Archive for May, 2008

Jenna Jameson – Not Your Father’s Porn Star

Highly intelligent with a flare for business, devilishly sexy though surprisingly down-to-earth, Jenna Jamison has become arguably the most powerful figure in the traditionally male-dominated adult movie industry. Writer Allison Krugel sat down with Jamison recently and dished sex, men, entertainment, politics, and motherhood in an exclusive and eye-opening interview

Jenna Jameson isn't simply smart for a porn star. She is one of the most intelligent women with whom I have had the pleasure of conversing. That being said, it's no wonder that she has not only become the biggest star in the history of the adult industry, she has practically taken it over. As if to say, "Ok guys, I'll take it from here," Jameson boldly started her own mega production company, Club Jenna, Inc. which rivals Vivid Video and Wicked Pictures for the biggest player in adult film industry.

Jenna Jameson speaks with purpose and precision, as if she has made self analysis into a full time job. She has probably dissected her own behavior and unconventional life more acutely than any psychologist ever could. She also sees herself as a true feminist and an activist for women's liberation and sexual freedom. In this interview, I bypassed the kid stuff (her impending divorce and petite frame), and went for the real deal: her life! Jenna Jameson is a full, three dimensional human being, and a fascinating one at that…

Allison Kugel: What's going on with your company, Club Jenna?

Jenna Jameson: My company is on a consistent growing spree. Since we sold to Playboy last year, we've grown so much. We went from one release every couple of months to six releases a month, which is a huge amount of work. It's just really exciting because it feels like we're on top of our game now. We're, like, the number one company in the adult industry.

Allison Kugel: Are you now bigger than Vivid Video and Wicked Pictures?

Jenna Jameson: We're right on par. For me, I grew up in the adult industry, so I looked at people like Steve Hirsh, who runs Vivid and owns Vivid, as a role model when it comes to running a business. I just applied all of his business model and it really seems to have worked. Now we're in contention for the number one spot.

Allison Kugel: Are you his competition now?

Jenna Jameson: (Laughs) Of course! I think everybody feels competition with my company, because we turn out the very best movies. Every year we're up for best film, best video. We (last year) released Janine Loves Jenna, which is pretty much the biggest movie ever shot in the adult industry.

Allison Kugel: How much did that cost you to make?

Jenna Jameson: Oh, it's a huge amount of money! I can't talk specific numbers, but it's been a year and a half in the making.

Allison Kugel: I'll tell you something, you're interesting to watch on film. It makes me wonder… when you were younger, did you ever think about just going for a mainstream career, before you decided to go into adult movies?

Jenna Jameson: No, not really. Acting was never something that I felt was on my horizon. I wanted to be a model. I wanted to be a Playboy centerfold. That was the ultimate to me. I used to steal my father's Playboy magazines and practice the poses. My father was horrified! He caught me stealing his Playboys! I was just so infatuated with the women in these magazines. I always felt so incredibly comfortable with being nude and my sexuality. That's what I aspired to be, was a model. It's been really easy for me to transition into the mainstream, and I don't really know how. It ended up just kind of falling in my lap. I aspired to be the number one porn star. I never aspired to be a mainstream star, and it just kind of happened. I'm scheduled for two mainstream movies this year and I'm just kind of like, "Holy Shit!"

Allison Kugel: To what do you attribute the astounding crossover success that you've had? You've basically made the impossible, possible.

Jenna Jameson: I attribute it to the fact that I am incredibly acceptable to not only men, but to women. I think that women feel akin to me in a way because I'm so incredibly honest about who I am as a person. I'm not this girl, [just] wearing a lot of makeup with big boobs, that nobody can access. I’m kind of like the girl next door with a dark side (laughs). I think all women in the world have that. Most women are pretty normal, but they are sexual beings. I always felt so incredibly comfortable with my sexuality. I'm normal. I'm kind of like the girl next door with a dark side (laughs). I think all women in the world have that. Most women are pretty normal, but they are sexual beings. I think that women have been incredibly oppressed, and I just kind of accept who I am, and I put it out there. With my E! True Hollywood Story and all those different things, I was able to tell my story, and women relate to me.

Allison Kugel: Did you find that your female fan base grew a lot after your E! True Hollywood Story aired?

Jenna Jameson: I think the turning point with my female demographic, was my book (Jenna's New York Times Bestselling Autobiography, 'How to Make Love like a Porn Star: A Cautionary Tale'). My book really changed peoples' perspective. Before that, people kind of looked at me as a sex star, a porn star. Once they read the book, they realized that there are so many different layers, and that I went through things in my life that a lot of women have, and that I have the same insecurities and the same troubles and the same worries that most women have. I think that it kind of changed things for my career, once I was finally able to get honest and just be truthful with everyone with who I am as a person.

Allison Kugel: I read your book. What I found interesting was that a lot of the journal entries that you put in there, from when you were a little girl and a pre-teen… things you wrote about, like the kind of music you listened to, and saying that you wanted a Cabbage Patch Kid, or liking a boy… and I'm like, "Oh my God, this is me! This could be me!"

Jenna Jameson: I was a normal girl, yeah. I went through all those same exact things that most young women go through. Worrying about whether or not I was going to get boobs, or I had all those weird insecurities that every girl of twelve or thirteen years old goes through. It was really, really hard for me to be honest, but I knew in writing this book that I had to be 100% brutally honest, because if you're going to tell your story, you can't leave things out. Whether or not it hurts you or hurts people around you, you have to be honest. For me, that book was therapy. It was the best thing I ever did, career-wise and just mentally and emotionally.

Allison Kugel: There were things in that book, where I'm sure when people read it, they really felt for you. There was not just one, but a few incidents of rape, including how you lost your virginity. Do you feel that some of that contributed to the career choice that you made?

Jenna Jameson: That's certainly something that I've waffled back and forth with. I question myself a lot about that. It's hard to say one way or another, because the strong feminist in me wants to say, "Absolutely not!" One way or another I would have been a porn star or a nude model or whatever, because I feel empowered. But there are certain times where I look back and I'm like, "Well obviously I was injured emotionally, and it's been things that I've totally stuffed down over years and years of enabling this abuse." I think that with writing the book, it made it ok, one way or another. It made me feel better about my decisions and made me sleep better at night. I was able to come to terms with the abuse that I did endure, and be a better person, because I was able to forgive and forget.

Allison Kugel: You talk about female empowerment a lot and that you feel like you're a role model for women. I don't know how that sits with the generation above us, but I completely understand it…

Jenna Jameson: Right, so you know…

Allison Kugel: Yeah, although my fifty-six year old mother knew who you were…

Jenna Jameson: I love it! That is so awesome! That's the kind of thing that I strive for. It's not really about how much money I have in the bank. It's about whether or not I've left my mark. And I feel like I have.

Allison Kugel: (Laughs) My mother asked, "So who's the next person you're interviewing?" I said "Jenna Jameson," and I was about to explain who you were and she said, "Oh yeah, yeah. I know who she is." (laughs) It's crazy! You might as well be working for Disney.

Jenna Jameson: I love it so much!

Allison Kugel: If you could sit down with Gloria Steinem for a debate on pornography, and how it represents and affects women, what would you say to her?

Jenna Jameson: Obviously everybody is entitled to their own opinion and I totally respect her position. I love women that are able to really put a period at the end of their sentence. She's fought for what she believes in, and I believe in a lot of things she says. The issue is that for centuries women have been put under the thumb of men in this society, and what she does is perpetuate that. Because a woman has a right to be the person that she wants to be. Relying on everybody else's judgment is what makes this society so sick. Having a woman going on TV and saying, "That woman's a whore and she's ruining society for women," … there's always two sides to the coin. I think that it's important to be well rounded and not to be so incredibly one-sided. It's just not healthy. There are very many parts of me that are very conservative, and I think that she needs to come to terms with herself, and start maybe having sex more. So I wouldn't end up debating with her. I would probably end up giving her sex advice.

Allison Kugel: (Laughs) What is the number one question about sex that other women ask you?

Jenna Jameson: Women always ask me about the best way to give a blowjob. That's a big thing for women. And the next one is masturbation.

Allison Kugel: They ask you how to do it?

Jenna Jameson: Yeah, what's the best way and how to get off, during sex or being alone. I think it's a major epidemic in women, faking orgasms. So many women in this world feel like they are put on this planet to please men, that they have to fake, and they never worry about their own pleasure. Sooner or later I am going to come out with a sex tips book, because I am a wealth of knowledge (laughs)!

Allison Kugel: You're talking about women feeling like they have to be objects to please men. A lot of people have accused the adult industry of turning out this product of factory made Barbie Dolls. It's usually all about men and men's fantasies. Will there be films made that are geared more towards women?

Jenna Jameson: Actually that's happening now. It's a big thing now in our industry, to shoot girls that are real. Like now, it's out of style in our industry to have a boob job.

Allison Kugel: Do you see motherhood in your near future?

Jenna Jameson: Absolutely! Finally at 32, I'm at a point in my life where I feel like I can put things aside and I'm ready to be a mom, mentally and physically.

Allison Kugel: Should you have a daughter someday, what would be your perspective, if she came to you and asked you about what you do or even expressed to you that she was interested in going into the adult industry?

Jenna Jameson: I think that honesty is incredibly important in being a parent. Once my child is old enough to understand the ins and outs of life and sex and all those kinds of things, when they get into their teens and start asking questions, then it's important for me to be honest and say, "Yes, I was young and this was my career choice and I felt comfortable with it, and sexuality is a natural thing. But it was my choice and it is not what mommy wants you to do (laughs)!" And not because I think that being a porn star is bad. I think that it's a really, really hard business to be happy in. I want pure unadulterated happiness for my child, and I feel like in my career, I had to fight and push and deal with incredible stereotypes and people trying to hold me down when it comes to being successful. I want my child to go to college and have all the different things that I didn't have as a kid. So I think that being a porn star would never even cross my child's mind, because I'm going to give it everything!

Allison Kugel: (Laughs)

Jenna Jameson: No doubt! She's gonna be so friggin spoiled, Oh my god! My poor pets, my dogs, can't even stand me anymore. They're like, "Mom, leave us alone!"

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Allison Dawn Kugel is the founder and president of AllisonDawnPR.com. To read her complete interview with Jenna Jamison, click here.

“Slut” Is Not A Four Letter Word

I have had a threesome fantasy or two in my day—the two-guys-and-me kind, not that way overplayed other kind. I have boys-and-boozed it up just for sport, and/or to lift spirits that self-help books would’ve told me just needed some yoga or a lavender bath or special “me” time. I enjoy a good vibrator and great oral sex and hot guys wearing boxer briefs. I don’t think any of this makes me very different from lots and lots of other women. But until recently, you wouldn’t have known many of us existed—at least not if pop culture was your barometer. Even the coolest chicks on TV have, if anything, been too busy being, you know, Strong Female Characters—chatty single moms, super-spies, angsty students, neurotic lawyers, mega-bitches—to get too down and dirty. In movies, women’s overt sexuality came with such lovely bonuses as gratuitous crotch shots and boiled bunnies. Music gave us our savior, Madonna—and then another 20 or so years of occasional tiny breakthroughs (Alanis Morrissette, I salute your idea of a good night at the theater; Kelis, sweetie, you can charge whatever you want; and Liz Phair, well, I’m speechless in awe), but no major movements.

Until now. Thanks to the Super Sexual Powers of a rag-tag team of surprising heroines—Meredith Grey, Christina Aguilera, Nelly Furtado, Fergie, and the Pussycat Dolls—our time has finally, ahem, come. And it is precisely because these women’s presences are so overwhelmingly popular, so mainstream—and so wonderfully slutty (that’s a term of endearment here)—that they’re so important.

Who knew the second coming of Madonna would appear in the form of a kinda wispy, kinda mousy, unfortunately whiny chick in scrubs? But love her or hate her, “Grey’s Anatomy”’s Meredith inspires more conversation than any one character in recent TV history. And thank God for that, really. Suddenly, all of America cares deeply about what happens to a woman who, the first second we saw her, had just slept with a guy whose name she never quite got the night before—and she barely cared, as it was her first day as a surgical intern. Of course we find out the guy is her boss, drama ensues, etc., but that’s not the point: We now have a blockbuster of a show whose central female character not only slept with a random—she did it on the night before a very important day in her career, she showed no regret, and then, by the way, she wasn’t even that interested at first when he tried to pursue a relationship with her. Oh, and later, once he succeeded and then broke her heart? She went right back to trolling bars for strangers, and when good old McDreamy called her on it, she called him on that right back with the greatest line ever uttered in a hospital stairwell: “You don’t get to call me a whore.” It’s no accident, incidentally, that this character was created by a female executive producer, Shonda Rimes.

That’s probably why we’ve gotten most of our recent spate of empowered feminine sexuality from the music world, where women are more likely to write their own material. Everyone tried to make Britney Spears the New Madonna a few years ago—but it was the other one in that famous girl-on-girl action with Madonna at the MTV Video Music Awards who really succeeded in succeeding the Big M. What Madonna did differently from most major sex symbols before and since—and Britney has never had the wherewithal to grasp—was to own her own desires, no matter how unladylike they were. She wasn’t getting off on her ability to excite men—she knew that was nothing particularly special.

And no where is her legacy better demonstrated than in Aguilera’s transition from raunchy X-tina to her current classic Marilyn Monroe styling. It’s not just a love of Norma Jean that these two share, either—they both demonstrate the toughest aspect of female sexuality for the culture at large to grasp, that you can be classy and horny at the same time. Every magazine article about Aguilera breathlessly describes her transformation and attributes it to the love of her new hubby—it’s a good, classic “Taming of the Shrew” story. She herself doesn’t dispute this—it plays right into her single, “Ain’t No Other Man”—and, to be honest, it comes off as at least part of the truth. But she also incorporates her naughty side on her current album, which feels all the more devious because it’s packaged as music heavily influenced by old-school jazz. “I’m gonna give you a little taste/ of the sugar below my waist,” she croons over a smooth Big Band track. And does it get any better than an Andrews Sisters-style song with a lyric like, “He’s a one-stop shop/ makes my cherry pop”?

Fergie also embraces the old virgin-whore dichotomy in her weirdly infectious rapping-singing hybrid thing, “London Bridge,” with a direct—if less artful—approach. “I’m such a lady but I’m dancing like a ho,” she chants before launching into the chorus: “How come every time you come around my London London Bridge wanna go down?” Complain if you must about this making no sense, question what body part and/or article of clothing “London Bridge” could possibly be a euphemism for … but admit it, you know what she means. In fact, you have a picture in your head right now of the man for whom your London Bridge does, in fact, want to go down every time he comes around.

And though I’ll take Justin Timberlake in shackles any day, he’s not bringing sexy back as single-handedly as he’d have you believe. In fact, he should know—he was, after all, in the video for Nelly Furtado’s early-summer hit “Promiscuous,” in which she imagines a presumably recent male acquaintance naked and laments, “You’re making me crazy the way you’re making me wait.” No girls, however, are more impatient than the Pussycat Dolls, an urgency I suppose they earned from all those hours entertaining men as burlesque dancers. They have some serious expectations, as they mention a couple dozen times in “Buttons”: “I’m tellin’ you to loosen up my buttons, baby/ But you keep frontin’/ Sayin’ what you’re gonna do to me/ But I ain’t seen nothin’.”

Look, I know these are no feminist icons—but that’s precisely the point. There’s a “Female Chauvinist Pigs” argument to be made that just because women are now willingly whoring themselves out doesn’t make it magically empowering. But I would not count, for example, Paris Hilton as part of our new Super Sexual Powers brigade. Yes, she has, in a bizarre way that none of us are likely to ever relate to, embraced her sexuality. But she’s been the object since day one. Someone made a sex tape of her and distributed it; I don’t judge her for capitalizing on that, but it’s hardly a manifestation of feminine agency. At the same time, I feel pangs of sympathy for the girl sometimes—it’s astounding the dirty-whore jokes that every single person on the planet feels free to make about her since she appeared in a sex tape that she presumably didn’t know would ever be released. (It’s as if her name is a license for Uncle Milt to work blue at the Thanksgiving table, as long as he chuckles and winks afterwards.) But Paris is more like the stripper who needs money for college or to raise her two kids than she is an icon of female sexuality. Jessica Simpson, on the other hand, thinks she’s doing the same thing as Aguilera when she struts around in short shorts, but here’s the thing: She’s simply acting out, in a very public manner, a very ho-hum 20-something rebellion/discovery of personal sexual power over men. Like Britney Spears before her, she’s not adding a damn thing to the discussion—nothing more than your average Girl Gone Wild.

But can a surgical intern with a healthy sex drive and some hot singers with a few naughty lyrics really add something to the discussion? Well, yes. Because they’re putting our private actions and our previously secret (or certainly kept-among-close-friends) thoughts out into the cultural ether. They’re doing it in a way that can’t be refuted as just one slutty chick’s aberrations. And they’re doing it in a way that they can’t be ignored … because everyone will be talking about it at the watercooler, or you’ll be humming it despite yourself.

Because of all that, I now get to say that despite all my admissions in that first paragraph—and a few more that I’m keeping to myself to protect the innocent and my brevity—you don’t get to call me a whore.

By Jennifer Armstrong - Editor of Sirens Magazine