GOLDEN GODDESSES: 25 LEGENDARY WOMEN OF CLASSIC EROTIC CINEMA, 1968-1985

by Nelson, Jill C.

  When Christy returned to the business for her final few years in 1995, she made a film with Vivid that mirrored her comeback suitably titled Comeback. Christy played a parody of herself: a porn superstar coming out of retirement after a few years absence to reclaim her position as the principal female personality in the X-rated genre. The movie is a day in the life on set as Christy’s agent Max Hardcore (Tony Tedeschi), her director PT (Paul Thomas playing himself), and the rest of the cast and crew (featuring Asia Carerra as a shy girl in craft services) all mill about in anticipation of the sexual fireworks Canyon is known to elicit. Unfortunately, things don’t exactly go according to everyone’s expectations. Christy becomes reluctant to step onto the sound stage after her agent inadvertently speaks out of turn — Max excitedly exclaimed about the prospect of copious loads of semen brought about by Canyon and her oral capabilities. Turned off by Max’s brash and insensitive remark the X-rated film diva refuses to put out leaving Tedeschi, PT (showing good humor), and the others in a quandary. Keeping herself pre-occupied during her no show, Canyon masturbates while observing others (Dallas and T.T. Boy) doing the nasty prior to helping Jenteal overcome her nervousness about a girl-girl scene. Canyon and Jenteal engage in a passionate exhibition, topped off by a fervent sex scene between Christy and Tedeschi (wearing a condom) but only after Canyon agrees to return to work once they arrive at a sizeable sum for her expertise. Christy is very vocal and descriptive when placing her carnal order with Tedeschi — she instructs what she wants him to do to her, characterized by licking and thrusting which serve to intensify the sizzle. Afterwards, Christy is satiated and raring to go as she enters a jungle scene with Steven St. Croix. PT sets the stage and the two actors go to work. St. Croix, excited to work with the busty legend for the first time, climaxes before PT and company are able to catch the money shot. Frustrated by the amateur-hour antics of his male star, PT remedies the premature expulsion by suggesting that a third performer be added to the twosome. Canyon suddenly remembers how special the girl working in craft Services is and invites Carerra to join her and St. Croix. The three make movie history while Carerra and Christy become BFFs as is later revealed inside Canyon’s boudoir in a comical conclusion.

  Christy’s final movie role in 1998 for Vivid Video with Janine Lindemulder is titled: Where the Boys Aren’t 9. It was released in 1999.

  Gemini: The Twins

  I’m very lucky that I live in Los Angeles in the Valley where everything’s accepted for the most part. I avoid people who knock the porno business to me like the plague and have not had much confrontation.

  In recognition of her birthday on June 17, Canyon has spoken in interviews over the years about how her personality fits the qualities known to be associated with the Gemini astrological sign. With two major aspects, duality and contradiction belonging to the central theme of the Gemini sign Christy has described herself as two distinct characters: Christy the uninhibited porn legend, and Melissa the complicated, tenacious woman who has fallen in love several times.

  Consistent with the contrary twin Gemini personas, Canyon stated she practiced condom use in all of the films she made for Vivid, yet claimed to have engaged in unprotected sex with all of her male co-stars (in connection with Vivid) prior to production. In her private life, Canyon conceded she did not practice safe sex. Although she excelled at portraying the throw-caution-to-the-wind, seductress on screen, in her personal life, Christy is far more pragmatic, particularly about money matters. To her credit, Canyon is financially solvent because shrewdly, she handled her own career.

  When I’m not on radio or I’m not acting, or I’m not dancing, I am Melissa. I am the other person. I don’t mix my two selves. I’ve always kept the two personalities separate and I’ve never appeared on the raunchy type of radio show like Howard Stern or on The Jerry Springer Show. I’ve never allowed myself to knowingly go into harm’s way. I don’t need the publicity. When my book came out, I was offered to go on the Howard Stern show, but I didn’t feel comfortable so I didn’t do it. I didn’t need the money and I didn’t need the extra promotion so I’ve never really had someone attack me because of my choice of being a porn star.

  I don’t want anybody’s judgment in my life. You’ve lost the right to be in my life if you have any little bit of judgment. I am who I am, and if it’s great, that’s okay. If not, that’s okay too. I don’t have time to be everyone’s friend. I have no problem with it and I cannot have anyone in my life, family or not, that has a problem with it. If you’re not in charge of your life, they’ll eat you up and spit you out for breakfast.

  I give nothing but props to this business. They allowed me to find out who I was in this world. They allowed me to find out sexually who I was. They allowed me the ability to earn a decent income and sock some away in the nineties and to really be proud of the person I am. I’ve learned to love my body because I’m not a twig. I’ve learned to love my Armenian hips. I’m never going to be the Barbie Doll body and it’s not a rock hard body, that’s for sure, but they seem to love it.

  I got into the industry at a time when we worked every day because they could not create enough videos to satisfy the customers’ demand. We all got paid three-four-five hundred dollars. When I took my four-year break and then went back in the business, I went with Vivid for the most part and I had a nice little contract there. I was one of the few girls that got residuals and when they went to catalogue, the owner cashed me out on the titles. When we stopped doing the films, he said he couldn’t continue my dollar-a-take royalty because he was only making one dollar and twenty-five cents. I took a pay out on everything and didn’t make any more royalties. I’m comfortable.

  The only misnomer Christy has made, according to her, is in the area of matrimony. Married and divorced three times, presently, Canyon prefers to be in the company of her children when she isn’t working for Playboy Sirius Radio.

  I don’t have time to date right now. My life is seriously my kids and my job. I get asked out, but I would rather be in bed reading Junie B. Jones books to my daughter — but the thing is, I did all of that. I’ve had hundreds of lovers. They were all great for their time and once their time was up, they were done. It’s funny. My book doesn’t go into my three marriages. The book is the onset of my career and until I quit and when I was going to start dancing.

  My first husband Bob was a contractor who worked at an old house I remodeled. It lasted from July of 1995 until August of 1995. I knew it was a mistake as I was saying, “I do.” I was turning thirty and I thought, “I should be married by now.” Thank god, we didn’t have a big wedding. It was funny, but he was kind of cute in his tool belt. Suddenly, I married him and he just got to be this lazy bum. I would come home and he would be sleeping on the couch. He was so dispensable. He got comfortable real fast, and I thought, “Oh fuck.” It was a good thing I had a pre-nuptial agreement and I just kicked him out. Then I married a guy in the business who was an actor in the seventies. His real name was Tim Connelly, but he went by Dick or something. I don’t even know his stage name. He was a writer for a while and then he worked for AVN [Adult Video News]. We got married in July of `96 or `97 for two and a half, three and a half years. I was on the road stripping at the time. We fought all the time. It was the most toxic relationship. I’m a very kind of Zen person and I don’t like arguing, and it was just a mistake so we divorced. We had no ill feelings at all — it just didn’t work out.

  Tim Connelly, Christy’s second husband went by the name “Dick Howard” in his 1970-1980s adult film appearances. He had been married to former 1980s porn actor Kimberly Carson prior to his relationship with Canyon. Connelly and Carson had two children together before Connelly apparently left Carson for Kelly Nichols. Since leaving the industry as a performer, Connelly worked as an editor and a writer for Adam Film World and more recently, AVN under the pseudonym Jeremy Stone.

  Canyon’s third husband, Grant, is someone she had known since high school. The two friends re-established
a connection many times throughout the course of her career in movies.

  I married my last husband in July 2001 and we were together for about six years. It just didn’t work out. You know he’s a great guy; they’re all great guys! I can’t knock any of them. I think guys have a really hard time with the fact that I’m really independent and I think that’s a really big turn-off to a lot of guys. At first, they’re really into it. They think, “Wow, she has her own money. She’s got her own place!” and so on. I think the thing they fall in love with is eventually what they hate about me. I don’t need anybody. I want somebody, but I don’t need anyone and I think that’s a big blow to a lot of guy’s egos. I think learning at a young age that I couldn’t rely on my parents at all ties into the way that I am now. I could never rely on anybody.

  “It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men.”

  — FREDERICK DOUGLASS

  At the time of our interview in the fall of 2010, Canyon shared, she was the proud mother of two adopted Asian children, a girl and a boy. Since our initial conversation, she has adopted a third child, a two-year old girl from China. After adopting her son, Christy had not withdrawn her name from the list of Americans desiring Chinese children. She was contacted by the agency in 2009 to gauge interest in adopting another child. Canyon hadn’t expected to adopt a third child, but felt that if she’d refused, in her mind, it would be the same as choosing an abortion. Admirably, Christy recognized the link between her patchy childhood and her desire to be a good mother. She is determined to learn from mistakes.

  The only way that my childhood has impacted me has been in a good way. Because of not feeling wanted — that is what has driven me to adopt children from orphanages. I want to give somebody a chance. If I have changed children’s lives in this world, I am a better person.

  My daughter from China just turned seven. She’s in grade one now because of the age cut-off. She was too young to throw into kindergarten so she was in kindergarten at a private school and now she’s at another school. My son is from Vietnam and he is now two years and eight months. They are the greatest. They’re beautiful. My daughter was thirteen months when I got her and he was eight months. They are the loves of my life, they really are. I started late. I was thirty-eight when I went to China to get her six years ago.

  My daughter was at her seventh birthday party and there were twenty of her friends there, and everyone was running around at this place called “My Gym”. She was laughing and having fun. I thought, “You wouldn’t have gotten this in the orphanage.” I was still with my last husband when we adopted the little girl from China. The first one I got with him. I think that three kids are enough. I’m forty-four. The problem is now all of the countries are closing or you have to be married for five years, so they’re really making it undesirable to adopt from foreign countries. For a while, you could get a kid out of there in about three months. Now I’m hearing it’s taking about two years. This is because we were under the Bush administration, it’s harder to adopt from foreign countries. Everything that motherfucker touched got fucked up. Democratic or Republican, I don’t care. I voted for Schwarzenegger a couple of years ago. I just thought the man had such a goddamn big ego he’d never fail. Boy was I wrong. I am a Democrat by heart — the Republicans have attacked our business a lot, but I vote for who I truly believe is the best.

  The funny thing about adopting Asian children: I’ve had Born Again Christians at three different times get mad at me for not adopting within the state. I’ve just said “My God. He doesn’t care where I adopt from.” In porn I’ve never really had anyone put a negative spin on me, but it was when I chose to adopt kids from outside of my country that I got hit with a backlash which I find fascinating. If they only knew I was a porn star, then all hell would have broken loose. That was the only time I ever felt anyone was judging me and it wasn’t for my porno career. How’s that?

  I needed to get out of my system the films, the dancing on the road. I needed to cleanse that part of my life. I did it for ten years and then I said, “That’s it, now I want kids.” I only ever wanted Asians. I kept on hearing how the little girls are abandoned in the fields and I just always thought there should not be a kid unwanted. Granted, I can’t adopt a million kids, but I think that any healthy young kid would get adopted. I certainly didn’t want a drug-addicted child. I don’t mean to be mean, but my energy level only goes so far. That is what it came down to, and then I applied for a second child in China a year later and they just started to slow down so I switched real fast to Vietnam and I got him.

  I’m single now and that’s how I wanted it. It’s just my path, it really was. I didn’t want to be pregnant or get a sperm donor or a boyfriend. I really wanted to adopt. My family medical history isn’t that good — you know, Mom went cuckoo, Dad died young, and I thought, “You know what? I really could make a difference in this world.” My mom was a great mom until we got to a certain age and then I think her brain started playing tricks on her. I just feel like maybe some of the faults that my mom had like dating a lot of men made me not want to do that. I don’t want my kids to feel like there’s somebody new all of the time. Again, my parents did the best job they knew how to do.

  When my father passed away in 1997-`98, we had reconnected and we had made amends. I loved him. Sometimes when I go through a bad period, like when I got divorced or you know how you have a cruddy day sometimes? I’ll sit down and I’ll cry and say, “Goddammit, Dad, why aren’t you here?” I miss having parents now because my mom’s not together. She’s doped up on some kind of anti-depressants all the time. Thank god, I have my sister who is two years older and who has always been my best friend through thick and thin, and good and bad. She is the only stability I’ve had throughout my entire life. She lives five houses away from me! It’s wonderful. My sister is another one of the main reasons why I really wanted to adopt kids. There are no guarantees my kids will be best friends, but I want to give them the opportunity. My sister has one child my daughter’s age and one who is a teenager. We’re a small but mighty family.

  Talk Radio

  Suffice to say adding up the trials and tribulations of the erotic film actress, Christy Canyon’s life is charmed. Canyon’s legacy as a Vivid Girl, a highly sought after feature dancer, and most meaningful of all, her place as a conscientious parent, demonstrates she is a gleaming example of an individual who discovered life after porn. For more than six years, Christy has enjoyed a successful career as a talk show host for Playboy Radio at Sirius Satellite Radio.

  In the summer of 2010 while at the Exxxstacy Show in Chicago, I had an opportunity to be a guest on Christy’s radio program. Invited to speak with her about the development of this book, it was my second experience as a guest on her show. As a host, Canyon is well prepared, sharp and professional, yet she is spontaneous with a devil-may-care attitude that is endearing and fun. Christy explained how the radio gig happened.

  It was good timing. When my book came out back in 2003, I went on Playboy Radio to promote it and then I went back again. At the time, I had a publicist for my book and then they called the publicist six months later and said, “Oh, we’re doing ‘Legends of Porn’ week, can Christy come back?” I went in a couple of times and did Playboy TV to promote my book. Then they called me one time and asked if I wanted to co-host one night because Julie or Tiffany [the regular hosts] couldn’t make it. I became a go-to-girl with one of the girls and I really wanted to do it. I got thinking what a fun job it would be. Then one time when I was guest hosting they told me that Julie was getting married and moving to Florida. I remember on the inside thinking, “I want her job!” but played it real cool. They said they were going to test some people and I happened to be one of the girls they tested. A month later, I got the job. How lucky am I? Ginger and I used to be co-hosts and then Vanessa Blue came on as my host. I do the show three hours a day five days a week.

  Christy has worked with a few different co-hosts on the Playboy R
adio show over the years since Ginger Lynn left. In the spring of 2011, Ginger rejoined Christy in the newly formed radio program “Spice” and Canyon is ecstatic to have her back. Due to her busy schedule with the two radio programs “Spice” and “Legends” along with her commitment as a mother, Christy temporarily abandoned her plans to write a sequel to her autobiography, Lights, Camera; Sex!

  I started a follow-up but then I got my daughter and my job at Playboy and then my second and third child. I don’t have time to even look at my e-mails, let alone continue my second book. It’s definitely on hold. It’s probably a quarter of the way done. My book doesn’t include my children because it was published a year before I got my daughter.

  I still do my website: www.christycanyon.com. I love it and Vivid runs it for me. I can post all the stuff and do the photos, but I don’t know the damn html — I’m not that computer friendly. So again, ten years later, they’re still coddling me. I love that company. They don’t make any money off of it; they’re just great people. I also have stuff that I sell on e-bay and it’s a lot of fun because there is a lot of “Christy Canyon” memorabilia. It’s a good little side business.

  When Christy’s time isn’t consumed by her family and her job, she occasionally becomes sidetracked by politics. Disheartened by current global economic issues, Canyon touched upon how and where American tax dollars might best be served for the greater good of everyone before concluding our conversation so she could pick up her oldest daughter from school.