. This is one reason that many couples are composed of an older man and a younger woman. I see them in my clinic and in the gynecologist’s clinic when they come for in vitro fertilization.”

Why do they need to see you on their way to the gynecologist?

“To make sure they are still fertile. I have a recurring dialogue with men on this topic. The man asks about his sperm count result and I reassure him, ‘Don’t worry. For a pregnancy, you need only one little sperm that can swim well.’ When a 65-year-old man starts a new family, I tell him: ‘Let me tell you two things: The bad news is when your child reaches adolescence, he will be impossible, insolent, and rude and may be involved in drugs and all kinds of other bad things, God forbid. The good news is that by the time your child reaches adolescence, you’ll no longer be alive so you won’t see it.’

Women want a big heart, not a giant penis

During his decades of work as a urologist in Beverly Hills, Danoff became well acquainted with men’s penis complex. “When it comes to men’s most important organ, his best friend, enough is never enough. No matter the size or the thickness, men always want more. I could fill up LA’s biggest stadium with all the penises I’ve seen during my 40 years as an urologist. I’ve seen all the men attached to the penises I examined, and in most cases the penis owners’ partners as well—wives, mistresses, and so on. I’ve never met a woman who said to me, ‘Doctor, could you please make my hubby’s penis longer or harder?’ On the other hand, many women I’ve seen did ask if I could associate the penis with a bigger heart. Through my book, lectures at medical conferences, and TV shows, I’m trying to challenge men and make them realize that their penis is as large as their heart and soul.”

And what do you say to a man who complains about size after all?

“My dear friend, you were born with a certain endowment. It’s genetic, it’s a fact, period. A very small percentage of cases may require enlargement, but even if you decide to go through implant surgery, the urologist will have to fit the implant to the size of your natural equipment.”

Danoff’s first book, Superpotency, was published some 20 years ago. “I wrote it for a simple reason: I realized that there were hardly any books out about men’s sexuality, while the shelves were overloaded with books on subjects like ‘how to improve your bank account.’ One of my patients heard me talk about impotence problems and said to me, ‘I wish there was a book like that,’ throwing the gauntlet down at me. The first book sold only about 50,000 copies, but it accomplished its pioneering task. It was translated into five languages—sadly, not into Hebrew. This is the goal I set for my current book.”

“I’m not saying women should always act like sex kittens, but those who manage to keep their men are usually those who give sex a high priority in marriage.”

Danoff wrote his two earlier books by himself, but for Penis Power, he was assisted by his son, Doran (29), a musician and singer whose name graces the covers of two CDs. ‘I invited Doran to assist me with writing because I wanted to be less lonely and because I knew how talented he was, and during his work I discovered that he was actually bringing a young spirit into the work. Thanks to Doran’s advice, I added references to gays in the book. While a gay man’s way of reaching sexual satisfaction is different from a heterosexual man’s, both he and his penis fall in love, get disappointed and jealous, suffer from performance anxiety, and compare sizes.

“Doran also introduced me to the Internet world—and I started writing a blog and answering readers’ questions. By the way, I only sign contracts drafted by my daughter, Aurele (31), who is a lawyer.”

Isn’t it embarrassing to cowrite penis stories with your own son?

“Doran and I have always been very close. When he was little, we stood in the shower and he asked me, ‘Daddy, when will my penis be as big as yours?’ I put my hand on his hand and said to him ‘It will happen when your fingers are as long as mine.’ It’s been years since we compared. I hope it did happen.”

Danoff’s wife, Hedva Amrani, never stopped singing, recording, and performing. Their daughter-in-law, Doran’s wife, is pregnant, and Amrani is getting ready for her next important life role—being a grandma. “My husband has his agenda, and I have my career,” she says. “After 40 years of marriage, I think the most important thing is giving each other space. Spouses don’t necessarily need to like the same things, but each of them should respect the other’s activities.

“Our second trick is called ‘next.’ We do fight, but we never dig into it endlessly. We just go on to the next thing.”

How does it feel to be the wife of a sexuality authority?

“For me, he is a regular guy. He has no secrets or magic tricks. Sometimes he’s extremely nice, sometimes not.”