The Other Hollywood (5 page)

NEW YORK CITY
1970–1971

FRED LINCOLN
:
I did my first loop for Butchie Peraino. I went to this place in Brooklyn, and Butchie was shooting film and Vinnie, his bodyguard, was shooting the stills. Butchie and I got along, and we were friends ever since. We were just the same kind of people. Italian people. And as I said, the girl was just gorgeous!

I guess she was a German hooker. Blond hair, big tits, yeah, a beautiful girl. Oh, it was incredible!

CHUCK TRAYNOR
:
When we first came to New York, someone said, “Go to the Film Center Building. There’s a lotta stuff goin’ on over there.”

So I go up to the seventeenth floor, and I meet Lou Perry, who was really Lou Peraino. They all called him Butchie. I just walked in and asked if they were hiring anybody, and the girl sitting in front said, “You wanna be in a movie?”

I said, “Uh, yeah, I’ll be in a movie.”

She said, “Well, go in the back; talk to Butchie.”

So I go back there. He was sitting in his office. I said, “I make movies. I’ve made a lotta movies.” I had made two or three, you know.

Butchie said, “Well, tell you what. Why don’t you make me a few movies, and bring ’em in, and I’ll see if we can do it. How ’bout that?”

So I said, “Okay.”

FRED LINCOLN
:
I don’t think Butchie made any more loops after that. I think that first one was for fun; he was horny or something. But as soon as he figured out how to make a loop, he had other people make them. He bought eight-millimeters from other people.

CHUCK TRAYNOR
:
I went and got Linda and rounded up some more people on Forty-second Street, just anybody that I talked to for more than two minutes. I’d ask, “Do you wanna do a porno film?”

Most of the girls I knew back then were girls who were either dancing or turning tricks—but I mean, I’d ask waitresses, anybody. And usually I’d do it in a joking way, so if they screamed I’d say it was a joke.

If they said, “Well, yeah, I dunno, maybe. How much money can I make?” then I’d take them up to the apartment and start making porno movies on the Bolex.

ERIC EDWARDS
:
The place we shot my first loop was some loft on Forty-second Street. It kind of looked like a bedroom/studio set, with one cameraman with an eight millimeter windup camera.

I was scared shitless, shaking up a storm, because I had no idea what I was in for. The cameraman was Teddy Snyder, and the girl was Linda Lovelace, only she wasn’t Linda Lovelace yet—she was just Linda Traynor, Chuck’s wife.

CHUCK TRAYNOR
:
We had gotten married before we left Miami. Mainly it was for her parents. Her mother was the kind that was always sending out private detectives and threatening this and that. She said, “You’re taking my daughter across state lines. I’m gonna getcha.”

And I said, “Fuck her. We’ll get married, and then she can’t do nothing,” and that’s what we did.

ERIC EDWARDS
:
So it was Linda and Chuck and another girl, some redhead. Chuck couldn’t perform, so I was brought in to perform with these two girls. And I started feeling fine, you know? I mean, I had two women that were kind of cute, and I was gonna make forty bucks, so I thought, “Wow!”

GEORGINA SPELVIN
:
I had done some casting for a film on a boat, and one day a guy who was working the lights came over and asked me if I would play this madam. The older woman they had gotten to play the madam for all of the white slave traffic that was coming and going on this boat had gotten a better job.

So I said, “Sure.” But I foolishly asked for a script—and they just stared at me, of course. They said, “Oh, just make up anything you want. But it does require a hard-core scene.”

The movie was called
High Priestess of Sexual Witchcraft.

ERIC EDWARDS
:
Even though I was nervous, I did fine—probably because Linda did perform deep throat on me that very first time. And I was amazed.

She swallowed my member all the way. I had never had that, no, no. There wasn’t even a
name
for it because
Deep Throat
hadn’t come out yet.

The girls got fifty dollars, and I got forty, which was all right, you know, fine, fine, fine. We were there for about two hours. And from my first loop on, Linda kept calling me, saying, “Hey, you did good. Do you wanna work again? I got another job for you.”

GEORGINA SPELVIN
:
I had helped cast the large black mass scene for the film. And while this scene was being shot, I was sitting on the throne next to the high priest of sexual witchcraft—who turned out to be Marc Stevens, who naturally asked, “What’s a nice girl like you doing in a place like this?”

And we got to chatting. Very funny guy. And we just had a good time, you know?

Marc Stevens was called Mr. Ten-and-a-Half because he reportedly had a ten-and-a-half-inch member when it was fully erect.

HARRY REEMS
:
The address I had been given to go to shoot my first loop was in the East Seventies. The address turned out to be a tenement, a fourth-floor rear walk-up.

I buzzed the buzzer of one Caprice Buzzard. Behind the door, there was lots of shuffling and shushing.

“Who’s there?” a man whispered.

“It’s me. The new boy,” I said.

GEORGINA SPELVIN
:
I was having sex with the high priest and with the dude that was playing my son.

Was I nervous? No. He was a very attractive young man, and I had always felt that having sex was the friendliest thing two people could do. I only realized in retrospect that I’d been the school tramp. I was the girl all the guys would take out to fuck—but never took to the dances.

HARRY REEMS
:
“The new guy’s here,” Caprice Buzzard yelled. I assumed I’d be working with her, and I wasn’t turned on by the idea.

Then I heard footsteps in the back room. Someone came down the hall toward me. It was a beautiful girl with a magnificent body. She looked like a young Gene Tierney. She wasn’t wearing a bra.

I knew I’d have no problem getting an erection. Or getting rid of it. In fact, it was starting already.

The girl was Tina Russell.

TINA RUSSELL (PORN STAR)
:
I did not have any idea what was involved in a pornographic film. In the beginning, I had no type of contact with any part of the business. My husband, Jason, had seen only a couple of eight-millimeter loops years before while in the army.

Anyway, my friend Suzanne, who had done some films, suggested the idea of us making loops because she really liked Bob Wolfe, the director. “He’s a real character!” she said.

So as relaxed about nudity as we had always been, by ourselves and with our friends, we decided sure, why not? I assumed that we would make love—only it would be for a camera.

Well, Bob Wolfe shot a ten-minute loop, during which he would leave the camera unattended several times while it was still running, and disappear for two minutes. Each time he returned with a fresh beer and yelled, “All right, sweetie, I’m comin’ in for a close-up.”

So that was it! A few kisses, a lot of tongue action, some fondling, and a lot of spread shots. All I had to remember was to be sure not to look at the camera and to be sure to keep my legs spread directly to the camera.

GEORGINA SPELVIN
:
We made quite a few films. I called them one-day wonders. Marc Stevens and I had sex together on-screen many times, but he was like my kid brother. I didn’t have “affairs” with anybody; I just had sex with a lot of people—there was a group of about six players. I referred to us as “The Rep Company.” It included Marc Stevens, Harry Reems, Eric Edwards, Sean Costello, and of course Tina and Jason Russell.

TINA RUSSELL
:
There was an incredible contrast between the types of jobs we did in those days. One night it was working in a dirty studio in the Forty-second Street district doing a soft-core, S and M job. The next day, it was a short job requiring a half-hour to an hour of making love for a hard-core fill-in, to spice up a film shot years before. Or maybe a job requiring only straight acting, not even nudity, in a higher-budget production.

HARRY REEMS
:
When I arrived to shoot my first loop, Tina Russell was dressed like a hooker—in a short, short ribbed maroon miniskirt and a black pullover jersey and high heels. And no bra. Then a handsome, thin, bearded young man joined us.

“Hi,” he said. “I’m Jason. Tina’s husband.”

My erection dropped like an express elevator.

“Are you going to be in the film, too?” I asked Jason.

“Nope. Not today.”

“Why me instead of you?”

“Because Tina and I have done too many together. Caprice thinks a new face and bod are needed. I agree.”

I was confused and embarrassed. All the blood in my system rushed to my face. “But…but,” I stammered, “they told me I’d have to have…relations…with…”

Jason laughed. “Relax, man. You’re trying to ask me if it’s okay to fuck my wife. Of course you can fuck my wife.”

TINA RUSSELL
:
Jason had to convince Harry that it was all right for him to fuck me.

FRED LINCOLN
:
Tina never cared about who Jason fucked, and Jason never cared about who Tina fucked—they were genuine swingers. I mean, I went over to their house once and fucked Tina while Jason was eating dinner.

I think Tina and Jason Russell were two people from Amish country, and they were childhood sweethearts. Tina adored Jason. She did everything for him. And she was a natural sex person. So the business didn’t bother her when they both got into it.

HARRY REEMS
:
To relax me that day, Jason gave me a joint. He passed another to Tina and lit one for himself. I felt anything but relaxed.

The first scene we shot on the street. As soon as we were done with that, Caprice was ready with our next instructions.

“Now the two of you go upstairs to the bedroom. Tina, you get Harry to the bed and undress him. When you get him undressed, you’ll give him head.”

I had never really heard the expression “give head” before. I had to ask what it meant.

GEORGINA SPELVIN
:
The boys would trade off holding the camera, and there was usually a sound person and perhaps one person handling lights. Sometimes there would be another cameraperson, other than the actual players. The film was basically cut in the camera—and the idea was to make up a story and work through the story in one day. One day of shooting and one location. And we would do all kinds of crazy and silly things to work in the six obligatory fuck scenes.

HARRY REEMS
:
It started out with Tina kissing me. It was such a tender kiss that I fell in love with her all over again. She was trying to tell me, “Don’t be scared. I’m going to help you all I can.”

Then the scene went from the sublime to the ridiculous. “And then,” Caprice cut in, “I’ll walk out of the closet, and it’ll be a happy surprise for you, Harry. You’ll have two girls going down on you. You’ll really get your money’s worth!”

GEORGINA SPELVIN
:
I was using all kinds of different screen names for every film—Ona Turale, Connie Lingus, ha, ha, ha! Though, strangely enough, once I started doing hard-core films, I wasn’t promiscuous in my personal life.

For one thing, I had this crazy idea that you didn’t fuck outside the
industry. You kept it within this group of people because otherwise you might “pick up a nail, and bring it home.” This was like a family.

HARRY REEMS
:
This had to be one definition of heaven: getting sucked by two women simultaneously and getting paid for it.

“Okay, Tina, get on top of him,” said Caprice, “and start to fuck, and I’ll back off.”

Loops—or stags—were silent, so it was okay to say anything as long as you weren’t facing the camera. If you were facing the camera, you should be saying something appropriate to the action so that good lip-readers in the audience wouldn’t be put off.

Tina mounted me. I came instantly.

TINA RUSSELL
:
It is not difficult for me to let myself go and to be my character in a film. I do not want to be a great, well-known actress—it’s too much of a hassle. Besides, I love what I am doing.

I am a porn star.

HARRY REEMS
:
“Open your legs, Harry,” said Sam the cameraman.

“Yes,” said Caprice, “take it out, and come on Tina’s thigh.”

“I already came,” I panted.

There was a moment of dead silence.

“WHAT!” screamed Caprice.
“What the hell do you mean you already came?”

“I came,” I repeated limply.

“Cut the camera!”
Caprice yelled, “
This dumb jerk came!
You schmuck, don’t you know you’re supposed to come outside her? That’s the money shot, the wet shot. The camera has to see your cum. Don’t you know that much, you nebbish?”

“I’m sorry,” I said sheepishly. “Maybe tomorrow I can—”

“
Tomorrow!
You’re damn well going to do it over again
today
. You’re not leaving this house until I get a cum shot out of you. Now how long do you think it’s going to take before you can get it up again?”

“I don’t know,” I said honestly.

“All right, we’ll clear out and leave you alone. You can start beating your meat or whatever. When you get it up and ready, yell.”

Tina, bless her, stayed in the room with me.