GOLDEN GODDESSES: 25 LEGENDARY WOMEN OF CLASSIC EROTIC CINEMA, 1968-1985

by Nelson, Jill C.

  Sweet Sweet Freedom is set in a hospital in arrears, whose patients are dying before they can pay their bills. With its National Lampoon style of humor, this film manages to elicit several laughs, in what seems a parody of porn films, which means the trade off is that the sex scenes are more tepid than hot. Slim Pickens and Sweet Freedom band perform during a celebratory orgy at the film’s finale.

  Sweet Punkin’ I love You showcases C. J. Laing as lowly servant Punkin’ Peel aspiring for greener pastures. She marries her wealthy older boss David Creen-Smith (Marlow Ferguson); only the groom has a heart attack on their wedding night. Grief stricken, Punkin’ orchestrates an orgy party with the help of her assistant Dixon Cocks (Jeffrey Hurst). In the film’s closing minutes, Punkin’ expertly administers TLC to the organs of three men (Tony “The Hook” Perez, John Holmes, and Jeffrey Hurst) in a salacious four-way scene. Once again, Slim Pickens and the boys close out the bash.

  We could never raise money ever for anything. Walter would downplay and denigrate the film business and I’d say, “Would you stop that? No one’s ever going to give us money for something they can’t make a dime on.”

  Eric Edwards got incensed because we had a habit of saving money to shoot two or three films at the same time with different scripts, of course, but the location and the actors were there. We’d use those actors in the same location for different films. He refused to continue to screw or whatever when he realized he was reading scenes from different scripts. I guess it was two films, so he felt he should be paid twice. I think that I told him to shut up and do his job. I probably gave him an extra twenty bucks or something!

  In the finest of these cumulative outings, the relatively highbrow comedy Dear Pam, stars Crystal Sync as Pam Slanders (porn’s answer to former columnist Ann Landers), a woman of high morality and virtue who holds the fate of her readers within the grip of her pen. When Slanders breaks confidentiality with Harry Phallus (Eric Edwards) one of her loyal readers because she is appalled by his confessions of promiscuity, Slanders defames his character (and his member) publicly. Joined by two British cohorts Richard Grandik (John Holmes), Barton Fartblow (Tony Perez), and a female supporter (Jennifer Jordan), Slanders is determined to get to the base of Phallus’ “indecent” sexual behavior, but instead, exposes her true colors as a latent nymphomaniac. Slim Pickens band cranks out the tunes once again during the closing frame as an orgy ensues including the entire cast and company.

  We always had very elaborate scripts and I paid a lot of attention to the non-sex scenes. I had no moral compunctions about any of this stuff, but I just found the whole thing disgusting — shooting sex scenes! I probably shot fifty hardcore films and we owned twenty-six of them, but I was always disgusted by the sex scenes so I’d say, “Okay, everybody screw.” That would be it.

  By the mid-late 1970s, we were shooting theatrical releases and Holmes said to me, “What are you, a dialogue freak?” He took the script and threw it. He made up the stuff as he went along, and he was actually very funny. He was amusing. He was kind of personable. Walter and I didn’t know he was on drugs. We were so square and so dull. We didn’t know anything about that. I’ve never had any drugs. I like Jack Daniels.

  New York City Woman (1980) was my idea. It’s a free film. We’d shot Holmes probably in five pictures and we had a fair amount of outtakes, so I took all the outtakes. There are a thousand cuts in that film, which is a lot — and we shot Holmes reading his memoirs in New York City Woman. Anyone But My Husband, Tony Perez had been in which got busted and I took all of the outtakes and put them in New York City Woman.

  With a catchy rock number for the title song, New York City Woman resourcefully incorporated multiple scenes from Sweet, Sweet Freedom and Sweet Punkin’, I Love You, in conjunction with outtakes from Anyone But My Husband to design a new story built around the life of porn star John Holmes playing himself. Holmes decidedly takes a leave of absence from adult movies in search of the one woman who can satisfy his sexual appetite. Most of the newly embedded scenes are shot on a rooftop in New York where Holmes chronicles his sex life on tape in a funny, self-mocking manner, stressing the point that the woman of his dreams must be equipped to deep throat him and more. The film also features C. J. Laing, Tony Perez, and Eric Edwards (from earlier footage).

  Anyone But My Husband is a film I’d made for another distributor and that was really rough. It was made in the late 1970s. I made that, and it was busted all over the country. I was the cameraman. I wasn’t busted on that one, but my friend produced it.

  Anyone But My Husband (1975) starred C. J. Laing as a newlywed Nora Pelman enticed into having an affair after she is neglected by her husband (Robert Kerman, aka R. Bolla). Eric Edwards supplies another fine performance as one of Nora’s dalliances, but the film’s most scintillating and controversial ingredient is the three-way fisting scene that takes place while Nora bathes with pals Tony Perez and Deanna Darby lending a hand. In 1970s porn, fisting scenes were guaranteed to attract attention from law enforcement officials, as was the case when Anyone But My Husband debuted as a theatrical release.

  A Taste of Honey — Do Not Pass Go

  The second bust was with Jack Bravman during the filming of Honeysuckle Rose (1979). Actually, both of the busts were with him. The year was probably around 1979. It was a bad arrest in Point Pleasant, New Jersey, and we were shooting at night in a closed shopping mall in a Beauty Parlor. Serena, Samantha Fox, Eric Edwards, and John Holmes were all on that shoot and we were all arrested. They’d covered the windows and such, but there was a crack in the window and the security guards looked in and said, “Oh, my god, look at John Holmes doing that terrible thing!” The police came in and busted us, and Walter said, “Do you have a warrant?” And no, they didn’t.

  At gunpoint, he said, “We’re not leaving.”

  They said, “Oh yeah?”

  Walter said, “No, we’re not leaving, you have no warrant.” We left and they didn’t have a warrant.

  Honeysuckle Rose (Findlay is billed as Robert W. Brinar) features Serena and John Holmes as a poor young farm couple, Sam and Kate, hoping to hit pay dirt with their race horse Honeysuckle Rose. Rosie eventually comes through with flying colors. In the interim Kate and Sam become disenchanted with one another and seek sexual refuge with other partners outside of their marriage. Samantha Fox, Herschel Savage, Bobby Astyr, and Carter Stevens all portray willing conquests.

  Because Findlay had a habit of shooting scenes for several films concurrently, the scene that was captured in the beauty parlor aforementioned by Roberta in her description of the bust, does not appear in the final production of Honeysuckle Rose. However, the similarly titled Honey Throat (1980) directed approximately the same time by Findlay’s friend John Christopher, is also set in a beauty parlor. Eric Edwards, Arcadia Lake (Edwards’ girlfriend at the time), Samantha Fox, Serena, and John Holmes all round out the cast. Roberta Findlay is listed in the credits as cinematographer.

  We lost quite a lot of footage at the bottom of a well. It’s where Jack hid the film. The lab tried to peel the film off and got a lot of the footage, but a lot of it was lost. I was unloading the film stock at the time from the cameras and putting it into film cans. Holmes said, “Expose the film.” He said, “Take the film out of the camera and expose it so it doesn’t exist.” I couldn’t do it. I’d shot all day and I just couldn’t do it.

  The police conducted the bust all incorrectly. They searched the car and they had no warrant for that at all. They took money from the glove compartment because Jack’s an idiot and left money in the glove compartment. They also busted the camera — they ripped out the film that was in the camera — that was part of the settlement too, because they broke the camera.

  John got out of jail first and was signing autographs for the police. According, not just to Walter, but also to the guys, they kept all the men in one cell and the women in another cell — Holmes was terrified because we were in the county courthouse jail that was filled wit
h murderers and convicts. The women were moved into a closed wing, so we weren’t exposed to anybody else, it was just us. The guys were in with convicts and Holmes was terrified of being raped or killed or whatever, so he hung onto Walter and said, “Protect me! Protect me! I’m scared!” The crew all surrounded him and wouldn’t let anybody near him, but he was a real baby. Anyway, the upshot was that Walter, being the tenacious, stubborn, pseudo lawyer sued the police and won. It was tried in Point Pleasant. The reward was very, very small but we won the case. The judge threw the case out at the arraignment because they had violated six amendments. It was a bad arrest.

  To add an amusing postscript to the story, Roberta admitted that during the arraignment she entered the ladies’ room and very quietly tore up the signed releases into tiny pieces and flushed them down the toilet to destroy any remaining evidence.

  Like many of her fellow adult directors, actors, and producers, Findlay adopted different pseudonyms while working in the illegal business in addition to “Anna Riva,” which she generally used when acting and shooting early on. To further confuse things, “Anna Riva” is also the pen name of the occult writer Dorothy Spencer (1923-2005).

  Over the years, queries and discrepancies have arisen regarding names adopted by Findlay and her colleagues. According to Roberta, “Harold Hindgrind” was actually Walter Sear. J. Angel Martine was Jack Bravman, while “John Christopher” was the pseudonym used by an associate director Roberta often worked with. Christopher was well liked. He was also one of the very first people in the adult industry to have contracted HIV, and died in the early 1980s from the disease. Most commonly, if she wasn’t billed as herself, Findlay was credited as “Robert Norman” when directing, and sometimes editing pictures such as Anyone but My Husband.

  Seen and Not Heard

  “Women who seek to be equal with men lack ambition.”

  — TIMOTHY LEARY

  Despite Roberta Findlay’s small stature and physique, her ability behind the camera won her respect and deference by the all male crews. With a cagey glint in her eye, Findlay is clearly the exception to the rule, and makes no bones about the fact she isn’t a fan of “hiring women to do a man’s job.”

  I made it a rule, an absolute rule for all of the films that no women were allowed on the crew except for make-up. The technical crew: cameraman, gaffer, grip, and sound — I never hired a woman. There are a couple of reasons for that. I don’t like women; that’s one reason. I can’t stand women and children. Women are annoying and get in the way and they talk too much. Those days were long before digital, video, and small cameras and so forth. Women were not physically and are not physically capable of doing the technical work that’s required.

  I remember one day the grip had to do something else, I don’t recall what it was, but he sent in a woman to replace him. We’re dealing now with feeder cable which is very, very heavy. It goes from the box to the lamps and it is two inches in diameter. It’s a rubber cable and it’s very heavy to carry that stuff. Walter, my partner said, “Oh no, she mustn’t do that, it’s too heavy.” Then he ran and he was filling in for her. She really couldn’t carry this stuff. I said, “Well, that’s crazy. Women can’t do this physically.”

  During the early 1980s, I worked on a film that had nothing to do with sex pictures. I was hired to be the cameraman on the film [The Waiting Room] that was never released. It was made by the granddaughter of Jack Warner. She was a very rich girl and she hired me as the cameraman. It was an all woman crew. That was her idea. She wanted to show the world that a group of women could technically and physically make a film. I think we shot for a month, but after a while I said, “Karen, this is crazy. The women can’t move a dolly from the floor onto the stage. They physically can’t pick it up. Let me hire some of my guys.” She had to relent. I thought it was a nutty idea but she paid very well. It was a psychological drama or a study, but I don’t think she made another movie. She hired me as a cameraman based on a sex picture that she’d watched.

  A sex picture we made that’s rather interesting is Mystique (1980) with Georgina Spelvin and Samantha Fox. I got carried away with a poem by Paul Valéry. That’ll show you. It had a score by Gustav Mahler and it’s very arty. It’s ridiculous, but it’s interesting in my opinion. This was sort of an arty sex picture and it played at the Pussycat Theatre, which was a chain in California. It was the biggest sale that you could make. The man who booked the films said, “What is this, the fucking opera?”

  I said, “No, no. There’s no resemblance there to operatic form.” That’s what he thought, that it was orchestral symphonic music. It wasn’t much of a sex picture, but it was arty.

  The Tiffany Minx (1981), an excellent crime thriller, is another one of Findlay’s most inventive sex films released toward the end of the golden era. With a clever assortment of plot twists and exceptional performances throughout, this little gem is undoubtedly a career high for Findlay in the adult genre. A wealthy heiress, Jessica Grover (Crystal Sync) is a pawn in a game of cat and mouse when she kills a home invader (Carter Stevens) with a pair of scissors in self-defense after he rapes her. Feigning concern for her safety and mental welfare after the incident, Jessica’s adulterous husband Paul (Jeffrey Hurst) insists they rent a house at the beach so she can put the ugly incident out of her mind. Jessica notices Paul has grown close to Anne (Marlene Willoughby), allegedly helping him to close a shady business deal and finds herself distracted from her concerns when she becomes friendly with a couple Pinky (Jennifer Jordan), and her gigolo boyfriend Matt (R.Bolla). While marooned at the beach house, Jessica senses her money-grabbing husband is devising ways to drive her over the edge when bloody pairs of scissors randomly appear at various locations. At the expense of hurting Pinky’s feelings, Jessica retreats in her budding relationship with Matt, while Matt has his own designs on Jessica’s fortune.

  Without giving away the revelatory conclusion, The Tiffany Minx accomplishes in every category where other erotic films edge close, but don’t make the mark. Stalwart acting, impeccable timing, tantalizing sex, an excellent soundtrack and cinematography, in conjunction with a top-notch screenplay, qualifies this picture a purebred of X-rated features. Candida Royalle also makes an appearance, as does Samantha Fox in the opening scene adding her indelible personal touch. The marvelous Robert Kerman (R. Bolla) is typically golden in the sex mystery.

  Samantha Fox stands out in my mind when I think back to our films. I kind of liked her; she was sort of strange. I haven’t seen these people in twenty or thirty years. She was an inveterate liar, I think. She’d make stuff up just for fun, but I found her to be interesting. She was prettier than most of the New York crowd, anyway. Bobby Astyr was her boyfriend actually, and he was a nice fellow.

  In Findlay’s personal experience, there are distinctive aptitudes between the American east and west coasts caliber of actor. The performers Roberta hired from the east coast were more serious in their approach to the material. In her recollection, they didn’t often require enhancements (one might say courage) in the way of alcohol or drugs in order to copulate before the camera. Findlay recalled that the talent brought in from the west coast liked to imbibe in drugs particularly, and engaged in an overall lighter party atmosphere on set.

  We imported Amber Lynn from California. She was a trip; she was very funny. Paul Thomas we imported from L.A., and then there was “The Germ,” Jamie Gillis from New York. He considered himself a — I don’t know what it meant, a Columbia University Professor. He actually fancied himself a professor, but I honestly don’t know what that meant. He tried to affect a kind of professorial accent and he carried a pipe, and was generally weird. I would say he was just in style, and what I intimated about him was that he was the most insecure of them all. Why I thought that, I don’t know, but here he was a nice Jewish boy…

  In keeping with her unwillingness to hire women to fulfill roles other than in the acting and make-up departments, Findlay was open to bringing in reputable male count
erparts to assist on her sets when she faced the occasional conundrum about supervising sex scenes.

  I had the bright idea, I said, “Walter, we’re just no good at directing sex scenes. We’re just no good at it.” He didn’t object so I hired Ron Sullivan. I think I gave him his pseudonym “Henri Pachard”. I thought on Mascara (1984) we’d get really well directed sex scenes. I’d known Ron Sullivan for years. He was good directing sex scenes. He was enthusiastic and knew what to do, but he was kind of a dope and he had no concept of how to put a film together. He was a director and I hired him, but I’d say, “Ron, what’s your next camera position?” The camera was a blimp camera and needed to sit on a head on a dolly, and it was pointing at the power supply which is a big piece of electronic equipment sitting there. He said something like, “Now it’s perfect.”

  I said, “Ron, the camera is just sitting there out of the way.” I said, “Look, it’s pointing into a piece of equipment.”

  He said, “No, it’s perfect. It’s perfect.” After that, I didn’t even ask him. I just moved to the next scene and operated the camera myself. I was a great stickler for hierarchy. We hired him to direct and even though he was an employee, we had to listen to his direction. Walter said, “No, we’re going to lose our money if this clown keeps on going.” As long as the cameraman took care of the set-ups then he was fine.