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

by Nelson, Jill C.

  She said, “If you want to stay there, you’ll stay there and you’ll figure it out one way or another.”

  I thought, “Oh, okay.” I left the next week.

  Changing on a Dime

  When Jane arrived in England without an employment visa, she didn’t allow the incidental issue to prevent her from pursuing fame and fortune. Hamilton took her place in line at a club audition for a dancer and waited on pins and needles until it was her turn to show what she was made of.

  I went over there with a student work permit that I was able to get so when anybody asked me if I had a work permit I would say, “Yes,” but it wasn’t legal any of the time that I worked over there. I was never asked to produce it. I was dancing over there and modeling, and it was wonderful to model because I’d grown up here where I wasn’t tall enough to model. If I’d have been taller, I would have stayed in Vegas and been a dancer and that would have been that.

  I went to The Wendy Ward Charm School — there’s a mentor for you. Maureen — she was a gal who was a model and was into fashion and I always wanted to be an actress or a dancer. Again, I knew I always would be something. Maureen was responsible for pushing me into that whole modeling dream. I learned how to do runway modeling. I could do the turns and do the moves and all of those kinds of things. I was only 5’6” so there was no chance of modeling in the States. In England, you can be short and be a model. I danced at the Cockney Club and at The Stork Club. It is mostly for tourists and they’ve got all of the English songs and so on. I had gone to a regular dance audition. It was pretty clique-y and everybody knew each other. I was the Yank that was just sitting there and they said, “Where are we going to get a topless dancer?” My little ears perked up and I thought, “Well, I’m from Las Vegas. We’re known for some racy stuff. I guess I could do that.” While I was in England, I went out with a guy whose father was sort of an equivalent to Dean Martin except that he appealed to the old dears. His name was Max Bygraves and he was quite famous at the time. I went out with his son, Anthony [Tony].

  Max Bygraves, the likeable all round British entertainer appeared on several of his own television programs starting in the late 1940s showcasing his diverse range of talents.

  I think it was very difficult for Tony to follow in his father’s footsteps. He had worked with a very talented musician. I know they did some jingles and some television. He performed for a while, but I don’t know exactly what happened. I kept in touch with him for a few years and then I think he got married and they had three or four kids. Their family was wealthy. That was fun.

  I also mismanaged a rock group over there. I got them a lot of gigs, but we never got any kind of a recording contract. We travelled all over performing, but it was very strange because they were kind of into more progressive rock and traditional rock and that was right when punk was really breaking. I tried to steer them in that direction, but they had their own ideas about music and the course they wanted to take so it was kind of tough. I lived in London for about a year and a half, and then I moved up to Birmingham because that’s where this rock group was from.

  Hamilton fell in love with Britain’s culture and practices. As one who is versatile and able to customize her skills depending upon what the situation demanded, Jane began a temporary assignment working as a server for attendees of a newly constructed centre. After a short duration of employment, an unexpected meeting with fate caused Hamilton to put her life temporarily on hold.

  They had just built the National Exhibition Centre over there. It was in the West Midlands right in the middle of the country and a lot of conventions were held there. I worked as one of the dolly birds on the convention floor, inviting people to come to the stands. I remember I toasted crumpets for a month at Wimbledon. I think that was for gas fireplaces or something like that. I did all sorts of crazy stuff. I worked for a car lease company at one of the auto shows when leasing cars was a new idea. I worked at many different jobs and I was always in the newspaper for one thing or another, a fashion show or for something else. That leads us to the accident.

  I was working at the National Exhibition Centre and I was on one of the stands. I was serving drinks: alcoholic, and coffee and tea. They had an old style coffee maker and the water would percolate up into a funnel that was on top that held the grounds. When all of the water had percolated up into this top-heavy piece of equipment, the machine was supposed to shut off and then it would just drain back down through. The mechanism on the machine was broken and it didn’t shut off so I would have to take the pot with the grounds and set it down [off the burner]. I was bending down to pick up a cup and a saucer and on my way up, I hit the side of the counter and the coffee poured out. It got me from my shoulder all the way down my side. I didn’t know anything about how to treat hot burns at the time, but what they did was the worst thing that could have happened. If you have clothes on, you get them off because clothes keep the heat in close to the skin. You need to strip the person off and you need to throw ice over them. You need to stop the burn from heating your skin. Years later, because I had actually told this to a gentleman that I was working with, he was able to save his girlfriend who had a pot of coffee pour out on her at craft services. He immediately tipped one of the ice coolers onto her. It saved her and I felt good that I had helped to prevent a severe burn.

  Anyway, nobody knew what to do. They kept me in my clothes and I stayed in those clothes burning and soaking until I got to the hospital. By that time, they were third degree burns. My right hip was taken out and my right shoulder. For the longest time, you could see the imprint of my bra on my back, etched right in. I had skin grafts and everything like that. I spent about a month and a half to two months in the hospital. They use a dry method with their burns over there. We use a wet method that is more susceptible to infection. The dry is less susceptible to infection but it’s horrible because you have a tendency to grow into your bandages. When they remove them, it tears everything off and then you have to start again.

  It is possible Jane initially experienced what can be classified as a “deep partial thickness” burn that extends deep into the skin and can progress to a third degree burn category especially if it is not treated properly at the occurrence of the accident. As Hamilton mentioned, early cooling of a minor or serious burn is imperative, as it will help to counteract pain and extent of skin damage. A “spill scald” is one of the most common types of burns. If it progresses to a third degree burn, the patient will generally require skin grafting and hospital stay in order to monitor the healing process and ensure that infection does not result. Fortunately, Jane did not have a history of physical or psychological problems which can greatly hinder a burn patient’s prognosis for recovery.

  Here I am, a model, a dancer, an actress — after my boyfriend [at the time of the accident] and I got home and I got into bed with him the first thing he did was turn out the lights. I just cried. I really thought that was it, that I’d never be able to be sexy to anyone again. I kind of felt finished, you know. It wasn’t true. I dissolved my relationship with him and got with somebody else who was very kind and very loving, and got back on my feet. Then I moved home.

  Introducing “Veronica Hart”

  Jane returned to the comforts of home and the theatre which helped to resurrect her self-confidence and esteem. While on stage in Las Vegas, Hamilton enthralled audiences by appearing in several theatrical productions adapted from and/or inspired by books and films and won raves for her incarnation of inspiring characters. Jane’s exceptional stage performances and eventual movie auditions caught the eye of a casting director which inevitably provided the framework for what lay ahead as an actor in adult oriented features.

  I had a real good run back home. I played Susie in Wait until Dark at the Judy Bailey Theatre [in Las Vegas], and I played Lulu in Pinter’s [The] Birthday Party. In a community theatre, I played Frances Black in Light up the Sky. I did all that and then they were making a movie called Going in Style (1979). I
t was with Art Carney, Lee Strasberg [and George Burns]. That was the one where three old guys knock off a bank in New York City and have a vacation in Las Vegas. I went out on an ad for casting and met the casting director here in Las Vegas and he said, “You know, you really should move to New York.” I also had a guy contact me because of an article/review that had appeared in the newspaper and he said he was starting into the music business. Because I’d been in England and been involved in the music business there, he called me up and said he would be interested in starting up a studio with me in New York. The casting director suggested that I move to New York, and the other guy who wanted me to partner with him in the music business wanted me to move to New York. I was twenty-two years old at that time.

  I moved to New York and the gentleman that I moved with was an agent. It was quite eye opening. He was a relatively callous, New York Jewish gentleman. I’d never really been around that kind of personality before. We were up at his friend’s resort and I think his friend had just had a heart attack or something. He’d just gotten this big resort up and running and I said I didn’t think anything was worth having a heart attack over. I had just been in the hospital for a couple of months and it was all fresh in my mind. He didn’t appreciate that comment so that was pretty much the beginning of the end. I knew I had to move out. I looked in The Village Voice and I found a couple of places to go. One of the places I went was to a gentleman called Roy Stewart. It was a loft and I moved in with him. He had seen my acting pictures and my modeling resume and he knew that I enjoyed sex because we had some casual sex.

  He said, “You should be in the [adult] business.” I couldn’t imagine that. When I’d gone to Australia, I’d seen some loops at Kings Cross, in Sydney. I think that was the first time that I’d ever seen anything like that. I had been a topless dancer of course and I’d seen Les Folies Bergere and all of the shows on the strip — they all had the topless acts and I was a bit of a nudist myself. Anyway, this girl came out and she did a strip, and then they showed the porn. I thought it was fun but there was no acting in it. It wasn’t something where I said, “Oh boy, I can’t wait to do that.” I considered myself an actress. Roy said, “You’d be a really good actress,” and I said, “Well, I am a really good actress, but I’m not going to do that. I’m not a prostitute.”

  Hamilton’s impressions while watching a sex film for the first time weren’t necessarily compelling, but with a good script and smart dialogue, she recognized the work was something she could possibly warm up to while putting her training and experiences as an actor toward something potentially redeeming.

  He took me to the [Show] World Theatre. I think it was at 54th street in New York at that time, and I couldn’t believe it because it was a real movie. There was sex in it, but there was acting, and dialogue, and costumes. I haven’t a clue what film it was, but it was enough to go, “Oh my god. This is a real movie. Okay, I could do this. This is something that I would like to do.” I always liked sex and I liked to act, and by that time, all of my friends at college were doing anything except making money at acting, so there was a chance for me to do that.

  I went around and met everybody, but nobody was shooting anything. I met Chuck Vincent and Shaun Costello. I did Pandora’s Mirror (1981) with him and a couple of other movies. I met a couple of filmmakers but nobody was doing anything. I found another boyfriend at that time, Billy McKeever, and he was a struggling musician. I was still staying at Roy’s place paying him rent and I was working at Psychology Today — that was slave labor. I was making no money and working hard and they would try to get you to work overtime or stay late. People ask me if I’ve ever been taken advantage of and I say, “Well, yeah, I worked for Psychology Today!” It was just a job to pay the rent.

  I was trying to get money together to go with Billy back to Vegas so that I could see my folks for the holidays at Christmas, and Roy said, “Why don’t we do some live sex shows?”

  I said, “Oh-Kay…” Roy’s thing was he wanted to put you in front of the camera, but he’d always fail miserably. He was a great lover, but when he went to do it in front of other people, he would always fail. That was very difficult in a week of live sex shows because he couldn’t perform. I literally blew my brains out during that week. What it did reveal to me was that those shows weren’t so bad. I did get paid. I got enough money to get Billy and me back to Las Vegas and decided that I had a new career when I got back. I would be doing the shows with Billy, and not Roy. Roy was my landlord and Billy was my boyfriend. I would be making love with him anyway and it was very exciting for the first day.

  We got there and it was so exciting. I think we made love in the dressing room and then we went out and did our first show. That was great, and then I think we went back and fooled around some more. When it came time for the second show — nothing happened. Billy’s dick was just dead so we learned to pace ourselves — he could only ejaculate maybe one or two shows out of the day and then we’d pretend the rest of it. Billy was a musician — I’m the one who got him into it.

  As Jane and Billy began to cultivate their act at the infamous Show World in New York City, Hamilton learned that everybody has a breaking point — especially when performing live sex.

  Billy and I were doing the shows and then the movies started picking up. I started doing the movies and it had gotten to the point where basically, [Billy and I] would do anything but make love as a couple. If your job is making love six days a week, six shows a day — it got to a point where I had conjunctivitis so I had to wear sunglasses, and I was on my period, and I had a cold or something. It just dawned on me that I couldn’t do it anymore. I always liked to make love, I always loved sex, and I realized that I had to stop this. It was very tough because it had been a way for my boyfriend and me to make a living. Essentially, I was telling my boyfriend that I was taking away his living. I could go and I could strip, and not have to make love and make the same amount of money. He had to get another girl to perform with him. It was easier for girls to get guys to perform with them than it was for guys to get girls to perform with them. It just wasn’t good for me anymore. I’ve always had good enough sense. I will try anything, but once I realize it’s not good for me, I do stop. It may take a while to bring it about, but I do.

  Somewhat relieved, Jane immersed herself in the transference from live sex shows to regular film work. In little time, her efforts paid dividends not only in the way of income, but more importantly, with critical praise. Her competence as a performer resulted in a touchstone of new heights.

  I got into the films and the films were great, and I would always work around my scars. I still don’t wear sleeveless outfits much. My garter belt helped cover up because I often wore garter belt and stockings. I worked in San Francisco or New York. They’d fly me out to San Francisco and I worked on the west coast, and we worked in New York. This is the late seventies, early eighties. When you went outside of New York, you shot with a script that had no reference to the sex. You’d tell everybody that you were making a low budget feature. I didn’t do loops because that wasn’t acting, and I didn’t do tons of layouts or anything like that — I really considered myself an actress. I was twenty-two years old so 1978 to the tail end of `78 and the beginning of `79 is when I started in films. Then it would take them until 1980 before the film was released.

  A Scent of Heather

  Jane’s first official film credit is in a movie titled Woman in Love: A Story of Madame Bovary (1978) in which she played a model and performed with Ron Jeremy along with supporting stars Laurien Dominique, Samantha Fox, and Vanessa del Rio. Confessions of Seka and Urban Cowgirls, both released in 1980, contained scenes where Jane is paired with one of the most likable male veterans in the business, Eric Edwards. Hamilton appeared with Edwards at least five times during her career as an actor.

  Eric Edwards was my first one going in and my last one going out. He’s a nice man and a great guy. There was [also] another guy who had never done it before an
d as far as a turn-on goes, that was more of a turn-on than the guys who had worked with everybody and their brother. To take somebody who had never made an adult film before and to get them to relax and start thinking about everybody not watching them and trying to get them to pay attention to you — it was great to pop somebody’s cinematic cherry.

  After exhibiting some fancy footwork in her first few appearances, by 1980, adult directors commenced to hire Jane for principal roles where she proved she could adeptly carry a story. Hamilton learned to be careful about angles — and keeping her feet clean.

  A Scent of Heather (1980) is the first film that I’d starred in, but I made a lot of other ones before that. I can’t remember which [sex scene] was first, but in A Scent of Heather I thought, “Oh my god, they can’t shoot my nose that angle because I look like a pig.” I’ve since had it fixed. I had the strangest nose, and if it was caught the wrong I did look like Miss Piggy. I think in one film there was a beautiful scene and I put my feet up and my feet were dirty, so I thought, “My god, I’ll always have to watch that.” When I’d see a blemish, I’d think, “Why didn’t anybody say anything?” That, more than anything, had a lot to with my directing. I will stop a scene and I will get make-up touched up on a beautiful woman who is having a little problem which pisses a lot of people off. I will make sure that feet are clean. Those little things are important to me.

  A Scent of Heather is an enchanting period piece examining the topic of incest. Newlyweds Heather (as Veronica Heart) and Frederick (Paul Thomas) discover they are half-brother and sister just prior to consummating their wedding vows. Virginal Heather is willing to keep their dirty little secret private in order to enjoy sex with her new groom in their boudoir, but Frederick wants to do the right thing. His method of coping with the surprising information is to emotionally detach from his new bride. Frederick proceeds to screw the female help (Vanessa del Rio and Tracey Adams) at the manor while in the midst of fantasizing he is bedding his half-sister/wife, while poor Heather remains chaste. Feelings of guilt soon consume Frederick as only he is partaking of the sins of the flesh. He arranges for Tom the chauffeur (R. Bolla as Robert Kerman) to seduce his unsuspecting spouse in an abandoned barn. The sexual episode that envelops the pair becomes a critical turning point—Heather can’t seem to get enough erogenous stimulation. Soon, she skips the pretense with available mates in her radar and encourages them to assuage the heat between her loins. The epilogue takes on a bit of a twist once Heather and Frederick uncover the truth — they come to understand their family heritage is even more confounding than they had initially thought, but get the green light to finally seal the deal.