by Seka
One day I was scheduled to do a loop. It was in this motel in L.A. that was commonly used to film pornos. Everyone knew about the place and if you watch enough films from the late seventies, you’ll see the same damn furniture, carpet, drapes, and bedspread over and over again. The Sahara, I believe it was called, on Hollywood Boulevard. In fact, the motel was even featured in an A-list Hollywood movie called Hardcore with George C. Scott.
George C. Scott was a wonderfully talented actor, but the only other person I tip my hat to on that movie was the location manager, who found our motel. Other than that, Hardcore represented exactly what Middle America wanted to think about porn. Everyone in the business was lured away from their wonderful families, drugged, forced to perform heinous acts against their will, and then murdered by a guy in a black leather mask in a snuff film. I am living proof none of that ever happened. In every snuff film I ever made, the guy in the leather mask missed. Ha! But seriously, all that stuff is bullshit, yet it’s the tale America wants to believe in order to sleep well at night, so Hollywood keeps accommodating them by making movie after movie spinning that same, tired yarn about how no one makes adult films willingly and we all get murdered.
Anyway, I got to the set early so I could get ready right there. I mean, it was a working motel, so they had a full bath and shower. My hair needed touching up, so I brought along the dye to do it.
I don’t know if I got the wrong stuff in my haste, I left it in too long, whatever. All I know is when I rinsed it out, it wasn’t normal blonde. It was white. Platinum. From the roots to the tips, without a hint of any other color anywhere.
I screamed! I looked in the mirror and didn’t recognize the girl looking back. I thought for sure they’d fire me for looking like such a freak.
When the cast and crew got there, every jaw dropped. God, I knew I’d really blown it this time. No one made a sound. Finally, someone said, “Wow. Cool.” I still didn’t know what to make of it. Wow, cool, good? Wow, cool, bad?
We started to work. No one could take their eyes off me. As the female in the scene, that’s not uncommon, but this was more than usual. It was freaking me out. I figured I’d never work again.
In addition to the platinum blond hair, I always shaved my eyebrows. Oddly enough, even though my natural hair color is almost black, my eyebrows are very light-colored and fine. I also don’t have a lot of body hair, and what I do have is rather blond — again despite not being a blonde. I think some of it has to do with my being a sun worshipper, but even on my ass and other areas that rarely get sun, what little tiny hairs are there are extremely light.
I shaved my eyebrows because it was too hard to see them to pluck them properly. Then I’d fill it in with an eyebrow pencil. Shaving them off allowed me total freedom in shaping them any way I wanted, so I made them as perfect as I could — although I wasn’t always successful, in my own humble opinion. I look at some of the pictures taken of me and I scream, “I look like Gloria Swanson or Joan Crawford!” It was such a severe look, like I was frightened or something. Again, I thought I’d blown it. I was simply trying to compensate for my natural flaws, as I saw them to be.
After I’d done a few movies, some director came up with the idea that I completely shave my pussy. With my girl-scaping and dyeing, I never looked like I had much bush down there as it was, certainly nowhere near as much as most of the other girls of the era. But this was a whole new thing for me and I think they even put it in the script. The shaving itself may have ended up on film. I can’t say for sure because I hardly ever watched those things once I filmed them, but that’s another story.
So part of my look, literally from the start, involved me being either closely shaved and then dyed, or completely shaven. For an era that was otherwise known for big, dark bushes on both men and women, I was different. I liked that part of the look. I still like it today. I don’t think everyone has to be shaved and it’s a pain in the ass to keep up with, but it beats having a monstrous chia pet down yonder.
Today, everybody in porn is shaved like a newborn baby. Some have credited me with starting the whole trend, but I can’t say for sure I had much to do with it. I’ll leave that argument for the film historians. But to me, being trimmed down there even feels better. More sensitive. And guys seem to like it, which is an opinion supported by all the movie girls today being totally waxed and shaven.
After that scene that day, I figured I was done for in the business. Little did I know the opposite was true. Industry people screened it and said, “Oh my god! Look at that hair, those brows, that pussy, that makeup (I always wore makeup, even during this hippy-era when lots of girls were going with the “natural” no-makeup look)!” And, of course, “Those tits!” I’m a naturally large-breasted girl. So were most of the women in my family. Today, any girl can go out and buy herself big bazoongas, but back then all the girls in erotica were natural. Some were big, some were small, and some were in-between, but we were what we were. I was one of the big-breasted ones, and deep down, most men never lose that infantile breast fixation.
After my dyeing accident, no girl in XXX looked like me — none. My look was dramatic, glamorous, and bold. While other girls looked like the girl next door, I looked like…I don’t know what the hell I looked like, which scared the living crap out of me. But I quickly learned it sent shock-waves throughout the business. Everyone passed that film around and began asking about me. Ken’s phone — not my phone, but Ken’s — began ringing off the hook. This look, which was as much accident as on purpose, got me more bookings than I could handle. The “Platinum Princess of Porn” was born.
19. Swinging
Ken was always there while I was filming and it was uncomfortable because he was always lurking. The photographers and movie guys didn’t like to have the boyfriends on the set because the girls didn’t like it, but he’d still sit through the entire shoot, clearly getting off on it. I didn’t completely mind him being there because I really didn’t trust anyone else. I thought he would protect me if anyone tried to do something to me that I didn’t want done. They agreed to let him stay on the set to appease me.
Swinging was starting to be a big thing in mainstream society and Ken pressured me to try it. This had nothing to do with the movie business; it was just something that was going on between couples all over America.
Quite frankly, after having sex all day on the set, I didn’t want to have it at night. I was also getting tired of Ken always talking about my on-set exploits while we were in bed the night after a shoot. He was all turned on, but I was not only tuckered out, I was skeeved out that he wanted to turn our bedroom into a live sex show.
For me, sex was one way on film, another way with a lover in private. They talk about that whole “life imitates art” thing. I had no desire to “make love like a porn star” at home. I like to cuddle. I like to be romantic, more than graphic. I like the lights off most times, which you can’t do on a movie set unless you film with night-vision goggles.
Ken was different. Ken watched the porn, and then wanted to be the porn — with me, the real life porn star! When was I ever going to get a break?! I didn’t want to be on stage all the time, performing all the time, talking dirty all the time. That stuff isn’t love; it’s lust. Lust is fine; lust is great. But what is life without love?
In the adult biz, we’d heard about swinging for quite a while. But then the dams burst open and it was being written about in almost every mainstream newspaper and magazine in America. It became all Ken would talk about.
After reading some stuff on this new lifestyle, I figured, “What the hell? I can meet some interesting people. I won’t do anything I don’t want to.” And maybe it would get him off my back.
It was the days of Plato’s Retreat. But in California they had swing parties in people’s homes. The first time I went it was in a big, gorgeous house in the suburbs of Los Angeles. There were probably sixty to seventy people there. They were upper middle class and a mix of all races, creeds
, and colors. My reaction was like, “Oh my God, don’t these people have any modesty?” This, coming from me, the porn star! But I always had that separation between work and play. Furthermore, I wasn’t an actual star yet. My first party was after only being in California a very short time.
There were fully clothed and naked people throughout the house from the second I walked in. There were skinny people, heavy people, well-built folk — it was a cornucopia of anything you could imagine. People were talking, swimming, eating, and oh yes, having sex.
It was at this private swing party that I saw two women together for the first time, and it didn’t shock me. In fact, I was intrigued by watching them. Yes, I’d seen it on film, but with the little experience I had making movies at the time, I assumed the lesbian scenes were just actors doing their jobs. But these ladies were clearly having a helluva good time. To top it off, there was a circle of people around them watching, like a peanut gallery. And it sure didn’t seem to bother them.
Being in the business, I had become far more comfortable around sex and nudity, but I still felt uneasy here and didn’t know what to say or do. There was no script, no director! I didn’t want to talk to anyone and chose to just sit, watch, and decide if I wanted to participate or not.
I had never been exposed to something like this before. I actually had a hard time looking people in the eye, because the first thing you want to do is look at their crotch when they’re naked and it’s hard to avoid that. It was a lot of information to take in all at once. Quite overwhelming.
Ken suggested we walk towards the back and see what was going on. There were bedrooms with nothing else in the room except mattresses with folks furiously going at it. I thought, “My God, this is a fuck fest.” It was a real, live porn movie, except expanded and without cameras, spilling out all over a huge house, all at once. It made my head spin. The loops I was shooting were nothing like this.
Ken wanted to go into one of the rooms and I really was not comfortable doing that. He was quite excited, so I told him, “If you want to go, then go.” I was tired. I didn’t want to have sex. I’d just come off a film shoot two days earlier. I was exhausted. I figured if he got off with someone else, at least I wouldn’t have to do it with him later that evening.
There was a little patio outside the dining room area leading to a pool and a Jacuzzi. People were hanging around in bathing suits. Decent music was playing. I was hitting the free buffet, more interested in eating and drinking than fucking and sucking.
A couple came up to me and started talking. They were probably in their mid to late thirties. Both were a little heavyset, he more than she. They just sat down and chatted with me. No pressure. No nothing. I was enjoying the conversation with these very nice people. His name was Jack and she was June. She was an executive at a bank and he owned his own business. I found it interesting that swingers seemed to come from every walk of life.
An hour or so passed. In the meantime, my boyfriend was in another room having sex with someone and it didn’t bother me at all. In fact, I wasn’t even enjoying sex with him that much anymore because it felt like it wasn’t with me, but rather about what I had done on set. Ken no longer made love to Dottie; he just fucked Seka.
Ken suddenly came walking out. He was naked, which kind of surprised me. I said, “If you’re done, put your clothes on.”
He looked at me and asked, “Are you okay?”
“Everything’s fine.” I introduced him to Jack and June and soon after I said, “Do you mind if we go? I’m really tired.”
We went back to the hotel where we were staying and he asked me what I thought about the whole thing. I said, “It was interesting. But I don’t know if I’d feel comfortable having sex there.” I told him I noticed the female couples were having so much fun and he brought up that they might ask me to do that in a film one day. I thought, “How bad could that be?”
He started to get in bed and it occurred to me he’d just been with someone else and God knows how many others so I said, “Go take a shower.” When he came back to bed he started to try to play around with me and I responded, “Look, I’m really tired. I’m not in the mood for this,” and I went to sleep.
In the morning we got up, took the dogs out, and over breakfast I looked at him and asked, “We’ve been out here a couple of weeks. Are we staying?” It wasn’t easy living out of hotels with two dogs and all our crap.
He found us a place in Diamond Bar in Pomona County. We go to the house and it’s in a great looking neighborhood. I thought it had to be really expensive. It had a circular driveway with iron gates and a pool. Two huge front doors opened at the same time leading into a large foyer and staircase. There were a couple of steps into the living room. Then there was a dining room area and sliding glass doors that led to a pool and Jacuzzi.
I was like a kid at Christmas. To me, it was a mansion. I’d never seen anything that was so elegant. But in my awe and immaturity, I never asked how the hell we could ever afford anything like this. I didn’t quite have a handle on how much I was making doing loops and posing for stills. Ken wasn’t really doing anything except “managing” me. Meanwhile, it was Bill Margold who was getting me the actual gigs, so I didn’t really understand where Ken came in at all. I didn’t know if he had savings from the stores back east or what, but I didn’t ask enough questions and I should have. In the meantime, I wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth.
Every Sunday morning, I had mimosas and shrimp in the Jacuzzi and read the newspaper. That was heaven to me. What I would come to discover was not only was I paying for most of this, Ken chose it because he knew companies were paying location fees for photo shoots and movies, and he had planned from day one to pocket that money on shoots at our house. I had no idea whatsoever. I was looking at it as my home, while he was thinking of it as a business. Since I didn’t have to travel to a set in the morning, I didn’t mind doing some of my shoots there. Still, I didn’t realize I was getting screwed in more ways than one.
I thought I had placated Ken by going to that one swing party. Boy, was I wrong. Once he’d gotten a taste of it, he wanted to go again and again and again. The thing is, single guys were rarely allowed in, so he needed me as his ticket, and that’s exactly how I felt — I was nothing but a ticket. It also didn’t hurt that I was attractive. Even if I wasn’t participating, I made Ken look good by being his date. It’s the same thing in everyday life. A guy walks into a bar with a mousy-looking woman and no one notices him. He walks in with a stunner and all the girls want to snatch him up, figuring he must be something special.
I tried to find ways of entertaining myself, but I was never really into it. It was Ken’s thing, he was my guy — despite there being little real love between us — so I went along. It was like being a football widow. Even if you hate the game, you pull on his favorite team’s jersey, go to a few games, and try to amuse yourself. I know, most women would not have done this for their man, but I was in the sex business, so it was less odd for me than most other women. But it wasn’t for me, it was all for him.
Me and Ken in Vegas.
My first agent, Bill Margold.
Me and Ken.
Swinging with Ken at the original Plato’s Retreat (his idea, not mine).
20. Miss Swedish Erotica
There were loops and there were features. Only the biggest stars got to do features. On the other hand, there were a lot more loops being done than features, so lots of A-List porn stars did loops as well, in between features. The whole thing was like baseball. You began in the rookie leagues, then moved up to the minor leagues, and finally the majors — except even those in the majors still played in the high minors now and then just to make ends meet.
Loops were often compiled together into a sort of feature, kind of like a mix tape. For that reason, the same scene might be used not only in one compilation, but in any number of compilations. That’s why it’s a joke when porn actors try to count how many movies they’ve been in. Yo
u do one scene and it ends up in twenty different compilations. Is that one film or twenty? Worse yet, we never got paid for the multiple times a scene was used. We’d get paid for a day’s work and that was it. Sometimes we’d complain and get suckered into making a deal for “something on the back end,” which was a total joke. We’d be promised some sort of percentage or something down the line, but none of us ever saw a dime. We got what we got paid for that one day’s work and not a penny more, even if that scene was used a million times, forever and ever, amen.
The top name in loops was Swedish Erotica. They were the big time, the place where even the features actors continued to work even after they’d become big stars.
Soon Swedish Erotica came calling for me, and I completely flipped out. Unlike most new girls who came on the adult scene, my time spent working in Ken’s stores taught me who was who in the business. When I went to meet with them I thought, “Damn, I can really make a living at this. If these guys are here, I’ve arrived.”
We met, we hit it off, and I was the new Swedish Erotica Girl. Of course, there were a lot of Swedish Erotica girls, but now I was part of their stable of players. Their loops were probably the most popular in the adult book stores, and their compilations were spliced together and ran as if they were features in adult movie theaters — a thing of the past from back in the days before home video. And once home video came around, their compilation tapes were always top sellers — not that I saw any financial benefit.
I was doing scenes constantly. It all became more comfortable and natural for me. I began to see some of the same faces both in front of and behind the camera, which made me less apprehensive when I’d show up for a day at work. And it was work. For a twenty-minute scene, I’d be there all day long, doing this, doing that. Waiting, lots of waiting, just like in a mainstream movie.