Irreplaceable: Around the World With Jia Lissa

This is the March cover story of AVN magazine. Click here for the digital edition. LOS ANGELES—Jia Lissa welcomed a moment of clarity during a break from performing last year. The realization came when she stopped watching porn, giving her time to reflect on what’s next. “What is it that I want people to see—what are my fantasies?” she recalls asking herself. “So I started writing them down. “And I started fantasizing what comes into my mind. So I wrote it down and I have plenty of scenarios that maybe one day I will use somewhere.” Fans of the Russian heartbreaker can rest assured that she will bring those fantasies to life sooner rather than later. The two-time AVN Award-winning performer at press time completed her seventh sex scene as a director for Vixen Media Group’s all-girl imprint Slayed as she moves into a new phase of her career. “And I’ve been working the last couple weeks somewhere in beautiful island with many beautiful performers,” Jia tells AVN in an exclusive interview from her secret location in the Caribbean. “I’m learning directing from Julia Grandi—she’s mentoring me. It’s awesome. “Every time I think I get better.” The red-headed Vixen Angel made her co-directorial debut with Grandi—who has been leading the company’s productions in Europe since 2018—in the fall of 2022, sharing the shot-calling duties for “Dollhouse” starring Nancy Ace and Sonya Blaze. A cam model on LiveJasmin and then MyFreeCams for about three years who did a couple solo scenes for MetArt in 2017, Jia Lissa made her hardcore boy/girl debut for Vixen in June 2018 in a scene directed by the VMG co-founder Greg Lansky. It did not take long for her to make an impact, winning her first AVN Award in January 2020 for Best Foreign-Shot Group Sex Scene with Ella Hughes and Jason Luv for her performance in “Double Dare” for Blacked Raw. Jia captured her second AVN trophy for Best International Anal Sex Scene in 2022 for her throw-down with Christian Clay in Jia, a glittering showcase that featured her cavorting through Greece, Paris and the Alps shooting scenes for VMG brands Tushy, Vixen and Blacked. But Lissa says stepping behind the camera has given her a whole new perspective on her career choice. “Honestly for me it was a real experience because I freaked out my first shooting because imagine I’m behind the camera now and I had no idea how hard it was,” Jia admits. “I mean I always respected the team but now I respect them twice more because I know how hard it is sometimes to work with some models. “And now I even start to behave a bit better because I’m like damn, now I know how it feels.” But as much as things have changed for Jia Lissa—whose performances and personality have propelled her to global stardom—one thing remains the same. She cares. “Since I started shooting I’ve been always very invested in the shooting,” Jia says. “I always care. I would always suggest, ‘Let’s do that, let’s try this one. Let’s try this position.’ And that’s how they noticed that I have this passion. “And also since I started with OnlyFans I really enjoy organizing my shootings. I bring fashion photographers. I would do a mood board myself. I really enjoy creating something and my dream is to maybe one day make my own production. “That’s why I’m studying now because porn industry really inspires me and I think porn is art for me. And I want to bring some of my fantasies into this world.” The performer also known lovingly as Jiayonce—due to her musical talents—arrived in 2023 with a following that exceeds 1.4 million on her main Instagram, 538,000 on her second page and almost half a million on Twitter. She tells AVN the way her porn career has soared is “amazing” for her, but it also isn’t her sole focus. “It’s not just about porn for me,” Jia explains. “I’m just an artist and I want to do whatever I want. I want to show that it’s possible for a porn star to do not just porn.” A natural entertainer who plays the ukulele, the guitar, writes her own songs and sings, Lissa also loves to act and appreciates any time she has the opportunity to demonstrate her flair for drama. “I actually enjoy longer scripts,” she reveals. “I like acting. I love porn, too. I really like when they give me bigger scripts.” In addition to the various scenarios she’s brought to life for the luxury-focused VMG in her 20-something scenes for the company, she has flourished on unconventional sites such as Romero’s sci-fi-meets-porn-driven projects—Hentaied and Parasited—and the equally mind-bending Futanari. Jia received a 2023 AVN Award nomination for Best Actress - Featurette for her performance in the scintillating “Date” on Parasited.com. In the elaborate scene that was shot in Budapest, Jia welcomes her co-star Mark Zane over to her place for wine and a horror movie for their third date, but things take a dark and twisted turn when Jia gets “Parasited” and then she can’t control what happens next. “Every time I come to [Romero’s] production I step up,” Jia says. “It’s very unique emotions because I remember the first time I come to his set and he said, ‘Play like you’re scared. Play like an alien stole you and you’re on a spaceship.’ “It’s very good practice. It’s not that easy. Or ‘play that you are possessed by a spirit—a parasite just entered your body.’” Jia at press time had almost 20 credits just for Hentaied alone, including several for her signature series, "Jiology Lab," where experiments are performed that sometimes involve tentacle mutations and cloning herself. “I’ve been working with Romero since the start of his production,” Lissa says. “I was basically his second scene. And because I work so much with him I kind of could see how his style elevated. And I was studying acting with him. He would give me to write my own monologues. “In a lot of the scenes—the dialogue, I wrote it myself. Like the 'Jiology Lab.' It came out from my fans’ jokes because I made up Jiology signs and I would do OnlyFans videos where I would teach them Jiology. “I sometimes have a monologue for three or five minutes. It’s a must-watch. I shot some new ones, I’m not sure they’re out yet.” Jia continues, “I can say for sure when I first watched what he’s doing I was like, wow, that is kind of hot because I like hentai. And I love tentacles and aliens. But since I’ve shot like 15 or 20 scenes of that I know how it’s done and how hard work it is to create even the short video. I cannot get off to it. Because I know how hard. I’m just thinking of how much work and how many hours put into that.” But she's not afraid of hard work—quite the contrary. When Lissa’s shooting sometimes she is the one wanting to do additional takes. “I’m the best judge of that,” Jia says. “Even if it was good sometimes I would say, ‘It’s not good enough, let’s shoot again.’ I would ask to reshoot because I want to do my best.” Romero tells AVN that he would not be surprised to see Jia “in a Hollywood movie soon.” “Any words I say about Jia Lissa won’t do justice to her talent,” Romero says. “Jia is one of my closest collaborators, and working with her is a delight. She’s one of a kind, the funniest and quirkiest in the room, and the alpha in the locker. “I first met Jia as a musician and artist, and we produced some songs together last year. Working on a porn set with her gave me the same feeling of creative flow. I remember a moment where I wrote a song, and it took me four days to record all the instruments and structure. When I showed her what I had, she took the base and in about 40 minutes, she came up with lyrics, a melody, and was ready to record. The song was brilliant, and she’s an amazing singer with a creative mind.” Romero continues, “Similarly, one day we wanted to shoot something together for her series 'Jiology Lab' on Hentaied, starting with the basic idea of a ‘Mad Scientist.’ In about 15 minutes, she came back with a crazy, preposterous, seven-minute monologue that was brilliant. I still laugh when I see that scene in ‘Jiology Lab: The New Ass-Sistant’ on Hentaied.” Italian stud Christian Clay, one of VMG’s most prolific performers who has more than 1,200 credits overall since 2001, tells AVN that Jia is “one of the best female performers I’ve met.” Clay would know—he worked with Lissa on both her Vixen and Tushy debuts and several times after that. “I remember when I met her for the first time she was a very shy girl, but from the first conversation we had I understood what she wanted and how far she will go and in a few years I think she got her goal,” Christian says. “She loves sex and she loves what she does—we don’t have that much girls like her. That’s why for her it was easy to get famous because from the first moment she knew what she want to be and I saw how focused she’s been on herself. “We like to work together and I’m very happy how good she talk about me as well. I remember I was in contract, but she ask me to be her first anal scene and that make me so happy I fly to France just for her, so I hope she will remember that. “... I hope she will take from life what she wants because she deserve all the best. Congratulations Jia for all you’ve done—you’re one of my top 10 girls.” Lissa grew up in the city of Izhevsk, the capital of Udmurtia, Russia, located along the Izh River in the western Ural Mountains. She moved to Moscow when she was almost 17, using the last 20 dollars she had on the car to get there. Nowadays when asked where she lives, Lissa pauses for a beat. “That’s a good question ... I’m a gypsy style,” she says. “Basically, I’m based in Budapest, Europe, since I’ve been living there last couple years. But since I am a travel addict, I’m always on my bags. “I haven’t been there for a couple months already because I’ve been traveling. I live partially Bali and Europe—because Bali is amazing. Like Bali is for my soul and Europe is for work mode.” She is close with her mother and her sister, so much so that her mom asks about her scenes. “I bring them to Bali now with me for vacation,” Jia says, adding that her move into adult only strengthened her relationship with her mom. “Honestly, after I started porn we’ve never been closer than ever. We talk every day. She asks me how was my shoots? “[In February] my second scene for Tushy is out. … I had a Tushy, Tushy Raw and this is my second Tushy scene. So three anal scenes I’ve shot so far. My fans were really waiting. I didn’t want to shoot anal for many years and everybody pushed me and I would say, ‘No, no,’ but then I decided to give it a try.” Now Jia gets into anal sex. “This new scene for Tushy [with Maximo Garcia] is one of my favorite, it was very fun,” Jia reveals. “And now I like it and I didn’t want to shoot it before. My mom after my first Tushy scene, she called me and said, ‘Are you OK? I’m worried about your ass.’ I’m like, ‘Mom, it’s OK, please don’t embarrass me.’ “She’s like, ‘Is your ass broken again?’ I love her.” Jia Lissa tells AVN she's started to crossover to mainstream projects, too. She receives many acting offers in Russia—many of which involve her getting naked.  “I get a lot of scenarios. They send to me, ‘Oh, we need a slutty slut. You want to play? Our movie that’s gonna have sex with 10 guys.’ I’m like, ‘OK, why don’t I just come to shoot porn then, why do I need to come to your movie?’ “Some of the scenes are not out yet. But there is one movie that’s called, Who’s There?… And it was like 150 people on set. It was crazy. I met some movie stars from Russia. It wasn’t a big role but it was an experience.” Jia plays a passenger on a doomed airplane. “We had to practice for like three or four days how to pretend we were crashing the airplane,” she says. “Nobody survive ... but the flight attendants would fuck in front of me. Flight attendants fuck the pilot in front of me.” Lissa sometimes shares her music on her Instagram pages, @jialissaonly and her backup, @jialissareal. She used to study music in college and also plays keyboard. She taught herself how to play ukulele. Jia titled one of her first songs “I Like to Masturbate.” Other times she likes to cover famous tracks with her own lyrics. “Like ‘if I were a boy, I would fuck every girl,’” Jia jokes. “I’ve been playing guitar, too, a lot now. I write my own songs but I never really share it. Only my closest friends know and I will play for them. In production they used to called me Jiayonce because in the breaks I would always play ukulele and I like to fuck up the songs.”She tells AVN that she has already recorded two songs in the studio but hasn’t been able to release them yet because of her other business obligations. “I’m working on directing now. I’m working as an actress, I’m modeling. I cannot have time for everything. I don’t know if I’ll be able to do that,” Lissa says. However, what she soon will be making time for is her women’s group—a community for girls based in Bali that will be "a safe space." "Where we would teach other things like to take care,” Jia says. “Because I’m shocked how many people don’t know basics that we know in porn industry about reproductive system, about safe sex and everything. “So I will take a break and I’m going to work towards that. I want to do just something nice for the world.” Lissa says the idea came to her when she was making her 2023 New Year’s resolutions. “And I really went through all my career past years and I decided that I want to do something else because all of my content is only for male audience mostly. Like 95 percent of my fans are men still,” Lissa explains. “But I have so many girls who come up to me in real life and they literally ask me the most bizarre questions that for me in my daily life is just normal to know this. And I thought everybody know. “And so I decided that the world needs it and I’m going to go to Bali after. That’s where I’m going to start making it. Like I’m going to do a podcast about sexual education and tell my stories and I will have a break from porn to create this. I cannot wait.” She adds, “I already prepared everything. I just need some time off. We have our girls’ community in Bali, but I want to make more worldwide on internet.” Lissa remembers celebrating Christmas in Bali and when she received her visa. “I literally cried. I was so happy because I got it to come to AVN,” says Jia, who attended her first AVN Adult Entertainment Expo in January, signing at the Vixen Media Group pop-up store at Pepper in Las Vegas. “Because it was my dream for a long time. And I wanted to meet all the performers and the directors that I really appreciate and be part of the industry and meet all these people and see the show itself. Because it looks amazing all the time when I watch it. And I flew over 30 hours to come the next day to AVN. “I was so jet-lagged, but I couldn’t stop. I couldn’t even sleep, I was so excited. And coming with Vixen, I’m really thankful they took really good care of me and introduced me to this world. … I enjoyed every second of it.” Jia flew 10 hours from Bali to Doha, Qatar, and then 16 hours from Doha to L.A.—then another one-and-a-half hours from L.A. to Vegas. “I would do it again 100 percent, 10 out of 10,” she says. “I think the pop-up store, it was next level. Honestly, I was surprised how many fans I have. It was crazy. I mean I’ve attended some events in Europe but American fans are ... they were standing in line for hours. I never signed so many posters in my life. My hand hurt. It was sore and I was taking pictures with every one of them. “Even I got some new fans because I just started talking to people who were standing in line like, ‘Hi! I’m Jia. Can you watch this scene? It’s so hot!’ “I got some new subscribers to my OnlyFans from the line. It was so fun. And I got so many cool pictures. The Vixen merch, I got a lot of stuff from there. I’m wearing this all the time now. It’s my favorite.” Jia says one of the most memorable parts of her trip was meeting Riley Reid at the Vixen pop-up store. “It was so cool, she’s so cool. I was standing in line, too, for a bit,” Lissa says. “It was my dream. I really wanted to meet Abella Danger though. I’m her big fan. But she was on the stage [hosting the AVN Awards] so I couldn’t catch her up. I hope next year maybe.” Jia thanked everyone who has supported her during the past five-plus years as she’s risen to the upper echelon of the industry. People such as her mentor, Julia Grandi, the VMG director who also owns the Budapest-based JulModels. “I’m really grateful because it wouldn’t happen without some people around me that really guided me and took care of me and believed in me and pushed me at the right times—like Julia Grandi and the Vixen team,” Lissa says. “They were very like super nice.” When she considers the future, Jia says she’s open to all the possibilities. “I am a creator. I just cannot stop creating in any way that I can possibly express myself. So I want to do art. And I do porn because for me it’s art,” Lissa says. “I do music and I do photography, films. … I cannot share all my secrets. “I will do it. That’s why 2023 should be an amazing year. And I wish everyone the best.” Photography by Vixen Media Group & @hunor_kolumban (cover)