DA DO RON RON
I've been on the phone with Joseph, my manager, all morning.
Arrangements are nearing completion on my new reality television series, tentatively
entitled American Idyll which will be shot here at Chateau
Maine. Each week I, Vicki Lester, will be training a bevy of fresh young faces
to be truly talented performers, but only one will be anointed a star by yours
truly, a Shirley Temple for the new millennium. Audition notices are heading
off to dance academies nationwide looking for little girls, between the ages of
four and eight who think they have the talent, the sparkle, and the fizz to win
over my discerning judgment and the great American public. From that open call,
ten lucky finalists will come to live with me at Chateau Maine while I teach
them the true art of Hollywood glamour and pizzazz; one will be eliminated each
week by popular vote until there is only one left who will co-star with me in a
new all singing, all dancing feature film, also to be called American
Idyll.
I've had Mrs. Jerry, my housekeeper, lay in large quantities of peanut butter and jam and the production company is having 'Cots for Tots' deliver a number of small folding beds which we'll put in the garage so they'll all have someplace to sleep. Normy is busy looking over musical arrangements for appropriate song and dance numbers although he seems to be starting with the Judge's song from Sweeney Todd which might be a bit rough for a first piece. It's all going to be such fun. Bob Mackie is rushing me a new order of gowns so I'll have something to wear and I'm trying to perfect just the right catch phrase when we have to let one of the little ones go. "You're Fired" seems to be taken and might be just a little too grown up so I'm thinking of singing "Well, maybe next year" from Send in the Clowns with a plaintive clarinet solo continuing under for each of the rejects long walk down the drive and back towards their humdrum lives.
I was absolutely exhausted by late morning and just had to collapse for a while in the home theater to recharge my juices. I didn't have the energy to root through my 'To View' pile so I decided to channel surf. I was somewhere in the woods of the low end cable movie channels when I noticed a film entitled, so I thought, 'Born Star' so I decided that might provide just the sort of inspiration I might need for my new endeavor. A few minutes later, after some scenes that seemed to involve some sort of naked hobbit, I realized that I had made an error. The film I was watching was entitled Porn Star: The Legend of Ron Jeremy and was a documentary about a gentleman who has made his name in, as we called them in a more genteel era, blue movies.
Despite being a refined, cultured and elegant lady, I do have my earthy side and I have, from time to time, rubbed shoulders with those in the adult entertainment industry. They can be fun at parties, at least those who are capable of forming basic English sentences. I personally, have never stooped so low as to appear in one of those productions. (And I would like to take this opportunity to set the record straight on those stills from Power drill III: Vicki Does Valdez that have been splashed all over the internet. That hoyden is not me and Fajer and Hellmann, my lawyers, have an active inquiry into suing for major monetary damages.) While viewing the film, I couldn't say that I was overly disturbed by the images unfolding, but it certainly won't be everyone's cup of tea.
The film is a 2001 documentary by Scott J. Gill, a Hollywood film editor, detailing the life and career of Ron Jeremy, a man who over the last few decades, has appeared in several thousand adult films. As in most biographical documentaries, we meet the subject cute (this time as he purportedly gets hopelessly lost in the bowels of an airport), and then move into some background on his family, where he came from and how he became famous. There are then sequences on the development of his art over the years, all intercut with the usual talking heads discussing the subject and his place in modern life. Only the majority of these talking heads are other adult entertainment figures and given their dishabille one wonders from time to time where they put the microphone battery packs.
From all of this, a picture emerges of Ron Jeremy, the man - a young Jewish boy from Queens who, from an early age wanted to be an actor and the center of attention. Being a relatively normal sort, he went to college and received a masters in special education and taught for several years until a girlfriend sent in an intimate photo of him to 'Playgirl' magazine in the late 70s under his real name. The deluge of phone calls to the family home was a bit much so Ronald Jeremy Hyatt became Ron Jeremy and, at the invitation of an adult film producer, took his first forays into that industry as he had a gift that few other men have been blessed with.
I shan't bore my dear readers with descriptions of sexual activity as the only sort of sex that's truly interesting is the sort in which you're personally involved. As this is a serious documentary, while there are lots of naked people and an erection or two, there is no hard core footage. The film did want to gain a bit of a wider audience. Suffice it to say, we see Ron morph over the years from a not unattractive young man to a cross between a hairy raccoon and the Pillsbury dough boy as he continues his adult career while trying, usually unsuccessfully to cross over to more mainstream entertainment venues.
This is where the documentary gets its power. While Ron tries to show himself as a respected individual in his chosen field and a success, he exposes himself as a very needy and vulnerable man who always wanted, and still wants to be a star. He grasps at any project in which he might be asked to perform clothed or which seems more legitimate. It's clear that while he has a certain limited talent as an actor, he would have been just another community theater supporting player, anonymous to everyone but friends and family, if he had not made the choices he did. He has a love/hate relationship with his sexual abilities which have kept him employed in adult films for decades.
The viewer is left, by the end, uncertain as to whether to feel sorry for this Pagliacci figure under the sex god image, a hairy little gnome facing an uncertain future, or to celebrate the fact that he was able to generate enough notoriety to warrant a documentary exploration of his life and times. Then one has to contend with the subjects enormously inflated ego; larger than most in an industry rife with them. It's quite perplexing, and actually requires more thought on the part of the viewer than most of the recent drivel coming out of Hollywood. Besides which, it's fun to meet his elderly father and sister, who are completely unfazed by what he does, and to see home movies and stills of the young Ron in what appears to have been a fairly normal boomer childhood. This isn't one for the kiddies, but there's food for thought.
Symbolic lost Ron. Home movies. Playgirl still. Gratuitous Rodney Dangerfield. Trip to France. Creepy husband/wife porn star couple. Gratuitous Al Goldstein. Porn studio. Porn sets. Young man on the street interviews.
I've had Mrs. Jerry, my housekeeper, lay in large quantities of peanut butter and jam and the production company is having 'Cots for Tots' deliver a number of small folding beds which we'll put in the garage so they'll all have someplace to sleep. Normy is busy looking over musical arrangements for appropriate song and dance numbers although he seems to be starting with the Judge's song from Sweeney Todd which might be a bit rough for a first piece. It's all going to be such fun. Bob Mackie is rushing me a new order of gowns so I'll have something to wear and I'm trying to perfect just the right catch phrase when we have to let one of the little ones go. "You're Fired" seems to be taken and might be just a little too grown up so I'm thinking of singing "Well, maybe next year" from Send in the Clowns with a plaintive clarinet solo continuing under for each of the rejects long walk down the drive and back towards their humdrum lives.
I was absolutely exhausted by late morning and just had to collapse for a while in the home theater to recharge my juices. I didn't have the energy to root through my 'To View' pile so I decided to channel surf. I was somewhere in the woods of the low end cable movie channels when I noticed a film entitled, so I thought, 'Born Star' so I decided that might provide just the sort of inspiration I might need for my new endeavor. A few minutes later, after some scenes that seemed to involve some sort of naked hobbit, I realized that I had made an error. The film I was watching was entitled Porn Star: The Legend of Ron Jeremy and was a documentary about a gentleman who has made his name in, as we called them in a more genteel era, blue movies.
Despite being a refined, cultured and elegant lady, I do have my earthy side and I have, from time to time, rubbed shoulders with those in the adult entertainment industry. They can be fun at parties, at least those who are capable of forming basic English sentences. I personally, have never stooped so low as to appear in one of those productions. (And I would like to take this opportunity to set the record straight on those stills from Power drill III: Vicki Does Valdez that have been splashed all over the internet. That hoyden is not me and Fajer and Hellmann, my lawyers, have an active inquiry into suing for major monetary damages.) While viewing the film, I couldn't say that I was overly disturbed by the images unfolding, but it certainly won't be everyone's cup of tea.
The film is a 2001 documentary by Scott J. Gill, a Hollywood film editor, detailing the life and career of Ron Jeremy, a man who over the last few decades, has appeared in several thousand adult films. As in most biographical documentaries, we meet the subject cute (this time as he purportedly gets hopelessly lost in the bowels of an airport), and then move into some background on his family, where he came from and how he became famous. There are then sequences on the development of his art over the years, all intercut with the usual talking heads discussing the subject and his place in modern life. Only the majority of these talking heads are other adult entertainment figures and given their dishabille one wonders from time to time where they put the microphone battery packs.
From all of this, a picture emerges of Ron Jeremy, the man - a young Jewish boy from Queens who, from an early age wanted to be an actor and the center of attention. Being a relatively normal sort, he went to college and received a masters in special education and taught for several years until a girlfriend sent in an intimate photo of him to 'Playgirl' magazine in the late 70s under his real name. The deluge of phone calls to the family home was a bit much so Ronald Jeremy Hyatt became Ron Jeremy and, at the invitation of an adult film producer, took his first forays into that industry as he had a gift that few other men have been blessed with.
I shan't bore my dear readers with descriptions of sexual activity as the only sort of sex that's truly interesting is the sort in which you're personally involved. As this is a serious documentary, while there are lots of naked people and an erection or two, there is no hard core footage. The film did want to gain a bit of a wider audience. Suffice it to say, we see Ron morph over the years from a not unattractive young man to a cross between a hairy raccoon and the Pillsbury dough boy as he continues his adult career while trying, usually unsuccessfully to cross over to more mainstream entertainment venues.
This is where the documentary gets its power. While Ron tries to show himself as a respected individual in his chosen field and a success, he exposes himself as a very needy and vulnerable man who always wanted, and still wants to be a star. He grasps at any project in which he might be asked to perform clothed or which seems more legitimate. It's clear that while he has a certain limited talent as an actor, he would have been just another community theater supporting player, anonymous to everyone but friends and family, if he had not made the choices he did. He has a love/hate relationship with his sexual abilities which have kept him employed in adult films for decades.
The viewer is left, by the end, uncertain as to whether to feel sorry for this Pagliacci figure under the sex god image, a hairy little gnome facing an uncertain future, or to celebrate the fact that he was able to generate enough notoriety to warrant a documentary exploration of his life and times. Then one has to contend with the subjects enormously inflated ego; larger than most in an industry rife with them. It's quite perplexing, and actually requires more thought on the part of the viewer than most of the recent drivel coming out of Hollywood. Besides which, it's fun to meet his elderly father and sister, who are completely unfazed by what he does, and to see home movies and stills of the young Ron in what appears to have been a fairly normal boomer childhood. This isn't one for the kiddies, but there's food for thought.
Symbolic lost Ron. Home movies. Playgirl still. Gratuitous Rodney Dangerfield. Trip to France. Creepy husband/wife porn star couple. Gratuitous Al Goldstein. Porn studio. Porn sets. Young man on the street interviews.
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