Gigolo (noun, pronounced JIG-uh-loh; plural gigolos). A man who is paid or supported by a woman in return for his company, social escorting and sometimes intimacy, usually as an ongoing arrangement. Originally a professional dancing partner in 1920s dance halls. Often misspelt as gigalo, jiggalo, jigolo or “gi go lo”.
Ask most people what a gigolo is, and you will get a picture stitched together from old films: a smooth, well-dressed man living off a wealthy older woman. The real meaning is more interesting than the stereotype, and the distance between the old gigolo and a modern male companion says a lot about how much has changed for women. This guide covers what a gigolo actually is, where the word came from, and how it differs from the professional companions Australian women can book today.
A gigolo is a man who is paid, supported or given gifts by a woman in return for his company, social escorting and sometimes intimacy, usually as an ongoing arrangement rather than a one-off booking. The word comes from French, and Dictionary.com’s entry for gigolo still records both of its English senses: a man living off the earnings or gifts of a woman, and a male professional dancing partner or escort. It is often misspelt as jiggalo, jigalo or gigalo. It carries a whiff of dependency, the idea of a man being “kept”, and that older meaning sits quite far from how modern companionship works.
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Anna Grosman, Founder, Her Confidant
“The word gigolo makes it sound like something happening to a woman. What we offer is the opposite. It is a woman choosing, clearly and unapologetically, what she wants for herself.”
The word was finding its way into English in the early 1920s. In 1922 the American writer Edna Ferber made it the title story of her collection Gigolo, which opens by explaining that gigolo is French slang for a man who lives off women’s money. It came straight from French, as a masculine form of gigole or gigolette, slang for a young woman of the public dance halls or the streets.
The root is probably the Middle French giguer, to frolic, according to the same dictionary, and the Online Etymology Dictionary traces the same family of words to dancing and hopping. At its origin, then, a gigolo was quite literally a professional dancing partner. The seedier connotations came later.
The gigolo’s rise tracked the dance craze of the early twentieth century. As the tango swept Paris and then America, venues hired charming men to partner women who arrived without a companion. Some became famous: Rudolph Valentino worked as a paid “taxi dancer” at Maxim’s in New York, partnering women who came in alone, before Hollywood made him a star, as a 1917 Maxim’s menu in the Grolier Club’s dining-out exhibition recalls.
The idea soon became a business. In late 1935, a young New York Times classified-ad clerk named Ted Peckham launched the Guide Escort Service, supplying vetted, presentable men to accompany women to dinners and nights out. As the cultural history site HiLoBrow records, Peckham was adamant about the distinction that still matters today, telling The Brooklyn Eagle that he wasn’t running a gigolo service. His escorts were vetted, presentable and bound by strict rules of conduct, at a time when many clubs and restaurants still turned away women who arrived alone.
Popular culture kept the archetype alive after him, from the song “Just a Gigolo” to the 1980 film American Gigolo, which recast the figure as stylish and self-possessed.
This is where the modern picture pulls away from the old word.
The difference matters because language shapes how women feel about making a choice. “Gigolo” belongs to an era that judged both the man and the woman. A modern companion belongs to a different idea entirely, one where a woman decides what she wants and books it on her own terms.
| Gigolo | Male escort | Male companion (Her Confidant) | |
| Arrangement | Ongoing, informal, personal | Booked, time-bound, professional | Booked, time-bound, curated by an agency |
| Who pays whom | A patron supports him | The client pays for a booking | The client pays for an experience |
| Vetting | None | Varies; often none for independents | Interviews, police and health checks, trial booking, trauma-informed training |
| Focus | His income | The service | Her experience, safety and pleasure |
| The word today | Dated, slightly mocking | Neutral, widely used | What the industry’s best agencies use |
The closest modern equivalent most women ask about is the boyfriend experience. Our guide to what a boyfriend experience is and what it includes explains how it works today.
Australia’s market for this is smaller than some, yet it has local roots. A 2017 QUT-led global survey of online male escort listings found that about a quarter of Australia’s male escorts catered to women and couples, compared with more than half in the United Kingdom. Before founding Her Confidant, Anna Grosman co-founded Aphrodisiac Male Escorts, an agency that ran from 2012 to 2018. Her Confidant carries that forward as a female-led agency built specifically for women, framing companionship first, whether that is a dinner date, a plus-one, a travel companion or something more intimate. Guided experiences like The Reawakening take that further still.
Today, a woman searching for a gigolo in Melbourne or Brisbane is usually looking for something far more considered: a vetted companion whose attention is entirely on her, booked on her terms. That is what our male escorts for women in Melbourne and male escorts for women in Brisbane offer.
For more on how this all evolved, see our look at the history of male escorts and male companionship, and if you are wondering about the rules, we cover whether male escorts are legal in Australia.
It is not a slur, but it carries dated and sometimes mocking connotations. Most professionals today prefer “companion” or “escort”, which better describe consensual, professional work.
A gigolo traditionally lives off a woman’s support in an ongoing personal arrangement. A male escort works professionally on a clear, booked basis, usually through an agency.
Yes. Social companionship, such as dinners, travel and time together, is legal everywhere in Australia. Where sexual services are involved, the law depends on your state: New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland and the Northern Territory have decriminalised, while the ACT, Tasmania, Western Australia and South Australia are more restrictive. Our state-by-state guide to male escort laws covers the specifics.
The stereotype says so, but the reality is broad. Modern companionship agencies serve women of all ages and life stages.
It is spelt g-i-g-o-l-o and pronounced JIG-uh-loh, with a soft “g” as in “gin”. Common misspellings are gigalo, jiggalo and jigolo. The plural is gigolos.
The old sense of the word, a man kept by a patron, has mostly disappeared. Men who want to do this work professionally become male escorts or companions, usually through an agency that screens and supports them. Our guide to how to become a male escort in Australia explains the steps.
A gigolo, in the old sense, was a dancing partner who became a symbol of a bygone kind of dependency. A modern male companion is something cleaner and more empowering: a professional experience a woman chooses for herself. If you are curious, you are welcome to ask the Her Confidant team anything.
