MAKERS OF PORN FANTASIES FACING REALITIES OF AIDS : Some Advocate Safe-Sex Films While Others Say Viewers ‘Don’t Want to See a Net Under the High-Wire Act’
Some performers have quit the business because of it. Others are demanding precautions that two years ago would have gotten them thrown off the set. Producers say it has caused a serious shortage in the talent pool, and some predict that if the industry doesn’t adopt safety as its primary theme, public opinion and the government may combine to put them out of business.
“It” is AIDS and, as you might expect, the scare has hit the pornographic film industry with the impact of a shark sighting off Nantucket.
“Everyone is terrified of it in the industry,” says Doug Oliver, who reviews X-rated films for publisher Larry Flynt’s Hustler and Chic magazines. “Many have left the industry as a result. . . . People who have an awful lot of sex, well, it’s inevitable someone will get it.”
Many people in the pornographic film business, which is estimated to gross upwards of $1 billion a year, say they do not consider the deadly acquired immune deficiency syndrome an occupational hazard. They claim that because sex is their business, they are more conscientious about hygiene than people having multiple sex partners in the general population and that they don’t work with people they don’t know.
Many are concerned, however, and in growing instances are trying to do something about it. In two major branches of the porn film business--one that makes movies for gay men, another that serves the heterosexual market--there are those who believe only “responsible sex” should be depicted.
Films employing the on-camera use of prophylactics, spermicidal jells and other measures have been made for straight and gay audiences. But none has been the porn equivalent of a Hollywood blockbuster, and most people in the business regard safe-sex films as novelties.
“It’s a fad; it’s not what America wants to see,” says Bill Margold, who has produced, written and starred in porn movies. “They want to see us taking chances. It’s like a circus. They don’t want to see a net under the high-wire act.”
More to the point, say some porn film producers, is that people rent or buy X-rated movies for the sexual fantasies they provide, and no one fantasizes hermetic sex. They say nothing will ruin an orgy scene quicker than someone passing out condoms.
Although rumors seem to be constantly circulating about certain actors or actresses having AIDS, everyone interviewed for this article in the heterosexual porn film business said they knew of no actual cases. Because of that, there is little support for using safe-sex techniques on camera, or for attaching cautionary advisories at the beginnings of their films.
Producers of porn films say there have been many deaths among gay actors and some producers have already begun taking measures to remind their customers to take protective measures.
Catalina Distributing Co. in North Hollywood precedes each of its videos with a reminder that the movie is intended as a sexual fantasy and that viewers should consult their physicians before engaging in sex. Catalina, in conjunction with the Gay Men’s Health Center in New York, also has produced a three-minute video demonstrating precautionary accouterments being used in a two-man-one-woman menage a trois .
William Higgins, who heads Catalina Video, says the three-minute training film also will appear at the beginning of his company’s movies.
Other producers say disclaimers aren’t enough. Terry Legrand, president of the Gay Film Producers Assn. of America, says Catalina should go a step further and practice what it preaches.
“Putting a caution on a film and then doing what you say is unsafe,” Legrand says, “is stupid. We have to stop making films with unsafe sex in them. The dollar cannot be important to us. Saving lives has got to be the important thing.”
Reliable annual porn sales figures are not available, but David Friedman, president of the Adult Film and Video Assn., says a realistic estimate of annual sales of X-rated films and videos is somewhere between $1 billion and $1.5 billion. Mainstream Hollywood grosses about $8 billion a year from theatrical rentals and video sales of its films.
Whatever the actual amount, it is said to be increasing. Because of the AIDS scare, say pornographers, more people are staying home and fantasizing with videos instead of going out looking for sex.
Still, the main topic of discussion in the porn film industry is whether to include safe-sex techniques, and if so, which ones?
“Behind the Green Door II”--a how-to sequel to the Marilyn Chambers movie that became a date-night oddity of the ‘70s--features safe sex techniques and a cameo by Dr. Ruth Westheimer to boot. Dr. Ruth makes a pitch for condom use for disease prevention, then we see actors apply the devices before giving them some strenuous duty.
“ ‘Behind the Green Door’ eroticizes safe sex,” says Missy, the movie’s first-name-only star. “It was the No. 1 rental the first month it was out.”
Missy, who claims to be a college graduate and a one-time U.S. Senate page, says she performed in “Green Door”--her one and only sex film--because she wanted to help educate couples about safe-sex practices. She says she talked her boyfriend, porn film producer Artie Mitchell, into letting her work in the movie, despite his warning that it might upset her family.
It did upset her family, she says, but there have been no regrets.
“I am really happy I did that film. It explicitly shows, in an erotic way, how to use (protective devices). . . . People are going to have to accept safe-sex methods.”
Missy is now making a career out of her safe-sex campaign. She has gone on national TV talk shows to demonstrate--using her fingers as props--how to apply condoms, and she just completed a 30-minute movie, “Missy’s Guide to Safe Sex.”
The movie, which does not contain sexual encounters, features Missy lecturing a class of college students and ends with her conducting a tour of a local pharmacy where she shows students and viewers a variety of over-the-counter safe-sex products.
“Missy’s Guide” will be sold on videotape for $9.95, she says, and Missy’s Safe Sex Kit--a sampler of hygienic lovemaking products--will be available soon.
The porn film industry is divided by issues other than safe-sex techniques. The advent of videotape, which makes it possible to make a movie in two days for as little as $15,000, has driven down salaries --starting salaries are said to be $200 a day for actors in gay films, $400 for straight films--and encouraged the use of transient performers, particularly in gay films.
As a result, actresses are refusing to perform with actors who have worked in gay films. When actresses don’t know their proposed partners, they say they are demanding blood tests.
“I think X-rated actors and actresses all need AIDS tests,” says porn film actress Barbara Dare. “Not because AIDS is in porno, but because AIDS is everywhere in the ‘80s. My friends who do the local club scene have a better chance of getting it than me.”
“There was a lot of crossover until 18 months ago,” says Daniel Holt, an actor who has worked in straight and gay films. “Then people got concerned. Then anyone who had done gay couldn’t do straight. If a girl found out a guy had done gay, that was it.”
Holt says there is an AIDS paranoia among the straight performers, and adds that because gays faced the horrors of the disease first, they have learned to adapt their life styles and take better care of themselves.
“The gay side has kept its act cleaner,” Holt says. “A lot of the girls (in straight films) are irresponsible. . . . They don’t care who they’re in bed with or what they’re doing. The risks that actors and actresses take for the camera are minor, but their off-camera activities put them at great risk.”
Producer-actor Margold, who refers to porn movies as “the playpens of the damned,” believes the AIDS paranoia is a greater threat than the disease.
“My feeling is that paranoia kills,” he says. “Paranoia causes other diseases. You never know (who is bisexual). Who needs all the agony and the worry? Life is a tightrope in general.”
Free-lance writer Craig Modderno contributed to this story.