Screen Shots: Three Mainstream Views on Adult

Above, a still from Mope; photo by Bryan Koss/MopeTheMovie.com Portrayals of the adult industry in film and TV are rare—and usually fictionalized tales written by people who don't work in the adult entertainment industry. But in 2019, a big-budget Hollywood movie, a premium cable series and an indie film have told stories based on real events in the industry. The movie Hustlers was inspired by strippers at Scores in NYC who drugged their Wall Street clients and charged up their credit cards. The indie film Mope follows the headlines involving two young guys literally dying to be porn stars. And HBO's series The Deuce chronicles two decades of the sex trade in New York's Times Square. You won't be able to stop watching.  Hustling Wall Street Hustlers is based on a New York magazine article by Jessica Pressler about strippers at New York City’s Scores who drugged and illegally charged up their Wall Street customers’ credit cards from $10,000 to $50,000 a night. The story begins in 2007 and stars Constance Wu and Jennifer Lopez, whose J-Lo ass looks asstastic, btw. Written and directed by Lorene Scafaria, the story is told from the female dancer’s perspective, which portrays the Wall Street hedge funders, traders and brokers as “mostly assholes.” It’s easy to sympathize with these women, who endure the job to support their grandmothers and kids, and are abused every night by douchey married guys who ask them stupid shit like, “So what did Daddy do to you? Tell me.” Since the film was written and directed by a woman, female friendship is at its heart. The dancers are heroes, and the Wall Street jerks are the villains.The movie appeals to a female viewer because it chronicles an unfair power dynamic, starting with the exploitation of the strip club owners and managers, who siphon off half the strippers’ take, and the repeated dominance and disrespect by jerky customers. Everything changes when Wall Street crashes in October of 2007. Wall Streeters lose their jobs and stop coming to the club. That’s when the “Hustlers” get desperate and devise a credit card fraud scheme. The strippers are still portrayed sympathetically, despite the fact that they are committing crimes and doing terrible things like putting 60 percent MDMA (“to make them happy”) and 40 percent ketamine (“so they won’t remember anything”) into men’s drinks before fleecing them via their American Express cards. Singer Cardi B makes a cameo, and recently admitted that she partook in the same scheme when she was a stripper. In the post Me Too era, you find yourself not wanting the strippers to get caught, since they are finally getting power over their oppressors. Spoiler alert: There’s a happy ending. The strippers don’t end up in jail for life, and the two main ringleaders get probation instead of jail time. The film has grossed more than $100 million. Above, David Arquette plays an adult director in Mope. Moping Around Indie film Mope, which made its debut at the 2019 Sundance Film Festival, is based on a dramatic yet true story about two aspiring porn stars who dream of making it big in the adult world. “Mopes” are straight male performers who have just entered the porn biz and are at the bottom rung of the talent ladder. Set in the late 2000s, the story follows two hopefuls whose porn names are “Steve Driver” and “Tom Dong.” The movie opens with a bukakke scene, where Steve and Tom’s dongs get ready for their close-ups. The gripping film portrays the realities of breaking into the adult business, and creates sympathy for the characters along the way. “It’s easy to look down on people in porn,” Mope director Lucas Heyne said during a Q&A after the film’s showing at Sundance, “but we visited some professional porn sets and talked to people working there who were thrilled to be working there.”   Heyne told us, “The beginning scene is a re-creation, but almost all the actors in it are real adult talent. The entire opening sequence was inspired by watching one of director Jim Powers’ shoots. He came out and hyped up the male talent and I thought it was so intense and compelling that I wrote the opening scene and cast Jim as himself. I also knew the real Steve and Tom, so it was surreal to shoot that scene.” The porn duo, who fancy themselves as the “Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker of porn,” get their first gig at a low-level fetish studio, known for “ball busting” and clown porn. The movie is funny at first, like the audition scene where the two both have to get kicked in the balls, but the film gets serious and then touching, as it chronicles the humiliation they endure on the way to stardom that never happens. In this film, it’s the sleazy owner of the fetish studio who is the villain, and the mopes are the ones you root for, whose innocent desire to make it in the porn biz will make you cry.  Spoiler alert: The movie does not end well for for Steve Driver—he kills his co-star Tom Dong, which is based on real-life events. But the movie is an homage to porn in a poignant way. The two main characters’ love of porn made them want to be porn stars, and they would do anything to get there. And when Driver realized he would never become a porn story, his life was over. The movie also features a scene where the two men go to an AVN Awards after party and excitedly meet a famous porn director, played by David Arquette, who was just picked up by a European distributor. Look for links to watch this film online in early 2020, and check out the trailer at MopeTheMovie.com.   Archival photo of New York's 42nd Street in the 1970s Tarnish on a Golden Age The Deuce tells the story of the “Golden Age of Porn” and the rise of the porn industry in the 1970s and ’80s in New York City. The brilliant series is gritty, beautifully shot, the acting is killer, and the subject matter is fascinating. If you haven’t seen it yet, once you watch the first episode, you can’t stop watching all 20. Season 1 takes place in 1971 and 72, season 2 jumps to 1977, and season 3 covers 1983-84. “The Deuce” is the one block strip of porn movie theaters and adult businesses that popped up during the early 70’s, thanks to twin brothers who are fronts for the mob, both played by James Franco. No other television series has offered a peep into the lives of street walkers and their corrupt pimps, the rise of peep shows and “massage parlors” that were actually brothels, and the beginnings of the modern-day porn world. Early porn movies were ushered in by sex workers who wanted to get off the street for a better life, and in this series, the creepy, violent pimps are the villains and the street hookers are the heroes. After just one episode, you will hate the pimps and love the ho’s. One interesting development that came from shooting the series, which coincided with the timing of the Me Too movement, was that the producers hired “intimacy coordinators” to act like a sort of “sex chaperone” during intense sex scenes. The coordinators make everyone wear “modesty patches” on their male junk and lady business, so none of the actors or actresses feel uncomfortable during filming. Emily Meade, who plays a sex worker turned porn actress, came up with the idea and approached the producers. Maggie Gyllenhaal, one of the show’s producers as well as a leading character, plays a street hooker who refuses to work with a pimp. She gets herself out of the street-walking business by moving into the world of porn, where she feels she has more control calling the shots. We call that a happy ending. Anka Radakovich is a certified sexologist, sex educator and author of three best-selling books, including her latest, The Wild Girls Club, Part 2. She has written columns about sex and relationships for Details, British GQ, Men’s Health, Women’s Health, Redbook and Cosmopolitan. She is now a columnist for Brides, and a screenwriter who writes romantic comedies filled with dick jokes. Follow her on Twitter: @ankarad.