“In any case, good luck, my dear,’ said Judith pleasantly. “I hope this place gives you what you want.’
I told her I just wanted a paycheck. She shrugged philosophically over that one and declared she was certain I had more depth than that. Then she said “Cheerio’ in the antiquated way seniors still do on my father’s street in Oxford, and she made her way to her Rover in the parking lot.
It was amusing to agree with her in my head that yes, I was more than what I did here, and that I probably knew more about the goings-on at Orpheocon than the sanitized press releases she was given as research for her corporate biography.
Most of the films were shot away from the Canary Wharf building, because you needed homes with different décors so the movies didn’t all look the same. But one large room at the office was used, redecorated with bits of furniture and a daybed. You’d stroll down to the lunchroom to make a cup of tea, and an insistent wailing could be heard from behind the door. It was mildly comical when the scene was abruptly cut—batteries low on the hi-def camera or something. The fresh cue would be given, and then with equal enthusiasm the girl would scream once more. Like kicking out the cord of your vacuum cleaner and plugging it back in again.
I wish I could tell you I got the job there because I had excelled at the two-week editing boot camp that Desmond Hodd had arranged. Truthfully? “Teresa Lane’ was competent, that’s all. Luis later admitted to me they had another guy in mind, but the first choice suddenly landed a fabulous gig in Leeds with the BBC. The second candidate became violently ill, and they couldn’t afford to wait. I sensed Hodd’s people pulling strings, and it was disturbing to say the least.
I wasn’t even hired by Antunes. Instead, it was the senior video editor who was responsible, a geeky little pear of a guy named Joseph. Like Hodd, he couldn’t look me in the eye. Unlike Hodd, he directed most of his remarks to my breasts. I got the distinct impression that for Joseph, this workplace involved a lot of Peeping Tom glances, but that he went home to watch Sky Sports over a couple of packets of crisps and a regimen of nightly wanking off.
As Hodd promised, my interviewer had watched an impressive mix of samples edited by others. When he was done, Joseph had coughed and tried to sound like he had to think about it. I knew he’d either choose me or he wouldn’t, he didn’t have to weigh anything.
“You’ll do.’
So a week into working for Silky Pictures, I learned that Joseph’s title meant nothing, and that I reported directly to Luis Antunes. Good for me, good for MI6, I supposed, all that infiltration-work-your-way-into-his-confidence stuff. But it looked like it was going to take a while.
Piled on my desk each morning were what they called P2 cards—which filled a slot under the eyepiece of your Panasonic HVX camera and stored the raw footage—all ready and waiting to download onto my hard drive for editing. A cartoon stork could have brought these babies in a blanket sling for all the difference it made. This or that PA just handed them over and went, “Here you go, Teresa.’
Things changed with Duncan McCullough, Silky’s director of all the movies.
He strolled into the editors’ area one afternoon and imperiously demanded without even introducing himself, “Get these done by five, Lane. Right? Okay.’
I slipped off my headphones jacked into the hard drive. Had I heard right? What the…? In my peripheral vision, I saw this tall man in his early fifties with a long face and a salt-and-pepper beard storming off.
“Schedule says Thursday,’ I answered, holding up the notes I’d been given. These came from the production manager, who had a lot more decision-making power than McCullough did.
He halted in the doorway. Now I picked up the accent that yeah, could be taken for either an Australian or a New Zealander (turns out he was a Kiwi—guess they have rude jerks, too).
“Well, I don’t give a shit what the schedule says, baby doll, I want the fucking thing by five, all right?’
I swiveled in my chair, biting down on my pen. In another time and place, I’d tell him to sod off. But I had a job to do here, and I sensed that this bully was tolerated. Hmmm, a more diplomatic approach was called for.
“You’ll get the ‘fucking thing’ by Thursday,’ I told him. My voice was very calm, the soothing tone of the nurse in the asylum.
“Now you—’
“Actually you won’t get the fucking thing—James will get the fucking thing since he’s the production manager. You want to see it, go see him. Thursday. Oh, by the way, my name’s Teresa, and it’s polite to introduce yourself before you ask for a favor. Otherwise, if you swear and call someone ‘baby doll’ they might be tempted to kick you in the crotch.’
That’s about as diplomatic as I get.
He made a small incredulous gasp, flipping his eyebrows, as if how dare I, and the other editors watched, half expecting us to pull out guns. “For your information, I’m the fucking director, Teresa.’
“That’s nice. And you work—sorry, fucking work—over there. When you do your job—if you can do your fucking job—my job starts. Now as far as I can see, we’re two different fucking departments, so there’s absolutely no fucking reason I need to have a fucking conversation with you at all. See the production manager—fuck. Goodbye.’
The other editors looked fascinated by what they were doing.
Right, guys, only I see hands changing the volume controls to listen to us.
I saw their lips curl and twitch in grateful smiles, doing their best not to show Duncan how much they loved this confrontation. Without another word, he stomped out.
Duncan, I learned, liked terrorizing the editors. People told me he actually relished creating an atmosphere of tension on the set as well, and if there was a girl-girl scene slated to be shot he went out of his way to pay attention to one actress over the other, using their insecurities to create a little drama for his own amusement. They didn’t understand why he did this, but I think I did.
The creep didn’t like women. It was that simple. Since everyone knows actresses are often insecure—and who could be more insecure than a porn actress whose body is her asset—he orchestrated these cruel charades because he felt that vain, pampered porn stars should be taken down a peg. They should be humiliated.
It was suggested that it “would be a good idea’ if I watched filming for a day to see how the movies were put together. I never doubted this notion originated with Duncan himself. He wanted me to visit his own personal fiefdom and pay obeisance to the king. So I watched and stayed out of the way, and the next week he was barking to have edits done, and once again I reminded him that I paid attention to the deadlines from the production manager, not him.
Funny thing was, I would end up owing the creep for bringing me into the inner circle and advancing me up the Silky Pictures hierarchy. I was called into Luis Antunes’s office one afternoon.
It was appropriately large for the boss, with a framed photo hanging behind his desk, one that showed a younger Antunes crewing on the deck of a sailing ship for what looked like a big yachting race, the white and red triangles of other sails in the distance on the great sweep of blue. Huh. A competitive sailor. Interesting. Supposed to be big money and sponsorship in those things, and I imagined you had to park your egos to work as a team. No picture of his significant other on his desk, but this business still carried an unsavory taint to it, and maybe he didn’t like the occasional creep or sleaze who might come in here seeing his girl. He struck me as the protective type.
As I walked in, Luis was as pleasant as ever, polishing his glasses and with his feet up on his desk. Duncan waited in a chair across from him.
“How are you, Teresa?’ Luis asked politely in his accented English. He stood up like a gentleman and shook my hand, and I got the genuine impression he really enjoyed having me in, that he almost looked forward to this like a fan waiting in line for an author’s book signing. He definitely had an unassuming charm.
“Fine, great.’
Duncan le
aned forward, lacing his fingertips, already starting on a pompous chord. “We called you in here because of your attitude.’
I saw Luis shoot him an annoyed look. Duncan had made the bad mistake of trying to control the meeting, and I don’t think the boss appreciated the “we’ coming from his director. “Um, Teresa, you seem to fit in fine here and everyone likes you, so I don’t want to blow this out of proportion. Duncan likes to see the final edits because he wants to make sure they conform to his vision, and he feels you don’t show him the proper respect.’
“Oh, no,’ I said innocently. “That’s not true.’
“It isn’t?’
“No. I don’t show him any respect.’
Duncan’s temper quickly got the better of him, and flecks of spit flew as he threw an arm in a wild-man gesture at Luis. “You see how this fucking cow talks to me right in front of the fucking—’
The naked assault of words had Luis sitting up in his chair, and now my boss was no longer focusing on my smart-ass remark but on this barrage. When I rattled off how I was only following company practice in submitting to the production manager first, et cetera…I’ll cut to the chase, because suffice to say, I was believed and Duncan already had his reputation.
Oh, but that wasn’t the highlight of the day. It was me pushing my luck.
“You’re a shitty editor anyway,’ Duncan said as he began a new tantrum. Up until then, the discussion had been about office behavior. Now he had started a new thread, and he should have left well enough alone.
“The mix is only as good as the ingredients,’ I replied calmly.
“What the hell does that mean?’ he shot back.
“It means I’ve edited five movies so far in my time here, and you rip off the ice cube down the breasts cliché in three of them. You lifted the striptease from 9½Weeks and the girls taking pics of each other from The Unbearable Lightness of Being, and you still blew the continuity in the mirror shots. Do you have anything original of your own?’
Luis tapped his pen on the edge of his desk. Smiling, without making it rude at all, he demanded playfully, “You think you can do better, don’t you?’
“I think I have an imagination.’
“Let’s find out,’ he said. He hit a function key and called up the production schedule for the latest feature. “There’s a straight vanilla sequence between Charlene and Todd on Friday. You direct it.’
Duncan was on his feet. “Now wait a fucking minute, Luis!’
“Duncan, it’s only one sequence,’ said Luis. “You can’t be threatened by somebody shooting one sequence! And to be perfectly fair, you are getting a little burned out and repetitive. If you’re going to insult the skills of somebody else in the office, then she should get her chance to prove she can do what you can. And it’s probably a good thing if we train another director—we increase our productivity.’
“Right, so I’ll edit her shit, and we’ll see how well that cuts!’
“No, no, no,’ Luis groaned. “I don’t think Teresa here has ever sabotaged your footage. And you’re not going to fuck up hers. She’ll put it together, and we’ll see what we have. It’s an experiment. Maybe you both learn to cut each other a little slack, eh?’
Duncan stared impotently from Luis to me then headed for the door, muttering, “This is bullshit.’
“Excuse me?’ snapped Luis, popping out of his chair. A flicker of temper here. “I believe I made a decision in the interests of the company—an experiment. And you’re about to get paid the same with your workload reduced for a while. Or do you want even less work?’
Duncan stopped in his tracks and went pale. If I understood that clearly enough, so did he.
“No, I’m…I’m good.’ He nodded and closed the door quietly.
Luis sighed and collapsed back in his seat. He looked at me and clapped his hands together, making a prayer gesture that said: Give me strength.
“Guy directs industrial training videos in Porto, back in my country, when I find him. He was cutting three-quarter-inch news footage in Malaysia before that—couldn’t get a job in film in New Zealand or Australia. I get him off these nowhere gigs in Portugal, get him into the UK, and now he thinks he’s Bertolucci.’ He pointed a finger at me and laughed. “You better come up with something marvelous, otherwise we both look stupid.’
“I won’t let you down,’ I promised.
I was beginning to like him. And I was developing a theory. Duncan clearly had a problem with strong women— hell, he seemed to have a problem with women in general. If he came to Silky Pictures via Portugal… Maybe this pipeline of hard-core nasty stuff didn’t rely on Antunes as the connection. Maybe it was someone else.
2
The atmosphere on a porn set is a strange one. On my first day as a director, a naked girl was in the makeup area, fussing over her face, and I was doing my best to persuade her through intermediaries that less is more, because the big false eyelashes and the heavy violet shadow just didn’t make it (in the end, my appeal to her vanity as an actress won out, because I wanted an “innocent’ look for her). I was lucky, in that our star for the day was a veteran named Charlene from Essex, who had short blond hair with bangs, natural breasts for once, and ones that were B cups (a fact that made Duncan treat her with contempt: “You need big tits! Big!’), and she was sincerely enthused about working with a female director. She was twenty-five and had done countless porn features after her audition for one of those dance reality show competitions had taken her only to the second round. Charlene clasped both my hands in hers now, greeting me like an old friend, wearing a big enthusiastic smile.
“This is wonderful!’ she gushed. “Just tell me what you want, darling. It’ll be so good to work with somebody who ain’t barking at me all the bloody time. Brilliant!’
When I sketched out my idea, she bit her bottom lip, listening with this sweetly charming yet vacuous look and then pronounced: “Oh, wow.’
I didn’t think it merited a “wow,’ but hey, I’ll take enthusiasm. She clapped her hands together with delight. She was easygoing, and though Duncan McCullough had reduced her to tears more than once, technicians told me she took direction well.
Male actors on a porn set are really cattle. They’re not nearly as well paid as the girls, often treated politely but as talking dildos, and with very few exceptions, they never make names for themselves. It’s the girls who are in demand. But Silky Pictures was trying to appeal to a broader base and get couples, so my argument to Luis was that the direction and editing had to adopt a different style, one that flattered the guy as much as the girl star. If a couple rented a Silky DVD, the girl got in the mood by looking at the male—his chest, his muscles, his face, not just his dick penetrating a vagina. Instead of tight close-ups of boobs and then a cut to a long shot of missionary or doggy-style sex (yawn), I wanted to mix things up a little. I argued we should be “more European’ (I was bluffing—I didn’t know what I meant by that either, but it sounded good).
When I explained to our male co-star, Todd, what I wanted to do for the sequence, I did my best to keep my eyes on his face. He was an athletic tall guy with Action Man good looks, neatly coiffed black hair, and a wide chest that he apparently waxed to keep smooth. And he was listening to me as he stood completely naked, nodding with his hands on his hips as his impressively long limp cock dangled between his legs—not a hint of self-consciousness. He liked my idea, too.
Oh, yeah, the idea. Right. Ummm, yes.
It was different from what he usually did, and after all, he didn’t have to maintain an erection as long, not that this was usually any problem for him.
I felt too timid to call “Action!’ It sounded so pompous in my ears, so I just said in a quiet voice, “When you’re ready, guys.’ I had promised to give hand gestures and signals for when I wanted the actors to move, and they didn’t have to go very far to hit their marks.
We had a full-length shot of Charlene as she leaned her elbows on the green blotter of a
big oak desk, her breasts dangling, turning her head just a little over her shoulder, half in fear, half in expectation of pleasure. Todd’s left hand ran over her back and down her ass, his fingers encased in a mink glove. The gloved hand stroked and caressed, winding its way to the inside of her thigh. And then, very sudden—
Smack. His right hand slapped an old-fashioned wooden ruler against her buttocks, leaving a red bar stripe. Charlene let out a small whimper. The interruption of sharp, stinging discipline seemed to come out of nowhere. Charlene didn’t turn, didn’t say a thing—because the glove of fur was making another slow journey along her thighs.
The camera picked up how Charlene’s nipples were hardening, a slight rise in the small orbits of her areolae, and her girlish fingers dug into the blotter, nails going white. She licked her lips. I moved my hand in a director’s cue, and time for her to look back at him. Smack! Another slap of the ruler against her ass. And yet another. Charlene’s mouth was open in surprise, her mouth smiling just faintly, just enough to show she liked this…
This beautiful blond girl, all curves and white paleness and pink hard nipples, half turning; and now she placed one leg on the desk, sprawling her body over it, offering her vulva up to him, buttocks with three long red lines. The camera shot worked if her face was in it, looking back at him hungrily. Her vaginal lips glistened with lubrication, and she was actually getting turned on. The crew was spellbound.
I hadn’t briefed the camera guys on angles or whether we had to move with the couple or not—I had merely said that I would give them gestures as well so as not to screw up the sound recording and have to redub it in studio later. Todd sank to his knees, his penis lifting at a tentative angle with his own arousal, and he licked her pussy as the ruler smacked into her ass cheeks once more. Mink glove caress, smack of the ruler.
The crew gaped and watched, knowing they were seeing a genuine moment of sexual heat. Actors were performing, yes, and we were witnesses to a sensuality that might have had an artificial start, but it swelled and grew with the raw carnal urges of two people. The sound guy swallowed hard, and I was feeling it, too. All of us were background furniture, forgotten. I didn’t really give a damn anymore if my stars stayed “professional’ and did what I told them, so long as we got great material. As it happened, Todd hesitated for all of a millisecond and then did what I wanted. Because it was natural. He flipped her around on the desk, his gloved hand swimming along the surface of flat white belly, a brief roaming of her tits, and then she was lifting her legs.
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