Porn Parodies Once Were King, But Now the Genre Is a Tough Sell

LAS VEGAS — The arrival last month of Wicked Pictures’ latest porn lampoon, “Captain Marvel XXX: An Axel Braun Parody,” was eagerly anticipated by fans of Braun’s work. But those same fans, who seek out satire with their flesh, are seeing less and less of the adult film genre.

Simply put: The parody market, riding a viable wave for almost a decade, isn’t what it used to be.

Two of the top parody directors in the biz — Will Ryder and Braun — are finding the genre a tough sell, particularly because production money isn’t raining down on such titles and because so many of the takeoffs that mock some of Hollywood’s most iconic titles have already been done.

“The parody genre will always have sentimental appeal because of the familiarity factor, but nobody is buying anymore,” Ryder told YNOT. “People were nostalgic   about the TV shows of their youth, so it created quite a sensation for about a 10-year period to mix that with sex.

“Sadly, the porn audience, while bigger than ever today, is getting their content mostly for free so there is no longer an economic engine that provides a surefire return on investment to create new parodies,” said Ryder, who produced his first parody — “Not the Bradys XXX” — in 2008. “Plus, the audience has pretty much seen everything they wish to see get spoofed and the people who are interested in seeing porn mixed with their favorite shows is finite.

“Those who were or are still willing to purchase a parody DVD or a VOD have pretty much done so, and we are now off to whatever comes next, which today is camming.”

For Braun, the “Captain Marvel XXX” release will be his 60th porn parody production. The venerable blue-movie director admitted that he’s the last man standing in the genre because he gets “decent” budgets.

“All my parody budgets are higher than a typical adult movie,” Braun told YNOT. With ‘Captain Marvel XXX,’ I wanted to do something special and went crazy with the costumes. That brought up the budget quite a bit, but it was so worth it!

“Kenzie Taylor was magnificent in the lead, and it is quite possibly the funniest movie I’ve ever made,” Braun said. “And while I appreciate that in the era of free porn my movies still make money despite costing so much, my main focus is never profitability. I always just try to create some epic awesomeness.”

Braun said the decline in porn-parody output industry-wide means that he’s able to get more attentive eyeballs.

“There has definitely been a decrease in the genre output over the last few years, which is awesome, because at some point it was a race to see who would make something first,” Braun said. “I still have PTSD from Will getting to do ‘Animal House’ before me.”

Ryder noted that he’s able to look back now at the heights of the genre with a big, glowing smile.

“It was a very expensive affair, but the money was flowing during the height of the parody explosion, so we never hesitated to spend,” Ryder said. “Later, when just about every company jumped on the porn-parody bandwagon, many skimped on the budgets and the quality was all over the place which helped to fracture the confidence of the buyer.

“Nobody knew what was good or bad so it was a crap shoot to purchase a DVD but any genre that taps into Hollywood iconic shows can only last so long. We all had a fantastic run, but times change, tastes change, the business changes, and we all sit back and say, ‘holy fuck, what happened.

“It was so much more fun when the cash was flowing in, and we were excited to create a quality product and kick the ass of the big companies,” Ryder said. “It was a wild challenge every single day, but we definitely succeeded for quite a while, but we are all on to the next chapter. In business you have to know when to hold ’em and when to fold ’em.”

“But, man, that was fun,” said Ryder, who called the genre, for the most part, a “historic relic.”

“It’s almost like driving by an old abandoned amusement park,” Ryder said. “You still see the roller coaster, but the paint has chipped off, the rails are rusty, and it’s missing some wooden support beams but it’s still there. The memory of those happy times with people happily screaming still exist but nobody is lining up to get on board.”

Ryder said the parody market “has collapsed faster than a house of cards mostly due to the proliferation of free porn and is virtually extinct like the dinosaurs.”

“Look at Adam & Eve’s website and you will only be able to purchase 16 porn parody movies today,” Ryder said. “That is correct. Sixteen available DVDs for purchase out of the 2,500 that were shot is not a good selection and that tells you pretty much the sad state of today but hey nothing stays the same.

“When we were in the heyday of shooting porn parody that we called ‘sitcums,’ we spent a lot of money and usually shot two volumes of each show at the same time during an 8-to-10-day shoot schedule,” Ryder said. “It cost just as much if not more to shoot a quality parody as it did to shoot a quality original scripted movie.

“The actors and agents charge the same, the lighting and sound crew required their same fees, the camera costs, permits, locations and insurance remain in the same ballpark but the set design was often more expensive for a parody because we usually built the sets from scratch and you often have to recreate the style of costumes worn by the original TV and movie actors and that all costs additional money.”

Ryder said that Braun and Wicked Pictures remain on the parody scene to some extent because of the detail and humor that Braun brings to his superhero parodies.

Braun agreed with Ryder, saying that his parodies are always laughing with the original, not at it.

“I only direct parodies of source material that I have a strong emotional connection to, whether it’s a TV show I watched as a kid, a fairy tale, a classic movie, or one of my beloved comic book characters,” Braun said. “There is definitely a strong fanboy component in what I do. As far as sticking to an original story, that really depends on the project.

“No matter if it’s a drama or a comedy, my titles are never goofy pornified versions of the mainstream ones, and I also almost never use profanity unless it’s already an integral part of the original. I think all these elements, along with the passion and dedication that my crew and I put into these projects, are what really resonates with the fans.

“Also, my movies have tits and asses, so there’s that,” said Braun, whose “Captain Marvel XXX” release includes a cast comprising Ana Foxxx, Aubrey Kate, Kenzie Taylor, Quinton James, Ramon Nomar, Tyler Knight and Alex Legend, along with Lacy Lennon, who sings the title’s theme song.

Ryder said that the future of shooting porn is now for the most part in the hands of the talent who create their own scenes and participate in content trade.

“The financial reward for bigger producers is gone so the female talent now is the new queen of adult cinema from a production standpoint. They are literally captain of their own ship,” Ryder said.

“Nothing ever stays the same, and while there are still a few production companies doing great work like Brad Armstrong, Greg Lansky, Bree and Craven and Axel Braun. They really have to innovate, hustle and create to be able to remain economically viable,” Ryder said.

“Ironically, we do have perhaps our best originally scripted movie coming out at the end of September from Adam & Eve called, ‘Love Emergency.’ It is not a parody [but] it’s all original and very funny and stars Tommy Pistol and Riley Steele.”