Humble Heartthrob: Cade Maddox on His Path to a Big GayVN Win

Above, Cade Maddox on the stage at the 2020 GayVn Awards, presented by ManyVids. Photo by Rick Garcia. Shortly after the red carpet festivities got under way at the 2020 GayVN Awards in Las Vegas, a dapper looking Drew Sebastian walked out of his room at the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino to head down for the show. He turned to make his way to the elevator and saw something that stopped him in his tracks: the site of Cade Maddox and his boyfriend, Kevin Benoit. “We were staying on the same floor and came out of our rooms at the same time. They made me nervous, so I went back into my room,” laughs Sebastian, who—when pressed—admits that wasn’t the only reason he retreated. “I had to go back in and make sure I had something, but I was like, ‘Oh my god, who are these beautiful men coming down the hall?!’” Too intimidated to say hi, he overcame his nerves and decided he was being silly. He worked up the courage and quickly came out of his room again—this time on a mission. “I tried to chase them down, but they had already got in the elevator. They’ll probably remember, because I was awkward. They came out of their room and were like two visions in matching black and gold tuxedos on the way to the red carpet. I was like, ‘Whoa!’ I had to give myself a little double-check to make sure I looked okay.” You’ll have to forgive people if they are intimidated by Maddox and his equally stunning boyfriend, although it sounds especially funny to hear it from the likes of Sebastian—a fellow nominee who undoubtedly has the same effect on people. And he wasn’t the only one to express a similar sentiment. The night before at a private industry party, an accomplished webcam performer admitted he was too nervous to go introduce himself to Maddox. And a successful producer laughed after meeting Maddox and Benoit for the first time at that same party: “I mean, they’re beyond gorgeous. I wanted to hate them,” he jokingly laughed, “but they were so nice that it was impossible, dammit.” Hours after Sebastian missed his opportunity, Maddox found himself on stage accepting the award for Performer of the Year—struggling for words and unable to erase the wide smile from his face. Less than a year after signing as an exclusive with the Falcon Studios Group, he had cemented his status as one of the greats following one of the most successful years ever—and his humble nature left little doubt as to why he is a favorite with fans and industry critics alike. Cade Maddox and Kevin Benoit on the 2020 GayVN Awards red carpet. Photo by JFK/FUBARWebmasters.com. “I hated my life”Most people haven’t heard of the small Mississippi town Maddox grew up in, so he just says it’s Biloxi, which is 15 minutes west. It’s a place he would just as soon forget. “It was really awful, man. I’d say for like the first 18 years of my life, I hated my life. I just felt like it wasn’t mine,” he says, reliving the pain with each word. “My mom was very religious, and so it was like you go to church twice a week, and if you miss church Sunday or Wednesday, you have no extracurricular activities—which when you live in a small town in the country, that’s all that you have to do. For me, it was sports. So we went to church twice a week without complaining. I was kind of raised with the belief that gay was wrong, that it’s not right to feel that way. So when I was discovering my sexuality in my early years, I just really suppressed it to kind of conform.” That included dating girls throughout high school and middle school. “When I told her I was gay, my mom was like, ‘Well, we kind of knew, but I had this hope that maybe one of these girls that you brought home would knock you off your feet.’ But I kind of suppressed it all to please my family. And I was afraid of what people would say. You know, it’s a small town, and people have nothing better to do but talk about each other’s business. I really feel like they use that Christian shit as a hate tool down there. I don’t know. I just really hated the first 18 years of my life.” It wasn’t until he moved out of his parents’ house and was attending college that he started to change his mindset. “I didn’t decide that I was going to come out openly, but I just didn’t care. I actually kind of got ratted out by my sisters ... they got into my MySpace messages one day. And so that’s how my family found out that I was gay.” Maddox had a scholarship for soccer and played for a few years, but didn’t know what he wanted to do in college. “I kept changing my major, and my mom was pretty much like, ‘Decide or get the hell out.’ So then I met my now ex-husband and we moved to Hawaii. I lived there for three years,” Maddox shares, noting he worked retail, in the food industry, and also went to trade school for cosmetology. “I wanted to be a barber. I thought cosmetology would be great, because it had all of it, but I realized I really hated the makeup and the nail aspect of it—I was really shitty at it. So right before I finished and graduated there, I got a divorce—and he wasn’t happy about it, so it didn’t end on good terms. I was like living out of my car for a little bit in Hawaii, and that was right before I visited my mom’s house, trying to figure out what I was going to do with the rest of my life. And that’s where I met Jason Sparks.” Maddox at the 2020 GayVN Awards Show, with his Performer of the Year trophy plus a gift from ManyVids. Photo by Rick Garcia. A Life-Changing LeapWhile discovering his sexuality, Maddox didn’t have a very memorable experience with porn. “Pornography was harder to watch in my age, because I feel like every time we’d watch porn, it would put viruses on our computer,” he laughs. “And this was like the AOL dial-up days where there were all these virus protectors, and I wasn’t too tech savvy. My parents always had a way of seeing what I was doing on the computer, so I was really scared to watch porn; I actually watched straight porn.” Sparks saw Maddox on Grindr, and asked him if he ever thought about entering the industry. “I was like ‘No, but that sounds pretty fucking cool at this point in my life.’ I had just gone back to my mom’s house after living out of my car in Hawaii,” Maddox shares, noting his mom had moved to Ohio at that point (“The rest of them didn’t know to get the hell out. I don’t know what the hell they’re still doing down there.”). “And my mom—I love her to death, but we have like two totally different views on life. And that’s great—whatever she needs to get by. But for me as an adult, I just can’t live by her ways of life anymore. So we were kind of clashing heads after me being there for like four or five days.” Enter Sparks with an opportunity at just the right time. “His idea of an audition was getting me to a hotel room and basically fucking a guy to see if I’m good on camera; basically, it was a free session for his site. I guess I did well, because he was like, ‘We travel the country going city to city, we film for these sites in these hotel rooms. Do you wanna join us on the road?’ And at the time he had a huge following on Twitter and three sites, and there were about three other guys traveling with him at the time. So I was like, ‘Okay, that seems legit.’” At which point he had to have a conversation with his mom. “My family is great. My dad—we’re cordial, but we’ve never really had like a close relationship. He’s just really weird in that aspect. And then my mom, she’s like my best friend. I tell her everything. Even when I was leaving to go travel with Jason Sparks, I didn’t even know what I was going for. I thought I was going to film a couple things, travel a little bit. I had no clue that it was going to turn into what it did. I definitely had to tell her after I had my audition—or whatever you call it—with Jason. I called her and was like, ‘Mom, I’m leaving in the morning to be a porn star.’ “And I didn’t know what I was going to do. I was kind of scared, kind of excited at the same time. But she was like, ‘You’ve lost your mind!’ She stood in my doorway—she thought the devil had got into me. But now after a year and half of being here, her view has completely changed. She sees that I am happy and successful—her version of successful is paying my bills and doing what I’m supposed to do.” Maddox hit the road and got a crash course in adult filmmaking. “Basically, I learned how to travel the country and survive…we were filming out of hotels and finding guys to film, which is what I do on OnlyFans now,” Maddox shares. “How I view it now is, it got my foot in the door. It got all these different studios interested in seeing me. It taught me a lot about what I need to know about how to survive on my own in the industry, so I guess that’s what I took from that whole experience.” After about six months in, Maddox was approached by Men.com for a shoot—which gave him a glimpse of something better. “They flew me out to Atlanta and put me up in this decent hotel with nice food, paid for my food, gave me a nice check at the end, so at that point I realized, okay, there’s more opportunity out there.” He joined two other models in venturing out on their own, a quick stop in Chicago followed by a six-month stint in Washington, D.C.—where he befriended one of the people he credits with helping his career. “This is going to sound like a shocker to some people, but Billy Santoro. When I moved to D.C., he took me under his wing—and this was right when only Men knew who I was. This was before Icon. And he did this interview with me on his site, and we filmed together for OnlyFans—and that’s when Chi Chi LaRue started calling me. That’s when all the studios actually took notice, and I started getting the calls. It’s funny, because Billy and Chi Chi butt heads all the time. Chi Chi has been very instrumental in getting me gigs, introducing me to people and taking care of me. If she hears something’s going on, she’s always one of the first people to call me and check on me, those have been the main two.” The calls came from the likes of Falcon, Icon, Raw Fuck Club, Gay Room and more. “It just kept on going, so I was like, ‘Okay, I can do this this month. I can sustain this month with this.’ But it was always in the back of my head, ‘When this slows down, what am I going to do next?’ And then I stared getting a lot of work in L.A., and I was like, ‘You know what? I really love it here, and it would be nice to be here because I would get more work because they wouldn’t have to pay the flight to get me there.’ So I just moved here after six months in D.C., and everything just kind of fell in place here.” (Maddox laughs when it’s suggested he must love traffic, as he has migrated to some of the most congested areas possible: “Hawaii has like three highways. What takes a 45-minute commute in the morning in Honolulu is like a two-hour commute back at night. It’s ridiculous.”) After leaving Jason Sparks, he continued to shoot with Icon Male and Noir Male, and had extensive work with CockyBoys. And in the City of Angels, his 2019 took off. Backstage at the GayVN Awards. Photo by Jeff Koga. Naked AmbitionThe move proved prosperous, setting Maddox on a path that would culminate on the stage in Las Vegas last month. “I met Tim Valenti at a party here in L.A., and he was like, ‘Why are you not exclusive with us?’ And I was like, ‘Well I thought y’all didn’t like me! You filmed me like a year ago.’ And he was like, ‘No!’ And then after that, we did a couple negotiations and I signed with Falcon. And it was always in the back of my head: How am I going to top my first year? All the studios I had worked with were calling steadily, and I didn’t want to do my second year any less than my first. So I thought signing with Falcon, which is such a good studio, would give me a great boost for my second year.” Falcon announced the signing last July, following an awards season that saw Maddox get a Best Newcomer nomination at the GayVN Awards (“That was pretty awesome…but I was up against Alam Wernik, and I knew I wasn’t going to win that. He’s a great guy and he has a great following”), and nine Grabby nods (winning for Hottest Top). Knowing that the iconic studio was interested in signing him gave the performer an added boost of confidence. “For me, it meant, well shit, I must be doing something right, you know?” Maddox says. “I figured I was never going to sign as an exclusive, because typically, you’re asked to sign as exclusive at the beginning of your career so that all of your stuff is on their site. So I was not expecting to be asked to sign as exclusive with any company. It really shocked me, and it really made me happy. It makes you feel like you’re doing something right when a big studio like that wants to sign you. My experience with them has been great—they have a great fan base that is already built up, they’re marketing me in ways that I could not market myself, so I think I think it’s been a great connection and a great experience.” Maddox soon appeared in Casual Connections and Afternoon Affairs for Falcon, and got a role in the long-awaited NakedSword sequel Scared Stiff 2: The Amityville Whore. “The main thing is confidence. I’ve gained a lot of confidence in myself over the last couple years of doing this, and that has changed everything—from how I go in and perform on set, to how I treat situations differently. I just feel more confident in everything I do, that when I go to an award show now or when I’m on set with new people, I’m more prepared than I was before, when I just didn’t know what to expect. Now I know how to handle it.” And when the 2020 GayVN Award nominations came out late last year, Maddox led all performers with an impressive seven nods. In addition to his Hottest Bod and Hottest Top noms in the fan categories, he received five more in the judged categories—all the more impressive considering it encompassed work from a wide range of studios. Besides his Performer of the Year nomination, he was up for a fetish scene with CockyBoys, a threesome with Skyn Men, a group scene with Dragon Media, and—perhaps the most shocking to him—a Best Supporting Actor nod for his work at Icon. “I was really surprised to see when the nominations came back. I was shocked, actually. It’s a huge honor,” he recalls. “I’m still working on the confidence part of me doing acting. I’m not very confident in it because I don’t think I’m any good at it. Like, if you tell me ‘Go fuck this boy,’ I have no issue doing that in front of a bunch of cameras. But when you want me to memorize lines, I have a hard time getting into a character. I feel like myself when I have to fuck—that’s me. But it’s different for me to get into a character. Icon was the start of that—I really had more of it in A Stepbrother’s Obsession. And now at Falcon and NakedSword, I really enjoy working with mr. Pam; she’s really helping me improve my acting career so much, like the thigs she’s done with Amityville Whore, and we did another one called The Gay Simple Life. She liked the acting, and she has helped me a lot. I feel like the more I work with her, the better I’ll get at it.” And the opportunities continue to roll in. Maddox landed a spot in NakedSword’s new feature A Murdered Heart, which tackles the controversial topic of gay conversion therapy and was written and directed by Marc MacNamara (in a rare opportunity to direct away from Men.com). “I’d like to get better at acting, and get better with my performing in some areas—I’m really horrible at being verbal on camera, and that’s a big aspect of it. Maybe I just need to watch more porn with guys who are verbal. I wouldn’t even know who to watch, but I’m sure I can figure that out quickly,” he laughs. “It just turns me on to have sex in front of people. I like going to bath houses, I like public stuff like that, although I think I’m kind of vanilla when it comes to sex. And it’s so much fun that I get to perform with some of the hottest guys.” Maddox also picked up two fan-voted honors in late 2019 for the Fleshbot Awards: Best Body and…Best Daddy?! “I saw that!” he says with confused excitement. “But you know what, though? It’s a cool award to have, but I don’t think I’m a daddy. I don’t even know how I got on that list. Like, I should not be on that list. I’m taking up the space of somebody—like a real daddy—so I feel horrible about that. I can’t even grow a full beard right now. Maybe when I can do that? I would love to grow a full beard and be a dad, but that’s not right now. It’s flattering, though.” Los Angeles has also inspired Maddox in other areas of his life. He’s studying to be a certified personal trainer, and hopes to accomplish that sometime in 2020. “I feel like that will help me a lot here in L.A., where everybody seems to live a healthy lifestyle. And then there’s like so many gay men here who are looking for trainers, or maybe that’s just what they say up front. But who knows? We’ll find out.” He also likes to spend time enjoying life with Benoit, especially the little things. “I feel kind of boring, but we go to different restaurants here all the time—we like trying different kinds of food. We go to the movies like three times a week because we have the AMC Stubs pass—oh my God man, it’s really great. We got to see a screening for Bombshell before it came out, and that was so good! We’re just trying to find different things to do around here all the time. I also get to travel with the job, so it’s cool trying different clubs in different places that will fly you out. We just did that in Canada. I got to go snow skiing for the first time, I did Lake Louise, and we went out and danced at a club.” But as his career and life settled in, Maddox noticed he had a shift in priorities. “When I first moved here, I was just going out all the time. I’m from a small town in Mississippi, so I’m not used to the clubs going full blast on a freaking Wednesday. So at first, I was out all the time—and then I’m like, ‘Okay, I want to sustain here. I want to live here. I can’t do that all the time.’ So things like the movie pass have really helped me a lot with giving me something to do that’s not drinking, and I really appreciate things like that.” Center StageBack in that hallway at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino, Maddox and Benoit made their way to the elevator, unaware that they had an admirer who came oh-so-close to saying hello. They walked the red carpet, and settled into The Joint for the ceremony. Hours later when his name was called as the 2020 GayVN Award Performer of the Year, Maddox took the stage in shock. The smile was sparkling, just like his black tuxedo jacket. His voice quivered. Words escaped him. Maybe, just maybe, the realization that the unhappy kid from Goutier, Mississippi had finally found his calling had sunk in. Backstage, still in shock, he admitted the moment was unreal. He couldn’t believe it. And already, he was promising to try even harder in 2020 to be even better. “This past year, I’ve been growing, I’ve been learning…(this) inspires me for this year. I just gotta step my ass up, man. I can’t do it like I did last year—you have to do better. So it’s pushing me to do better in my work.” It’s that humble nature. He can’t escape it. And if his 2020 tops his 2019, the industry and his fans are in for one hell of a ride.