Once again, Twitter has provided a question for Dr. Lags, Sexpert, to answer. I’ve done the best I can, but I’m sure the guy can use advice from those who know more than lil’ ol’ me in the comments section!
Dear Dr. Lags: Any advice on how to start in the industry as a male performer
Dear Would-Be-Porn-Star:
As far as specific people to contact or places to go, I’ll admit I’m not much help. I’m more of a commentator on porn and porn culture than an actual take-part-in-it type. But I can tell you that porn people are, in general, far more approachable than you might think. Attend any event where porn performers, producers, and general industry types are congregated, and you’ll probably have much less trouble slipping a business card into their hands than you’d imagined. Of course, whether they’ll choose to get back to you is a matter of their whims, and your presentation.
And that’s the rub. Depending on who you approach and what level of the business you’re looking to get into (for instance, are you looking to take part in the occasional gang-bang, or do you want to be working every day with the likes of jessica drake and Teagan Presley, or are you interested in doing more indie, artistic work less frequently?), what the people involved will be looking for in male talent will vary. But the truth of the matter is, finding good male porn performers is not easy, and that’s why there are so few of them at the top of the business. Truth be told, being a male porn performer is, according to all my sources, incredibly difficult. Most men, no matter how virile or well-hung they are, simply cannot get it up or keep it up in front of a camera.
As Nina Hartley pointed out in one of her outstanding Sexwise.tv episodes, there are very, very, very few men in this world who can withstand the rigors of being a male porn star. Nina’s advice: get together ten or fifteen of your closest male friends and ask them to stand in a circle around you while you get naked, get yourself hard, and jerk off to completion while all of them stand around and watch, point, and laugh. If you can do this and enjoy it, you might be a great male performer. She’s got a point: at any time when you’re watching porn and it looks like there’s just this guy in a room with a girl or several girls, there are in fact at least three other people on the other side of a camera and a set of hot lights, watching, critiquing, directing, and so on. It’s not just a matter of having sex; it’s a matter of having sex in front of an often-large group of seasoned professionals, a wall of cameras, and lights so bright you can hardly look at them. If you can do these things in front of your friends, you’re on the right path to being able to do it in front of a room of near-strangers, with a stranger.
Or, as Evan Stone put it in a speech last year at the AEE Expo in Vegas, “If you don’t mind someone, probably a guy, telling you when to get hard, how long to stay hard, which way to fuck, who to fuck, and when to cum on command; if you’re ok with your genitals touching the genitals of another man; if you’re ok with very likely getting another man’s bodily fluids on you… then you could be a male porn star.”
Add to these considerations the fact that in order to even think about getting into the biz, you need an acceptable musculature, a large schlong, and an almost-unnatural ability to stay hard for-frickin-ever. Of course, there are often fluffers, and Viagra isn’t exactly absent from the set of most porn movies. But, still, there’s a whole hell of a lot of work a man’s got to do on his own to discipline his body to be able to not only last as long as necessary, but to be able to again and again if necessary, and only cum when requested. Mr. Marcus has written extensively about how he’s disciplined himself for years to get the level of professional penis-mastery you can see in any one of his thousands of videos. It ain’t easy.
All that being said, if you’re convinced you’ve got what it takes, then by jove, hop into the fray! The porn biz is always hoping for a new woodsman, and if you can make the grade, you deserve the job. Most men in the biz have wildly varying stories about how they got into the business, so there’s no tried-and-true way to go about getting that rare talent audition, but because most porn studios don’t have contract positions available for male talent like they often do for females, you’re kind of on your own about how to approach it.
My most pertinent advice would be to practice your craft at home, and take photos and videos to get used to the idea of being watched. A body of amateur work that you can show any prospective employers as a portfolio could be incredibly helpful: maybe your own channel on YouPorn showcasing your prowess with the boys or girls, and a healthy dose of self-abuse to show off the size and shape of your apparatus, could be a great way to get into the biz before trying to make money at it. A private website with photos of your rock-hard abs and other parts could be a great way to show off what you’ve got before actually getting an appointment with a prospective studio. If you’ve done any professional modeling, your portfolio would help enormously. A ModelMayhem or other similar networking site can be very useful for this. A pre-existing Twitter where you tout your abilities and projects to the world, a MySpace or Facebook account, and anything else you can develop on your own to show that you’re serious about your career as a male performer or model is also a plus. Just like in every other business these days, self-promotion and legwork is 90% of the battle. Nobody wants to work with someone who’s brand new, so it’s your job to make it look like you have tons of experience.
Because there’s a less-strict contract hierarchy for male talent, there’s also a less-strict set of rules about where to look for work. In some cases, you can approach female talent, who can either vet you themselves or direct you to someone who does it professionally. In others, you can probably contact studio heads, directors, and producers directly. But the most important thing is to have something besides just your cock to show them when you make contact: a business card that denotes professionalism and can direct them to your website or portfolio is brilliant for face-to-face contacts at conventions, signings, and cold visits to studio headquarters. E-mail being the easier and more standard way to go about communications these days, a professionally-written email (nobody, no matter what business they’re in, wants to do business with some guy who can’t spell, use punctuation, or who communicates mainly through emoticons), filled with links to your sites, can be a godsend.
Of course, there’s also the world of straight-to-the-point auditions and casting calls, which happen relatively frequently in the adult world. There are tons of ways to keep up on when auditions are happening and where, and depending on what type of work specifically you’re looking to get into, you can pick what works for you. If you have a specific company or niche you’d like to audition for, your best bet is to frequent the websites of those companies–when they have auditions coming up, they’re not shy about broadcasting it. Keeping up with industry sites like AVN.com, WHACK! Magazine, LukeIsBack.com, XBiz, AINews, and others often run press releases for casting calls, if you’re casting a somewhat broader net. And of course there are companies that cater directly to managing and agenting for adult stars: AdultCastingCall.com, AdultCastingCalls.com (with an “s,” see?), and AdultFreelance.com are good places to start.
All in all, my friend, good luck to you! It’s not an easy business to get into as a dude, but it’s a great gig if you can make the cut!
Yours,
Dr. Lags, Sexpert