One interesting (and mildly terrifying) facet of my life as a porn actress is that I don’t necessarily know who I’m going to be having sex with on a given day. It’s a little like arranging a boxing match — who do the fans want to see go at it? Who would make good ‘opponents’? Sometimes conventional wisdom is correct, and other times — as highlighted in my last column — it’s a bit of a disaster.
And sometimes you strike gold and you find yourself in a scene with Stephanie Swift.
Most people know her as that former Wicked contract girl, the super hot, exotic-looking one who seems a little… glum. Stephanie is not blonde and big boobed, nor is she particularly bubbly. There’s something sincere about her, a hint of something genuine. A longing, or a sadness. It comes across on screen and it’s even more apparent in real life.
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In recent years, as porn has trended toward the more extreme and novelty-oriented, an act called “squirting” has gained popularity. The proper term, I’ve been told, is “female ejaculation,” and not everyone can do it. Or alternatively, everyone CAN do it. It largely depends on who you talk to, and it’s hard to know whom to believe. Sex Educator Deborah Sundahl has made a career of writing and speaking about female ejaculation and after 20 years she’s still going strong. This suggests most laypeople are still in the dark about the ultimate Female Orgasm, and it’s taking a while for us to get up to speed.
And because we are ignorant, we can be fooled. You see, squirting, to the untrained eye, can look a lot like pissing. And sadly, sometimes it really IS pissing.
I found this out the hard way.
A while back, I worked with a woman – let’s call her Karla — who had suddenly in mid-career developed the ability to “squirt.” Karla was in her forties and having trouble getting work, even with the current MILF craze. Actually, she seemed to be having some trouble coping with life in general. Karla had an unsettling affect to her personality; high strung and prone to inexplicable mood swings. It was hard not to wonder if she was abusing drugs — prescription or otherwise.
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I know it’s been a while since I’ve done a column; life has been coming at me fast and furious lately, and it’s been all I can do to just catch my breath and keep moving. It’s not always a pretty sight, but at the same time I’ve really never been happier.
Most of my joy lately has come from the simple pleasure of talking to and corresponding with fans. What I’ve come to realize, not that it’s much of a surprise, is that the average porn viewer is much smarter and more thoughtful than most people like to believe. While most of us enjoy some form of pornography (or, for those of you who don’t like that word: “erotica,”) we still tend to make broad and unfair generalizations about the typical porn consumer. It reminds me of when I was a stripper — almost every customer would at some point say to me, “You must meet some real freaks and weirdos in your line of work.”
“Actually,” I would reply, “Most of them are just like you.”
Nobody ever thinks of adult entertainment enthusiasts as being “just like them.” For most of us, our love of porn is a little peccadillo, a harmless secret, a slight eccentricity in the personality of an otherwise normal, multi-faceted person. We don’t define ourselves by our love of erotica, yet we’re quick to define others by theirs. And it’s usually to discredit them: their opinions, their worth, their intelligence. It’s just another form of self hatred and deep seated shame. And it’s time to get rid of it.
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Anything can be done well or poorly, and porn is no exception. Just as it takes time and practice to become a good lover in real life, the same is true for performing well in adult films. And, again as in real life, what turns on one person can be anathema to another. But there are certain rules that seem to apply, regardless of personal taste.
The first rule of being a good adult performer is to be “into” the scene, involved with your partner and passionate about the encounter. This means keeping connected to your costar, both physically and — for lack of a better term — “emotionally.” Eye contact, constant touching, increased breathing, gazing at each other lovingly; all of these things are fundamental. Let your arms go limp at your side for a moment while she’s kissing you, and you’ve just communicated a lack of enthusiasm to your entire audience. After all, you’re supposed to be in the throes of passion and you have to convey that with your body, your eyes, and your attitude in every frame of the film. It’s not as elementary as some might think.
At the same time, you have to be aware of the fact that you are, at bottom, performing for the benefit of others. Being aware of where the camera is, approaching your costar from an angle at which the camera can get a good view of the action, and choosing positions that are possible to shoot well are important things to remember. But we obviously don’t consider those issues in our real life sexual encounters, so it takes some adjusting to get used to it. Some performers master these new requirements quickly while others never really do.
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Not that long ago, when a female adult industry performer reached the big 4-0, it was pretty much a given that it was time to move on to that “new career” as a psychologist, real estate agent, or soccer mom. After all, porn was a young woman’s game. Like fashion modeling or ballet, it was simply the way of the industry, and it was nothing personal. Sure, there were always the extraordinary beauties who managed to stretch their careers to, say, 45 (all the while claiming to be 32) but that was the exception, not the rule. And women who stayed in porn past their prime were thought to be rather sad and cautionary tales: Here’s what happens if you don’t find something else to do with your life. You can end up an old lady, still sticking your head between someone’s legs for less and less money each time.
Well, times do change, don’t they? These days, older women are in demand like never before, and for some companies, such as Girlfriends Films, finding gorgeous women 35 and over is our main priority. The “older/younger” dynamic (placing a young girl in a scene with an older woman) is perhaps the biggest seller in the girl/girl genre right now. Part of this can probably be attributed to the recent “MILF” craze, but it’s also because women just look better these days, and they stay looking that way for much longer. With advancements in anti-aging plastic surgery and cosmetic “maintenance” procedures, along with regular workouts at the gym, it’s reasonable that a woman can expect to look 25 or 30 when she’s actually a decade older.
It’s also become reasonable for a woman to embark on a career in porn when she’s approaching menopause.
Our most recent and exciting find was a woman named Magdalene. Tall, striking, and sophisticated, Magdalene caught our eye on the final day of the AVN show in Vegas earlier this year. She was a civilian, simply walking around and looking at the booths for kicks and thrills, but we were struck by her commanding presence, her aura, her perfect bone structure. We admit it — we propositioned her. She was, thankfully, flattered. She said she would think about it, and we assumed she was just being polite. She was probably about 42, we thought, and a middle aged civilian is not really very likely to suddenly decide to be a porn star.
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My introduction to porn began many years ago. Long before I started working for Girlfriends Films.
I starred in a B/G (boy/girl) video when I was in my early 20s. My costar was my live-in boyfriend, who had a large penis but had never before performed in an adult film and, prior to meeting me, had never considered doing so. However, the notion of his girlfriend fucking a male porn star filled him with a special dread, so he agreed to “costar” in my porno debut. He was the lead singer for a garage band at the time and was quite certain fame was waiting in his future, so he wore a cap pulled down over his face to disguise his identity. However, I was totally recognizable. I had no illusions of grandeur, and I felt relatively sure I’d never run for public office.
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Lately people have been writing to me to tell me how excited they are to see a woman creating erotic films they can feel good about watching. I can’t tell you how much that means to me. In fact, if I couldn’t do something positive in porn, I wouldn’t be here at all. I have such love for the adult industry and for the brave men and women who endure the stigma placed on us by society (that is, by the very people who enjoy our work when they’re in lonely hotel rooms or need a little boost to their sex lives). It’s quite a service we offer and we don’t get a whole lot of respect for our efforts. It’s become very important to me to do what I can to change that.
But I wasn’t always so clear on how I felt about my role in the sex industry. In fact, I wasn’t always so clear on how I felt about sex work in general.
I was an exotic dancer for many years, and like so many sex workers, when I decided to leave and re-enter “mainstream America” the decision was abrupt. When you reach “burn out”, it often comes with little warning, although looking back of course the signs were there. After leaving the world of sequins and platform heels, I changed my phone number, moved into a new apartment, got a “real” job, and a new circle of non-sex worker friends. My resume was a pack of lies, and I avoided talking about myself except in the vaguest terms. I’d decided that my past was something best forgotten, and that I no longer wished to carry the stigma, or exhibit the mannerisms, of the girl I’d so recently been.
But instead of feeling “free” of my past, as the months went by I could think of little else. I analyzed my obsession with my former life to mean that the sex industry had damaged me even more than I’d thought. Why else would I feel so defined by it? Why else was I continually menaced by the intrusive thoughts and memories I was trying so hard to forget?
Confused and angry, I began doing late night Internet searches, googling the words “stripper” and “ideology”. I was hoping to find some smart person out in cyberspace who had written an article or thesis on stripping and its effects — something that could help me. I wanted to analyze what I was feeling, and I needed to figure out what I thought about the adult industry.
I simply wasn’t at peace.
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When I tell people I’m an adult actress, I can pretty much predict what their questions will be: What’s it like to have sex with people you don’t know? Is it weird? Does it ruin sex for you – do you just get sick of it?
They’re good questions, and I don’t blame people for being curious about how it works – or should I say, IF it works. The answer is, it does. Work, I mean. Or at least, it can. Like most things, state of mind is what’s important when embarking on a career in porn. The attitude you bring to your job has a lot to do with what kind of experience you’re going to have. If you’re a difficult person who has trouble interacting with others, if you struggle with drug or alcohol abuse, or if you suffer from low self esteem, a career in porn may not be right for you. But then, if you’re saddled with those afflictions not many things are going to feel right to you.
The first scene I did was with a lovely young woman who made it clear from the outset that she was not attracted to girls and that “you won’t be getting much out of me, but I can fake it.” I was pretty upset about that, since Girlfriends Films has a strict rule that any performer who wishes to work with us must truly be bisexual or lesbian – not “gay for pay.” Somehow, though, this pretty young thing had slipped through the cracks and was totally unaware of our requirements. It wasn’t her fault, but she wasn’t invited back. And the scene? Suffice it to say it fell utterly flat. When the reviews came out, most said things like “these girls (she and I) have no chemistry” and “the worst scene in the DVD.” Not quite the splash I’d hoped to make with my first effort in lesbian porn.
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Back in the 70s when the adult feature film Deep Throat first came out, it seemed porn was poised to be the new art form — or at least to revolutionize cinema as we knew it. We felt very cosmopolitan and European as we sat with our partners in darkened theaters as six foot tall images of human genitalia filled the screen. Linda Lovelace became a household name, and her success opened the door for a whole generation of porn stars. Names such as Seka, Sharon Mitchell, Nina Hartley and Kandi Barbour became synonymous with erotic entertainment and sexual, exotic beauty. The porn industry itself became known as “The ‘Other’ Hollywood.”
But then, something happened — or rather, it didn’t happen. Porn never quite made good on its promise to make sexual sophisticates of us all. The “new art form” devolved into what most referred to as “smut”, and nobody sat proudly in theaters anymore to watch the latest x-rated film. In fact, porn went completely back in the closet — or almost completely. Most people still watched it, but you certainly didn’t admit you did. And if someone you knew caught you going into an x-rated theater, it could change the way they felt about you — and not likely for the better.
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Recently I attended a party at an Altadena art gallery. A good friend of mine was bartending the event, and when I arrived he introduced me to his sister, Laura. Laura’s dress and hair was new-age bohemian chic, and she immediately struck me as smart, cool and quirky. I liked her instantly, but her reaction to me was a bit hard to read. She wasn’t unfriendly, but I sensed a bit of wariness, perhaps even suspicion, directed my way.
After telling Laura how nice it was to meet her, I found myself distracted by a portrait of Adolf Hitler painted entirely in glitter. I moved in to take a closer look and Laura quickly moved on. I didn’t see her again for the rest of the night.
The next day, my friend told me that he’d mentioned to his sister what I do for a living and that her response had been a mixture of shock and moral indignation.
“Don’t you feel sorry for her?” Laura had apparently asked him. “Aren’t you going to try to help her? You’re her friend, aren’t you?”
The words stung, but I wasn’t really surprised. Unfortunately, Laura’s reaction represents how many people continue to view those who work in the adult industry: as damaged human beings, even as victims. I sometimes forget how strange my job can seem to “civilians.” By “civilians,” I mean conventional folks that hold jobs where their coworkers never once get to see them naked. (Not even at the company Christmas party!)
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