Among the female movie directors, I really like Kelly Holland. Kelly is just really cool and laid-back. She's very easy to work with, knows what she wants and gets great results. I remember having her as a cinematographer during the shoots I did with VCA, and then eventually she became a director. She hails from Dallas, Texas, and was at first a mainstream actress with a trained theatrical background and then became a mainstream documentary director before she moved to shooting porn. (She has actually done serious documentaries, for her company Art Attack Productions, on a variety of fascinating subjects, including two she shot in Latin America about military coups and the fanaticism of soccer fans – a whole world away from porn!) Kelly got the break of her career when Vivid Video hired her to direct movies, which she did for seven years under the name Toni English. She then directed for another big porn company, Adam & Eve, under the same name before working under her real name in 2004 at Playgirl. ('I started directing under my name with Playgirl because I couldn't tell women to "claim their sexuality" and then work under a pseudonym,' she said.) She moved to Penthouse in 2005 and became its head of production before assuming her current position as president of Penthouse Studios.
I like both Kelly and Suze not because they're women who are successful in what has always been a male-dominated business but because they're both very good at what they do, period. I see no reason why a woman can't deliver the goods from behind the camera as well as any man.
As far as other porn stars go, I've always thought Shayla LaVeaux was awesome, and the way she is still performing for the camera after the age of 35 is inspiring. I love Shayla's attitude, since she's so friendly and down to earth and never seems to let anything get to her head. But as a whole, I can truthfully say that no one inspired me to get into the business. I didn't know any names before coming in. Afterwards, I watched some of Jill Kelly's scenes and got to know her, and she gave me some good advice – including the breast-surgeon tip-off – which helped me a lot. In some ways, I wanted to be like Jill. I just thought she was so hot! When she walked into a room, you could feel her sexy energy. I learned from Jill that sexual energy is contagious.
In an interview I gave in 2006 to Eve, a mainstream women's magazine in London, I said that the most important technique that all aspiring porn stars need to learn is 'to open your legs so the camera can see the sex'. It's actually a lot harder than it seems. It's more than spreading your own lips with your hand. It means opening up your angle to the camera when you're having sex so the viewers can see the 'hardcore' at all times – knowing how to keep your thighs spread no matter what position you're holding, so that the camera can see the guy's penis penetrating you (if that's what's going on). To do this, you have to be constantly aware of where the camera is in relation to the heart of the action – and nobody ever has to consider this when they're having sex at home!
In porn, you have to learn to expose your body in ways most women would be too shy to actually do but which, if they're honest with themselves, they might well fantasise about. I think we do fulfill a vicarious need for women who enjoy watching our movies. So, over the first couple of years in the business, I developed a pro fessional skill set, in the same way that Maria Sharapova works on her serve and her backhand. I eventually just got used to these new ways of having sex, and I became more fl exible after doing it for a while, especially from so many photo shoots where I needed to hold the positions. I well and truly lost my porn virginity.
Doing reverse-cowgirl, for example, is a great leg workout and fantastic for cardio. It's a porn position where the guy lies down fl at on his back and the girl gets on top but facing away from him. This is considered a good camera shot for obvious reasons: she's facing the camera with her legs spread apart, so viewers can see the total full-frontal exposure, what we call the 'insertion shot', of his erect penis going in and out of her open vagina.
Yoga really helps, too: it tones the body and makes you look good. I have no problem spreading for the camera these days. It just happens naturally, because I instinctively know I have to open up for the light. If I see darkness down there, I find the light – pretty crazy, huh?
I'm sure there are women who must think I'm a lunatic, because there's just no way in hell they could ever imagine themselves doing what I do for a living. I can understand them not wanting people to watch them have sex, but I guess that's where the actress side of me comes into play. You really do have to be a good actress. At first, I felt very uncomfortable with the idea of people watching, but then I thought, 'Wait, I'm an actress. I'm not just having sex in front of the camera, I'm performing!' So I think about my performance and how I'm reacting, and it's always great when you actually enjoy working with someone. You kind of get lost in that moment and forget about everyone around you, until the director yells out 'Cut!' or 'Next position!' – usually just as you're about to cum for real. I hate it when that happens!
The other thing that's hard to explain to anyone who hasn't worked in this industry is how demanding it can be physically and how it can affect your domestic life. When I was married to Craven and shooting a lot, I was always sore and I didn't want to have sex off -camera, because I didn't want to be in pain shooting the next day. So the balance was tough. It was a good thing he loved blow jobs!
The thing about our relationship was that Craven was primarily not a performer but a camera guy, someone who shot stuff and was graduating to directing gonzo porn. Craven already had his own blow-job series, called The Oral Adventures of Craven Moorehead, and he had appeared in a couple of scenes elsewhere in the past. By the time he got round to directing me, our relationship was pretty dead anyway, so I didn't much care about fucking someone in front of him. We did perform one blow-job scene together and a sex scene with another girl, so I can't say that counts as jointly performing all that much. Really, it was just another job to both of us.
One of my favourite films from my early years of porn was Sweet Sounds, directed by Nicholas Steele. I was the lead in this 2003 movie, which received several five-star reviews. It was about a singer trying to get her big break, and the song they had me sing in it was a ballad, which they wouldn't let me sing the way I wanted to but it ended up sounding great anyway. I did three hot sex scenes and a lot of actual acting, and the most notable scene features me and Cheyne Collins on a rooft op in downtown LA at night, in the middle of winter – it was freezing and we were exhausted by the time we had to have sex, but it looked so hot. I always loved shooting with Cheyne – he's good-looking, very cool and easy to work with. (And he has a perfect cock – not too big, and not too small. Give me the average-sized ones any time!*)
* By average here, I mean average for porn, not for normal life, as in around six to eight inches.
That same year, 2003, I got my first writing credit on a movie, which was a huge deal for me. The movie was Witch Coven College and it was directed by the late, great Jim Holliday for VCA. It was basically a spoof about witches teaching college girls a few tricks, although it was pure fantasy and nothing truly of a Wiccan nature. But it was so much fun to shoot. We had 'magic dust' that made people automatically have sex, so it was intended as comedy, just like all of Jim's movies. There were a lot of hot chicks, a lot of toe-sucking, butt-licking, anal and girl–girl scenes. I wrote the script around Jim's sense of humour, and he loved it. Of course, he would add his own words and phrases, which he always enjoyed doing. I still think of this movie as my way of paying homage to him.
Jim was such a treasure and we worked together for several years, until he died in December 2004. He used to call me one of his 'angels', which is a term of endearment that he used for the top girls who appeared in his movies. Among those top girls were Jill Kelly, Shayla LaVeaux and Felecia, so of course I was honoured to be included in that company. Eventually, he started to call me his number-one angel (replacing my idol Jill Kelly), and as I was the only one of his angels who didn't do anal that was a great honour for me.
Jim always liked to put me in the m
iddle of the box-covers and almost always had me as the lead girl. And when I decided I was quitting the business, right at the peak of my career, Jim would pay me just to walk around in one of his movies and have me show off my butt!
Working for Jim was a great experience. There were always 15 to 20 girls on set, and Jim had his quirky way of shooting things. I'll always remember that he loved pink lipstick and pink nail polish, and he would have us wear moccasins sometimes, as part of his trademark. In 2003, he directed another of my screenplays, Charm School Brats. Both Charm School Brats and Witch Coven College got great reviews and turned out really cool.
It was very sad when Jim died. Jim had diabetes, but the catering was never very healthy on his sets. It was 'Jimmyland', as he called it, and what Jimmy wanted Jimmy got. He always said he'd be surprised if he lived to be 50, but he made it to 55. Hustler eventually took over VCA, and things changed. I was no longer shooting big features for them and they were thinking of cutting Jim's movies out all together, which shocked me because they were apparently the best-selling movies that VCA had to offer.
The porn-star work kept coming in during this time, but I couldn't quite hit my stride again in terms of reviews and notices, almost as if I'd peaked and had to hit the brakes before I crashed. I freaked out at that juncture and took a hiatus. There was a lull in 2003 when I worked less and less, and I didn't resurrect myself until 2004.
Chapter Six
MAINTAINING
CONTROL
After four years as a porn star, I had achieved such fame as an adult-film actress that it had translated into increased demand for me as a feature dancer. That's how it works: success as a porn star is what gets you the feature billing at a strip club, and that can be very lucrative. I was dancing in clubs across the USA and Canada and was also fl own out to Melbourne, to dance at the Spearmint Rhino there, where I shook my booty to the music of Australian bands such as AC/DC and INXS. (As a feature dancer, you do get to choose your own music.) My dance career became hugely successful, and for a long time it was my biggest source of income.
I've got some great stories about my experiences on the dance stage. You know that famous phrase from NASA, 'Houston, we have a problem'? Well, one time I was featuring in Houston, Texas, and while I was on stage I suddenly noticed some guy jacking off , right at the tip rail! I laughed and pointed him out to the bouncers, who began freaking out. They started discussing among themselves who was going to go up to the guy to tell him to stop. One of them eventually went up and said, 'Listen, sir, you can't do that in here. You're going to have to leave.' I mean, he had his cock out in public, right there, by my tip rail – I thought it was so fucking hilarious but also gross at the same time!
That was the only time this happened to me, but there have been other kinds of dance-stage drama. I've had bouncers run up to grab guys who have jumped up on stage, and I've also had to slap guys for grabbing me. One guy even bit my nipple, and I responded by hitting him really hard. (Most women defend themselves against sexual harassment at work, but my methods take that to a whole new level!)
At its peak, the porn-star life involves balancing life on the road with filming. I actually loved mixing shooting and dancing – that way I wouldn't get bored with one or the other. But there are things you need to do in order to cope with that lifestyle.
One night in 2007, at The Crazy Horse in San Francisco, I nearly collapsed before my first show. I'm sure it was due to my unhealthy, stressful lifestyle: drinking, lack of sleep and not eating right are a bad combination. And the random panic attacks I'd been having weren't helping either, not to mention almost having an asthma attack from all the strippers chain-smoking backstage. But I still went on stage that night, a little late. I finished up three very low-energy shows still feeling dizzy. I was actually scared I might fall over and pass out.
After the show, I met the cutest 18-year-old who had seen all my movies and wanted to get into porn. I told her to finish school and call me before she did anything in this business. I could have easily made a ton of money off her by setting myself up as her agent, but something came over me. I didn't want to be the person responsible for potentially ruining this girl's life. A lot of girls might be emotionally stable enough to handle this industry, but some girls end up wrecking their lives with drugs. Instead, I gave her advice on how not to go off the rails while being a porn star and on the consequences that she would suffer for the rest of her life. I've learned so much from my years of experience yet I'm still picking up the pieces of my life. I hope that girl listened to me. I know there are a lot of directors who will be pissed off when they hear that. But I really don't care what anyone thinks. I was doing a good deed, giving some good advice, something for her to think about before she jumps into this world.
I find it very fl attering when new girls come up to me all star-struck, and I'm always willing to give them advice so they don't make some of the same mistakes I did – like partying all your money away and helping out people who turn out to be less than true friends. Basically, I tell them just to be wary of everyone and not to do anything that they're not comfortable with. Maintaining control of your career is the key.
I hate seeing these girls that come in and do scenes for practically nothing. We deserve way more than what we get paid, and some of the new girls who work for low rates just spoil it for everyone. And the girls who come in and say, 'I wanna be the next Jenna,' they really make me laugh. They are so naive. Those days are long gone. Jenna Jameson was a publicity machine. She came into the business at the right time and had the right people behind her, back when there weren't nearly as many girls in the industry as there are today. These little girls can't seem to grasp that fact.
The truth, though, is that they do have youth and time on their side. Agents today like to offer producers new girls to shoot, because new girls pay a higher percentage in the beginning and the agents win on commission. I miss the days when there weren't so many agents and I'd constantly get calls for work from production managers.
From 2002 to 2005, although I was at the top of my game professionally – successfully combining dancing and filming – it was hard because I could never book a shoot within a few days of coming back into town. My body was always too beaten up from dancing, and I felt so bruised and sore. I needed to relax and get massages and heal myself. It's part of the whole process of taking care of business.
I was also doing a lot of partying, which for me involved consuming too much alcohol, cocaine, marijuana and Xanax. Deep down, I was just sick of porn in general: I had worked too much too soon. It was all starting to become a blur and I found that depressing. I realised I was going through an early mid-life crisis of sorts, just three years short of turning 30.
I was also starting to think that I might have chosen the wrong profession – I wanted to be a rock star, not a porn star, and it finally occurred to me that I may have ruined that ambition for myself. So I tried to sabotage my porn career by being rebellious. I had the dragon from the Welsh national flag tattooed on my upper left arm, as my way of saying 'Cymru am byth!' ('Wales forever!') and 'Y Ddraig Goch ddyry cychwyn!' ('The red dragon will show the way!'), as all good Welshpersons are wont to proclaim. I had lost touch with my heritage over the years, and as I have always strongly identified with my Welsh ancestry it was a great way of getting back in touch with who I really was. Except, of course, a lot of porn producers don't like tattoos and wouldn't hire me. What's more, I was known in the porn world as a blonde, but I went and became a redhead, to make me look more like a rock star. And all that did was create problems for my public image.
People didn't want to shoot me as a redhead with tattoos because they thought the fans would either not recognise me or, worse, hate me for my new look. It was a complete mistake on my part and I admit I really fucked up. I still hadn't learned that there's a difference between your public persona and your personal self, and if you want to be a celebrity of any sort you have to somehow manage to keep both in
check.
Yet you can only go so far. There are cases in which your private self and public persona do have to be in harmony, otherwise you risk losing sight of your identity. For instance, I've done a fair number of scenes involving sexual fetishes and also bondage and domination. In real life, I don't like to dominate guys, because I want them to take charge, to act like a real man. But I do love to dominate women. After all, I am a bit of a tomboy at heart.
I've worked for Cybernet in San Francisco a couple of times – a company that runs lots of bondage websites – and for one of the scenes I had to beat the crap out of a girl. She was the porn star Ariel X, and she loves that kind of thing. (Each to their own, I guess.) Then I got sent on a shoot for a fetish site, Fetishnation.com. My agent told me that it would only be some light bondage and spanking, so I accepted. When I got to the set, they explained everything they were going to do to me – they would tie me down and then force me to orgasm while slapping and whipping me and pulling my hair, as well as verbally humiliating me. I totally freaked out. I told them I couldn't be submissive. I was afraid it would stir up some old feelings from the past – of being abused, mentally and physically. They were very nice people and said they didn't want me to do it if I was at all uncomfortable, though they were understandably pissed at my agent for sending someone who 'doesn't do submissive'! So that was one instance where the public persona and the private self had to mesh perfectly or it just wasn't going to work.
I do love getting dressed up for fetish shoots, though, especially if I'm going to be wearing latex, which looks all shiny but grips your skin at the same time. I wore a slinky black latex number for a Penthouse movie called Fetish Diaries, released in April 2007. It featured me doing light bondage stuff with a male slave, played by the porn star Van Damage. I remember that it was very hot – it must've been 38°C in that studio – and I was dripping with sweat. It would just pour out of me every time I took a piece of latex clothing off , and I had to gradually undress to complete the scene, which involved me sucking and fucking the slave.
Absolute Mayhem Page 7