Can pornography be art?
I circle that line on a page of my script for “Muse” — the new feature, now-turned multi-season series by Kayden Kross for Deeper.com — as I wait for my daily COVID-19 swab. It’s one of 600 lines I’ll say in Season One of this innovative project and my seventh swab in eight days. There will be more.
That question is the script’s most important one; it is central to every storied vine. It’s the question my character — a smart, successful author and professor of sex psychology — asks her students, just before quarantine lockdown hits. It’s also one she’s been asking herself.
This series, through many layers, plot points and seasons, sets out to affirmatively answer it.
I headline an all-star cast that includes the phenomenal Adriana Chechik and other A-list names like Lena Paul and Gianna Dior, as well as Gabbie Carter and Scarlit Scandal. They are all students in my classroom and I give them an assignment: create something on film proving why pornography can or cannot be art. It’s a controversial one, especially at an esteemed university, and serves to thread together all these individual lives and stories as they finish their projects for a final grade.
And while they grapple with their unique situations and personal demons, I’m fighting demons of my own. Though I may be on top of the world professionally — and in the midst of writing a groundbreaking new book about “the feminine” in regards to sex and status — I feel I’ve missed out on something. Because I am unapologetic with my sexuality and I find power in that, I am denied the most valued of emotions, which is love. Only good girls get to feel something so soft.
Kayden and I started talking about the concept for the year’s big feature back in January. In that before-time, when plans could be made with a high degree of certainty and life as we knew it hadn’t been cataclysmically altered. It would be my first full-length feature since my debut last year with Kayden in “Drive” — the film that, just days earlier, I had won Best Actress and Feature Sex Scene at the 2020 XBIZ Awards. It would also be my first big feature as Deeper’s contract star.
We wanted to make something grand and important. Something that made noise — the kind you hear from the rooftops, but that also keeps you up at night because your mind just can’t stop whispering about it. Any noise that makes an impact is always heard in both a bang and a hush.
We were forging ahead with a bold new idea, one that would take us to exotic locations and require scores of talent and extras — maybe even those Dobermans we had used on “Mistress Maitland” and a horse or four — when COVID-19 struck and the industry shut down.
Bang.
Hush.
I can only equate it to an explosion, some bomb thrown in the center of us and, without alarm bell or ceremony, it detonated. We landed wherever we landed. We stayed wherever we stayed. Shrapnel and debris surrounded us. Everything felt a little bit broken.
In my last piece for XBIZ, I wrote about lockdown … how it affected me and what had changed. I spoke of reading and studying up for the feature we were still determined to make, with my stack of books and research notes that had me studying the societal developments of early man. Well, that wasn’t what we ended up making, although we hope to get back to that one day. As the numbers on the calendar peeled away and summer knocked, we knew we couldn’t make the film we planned before.
Too many sets. Too many bodies. Too little time.
And those dogs required their own honey wagon and two trainers.
In order to still make something powerful, achievable and now relevant to our times, there would have to be changes. We weren’t going to make-believe we were living in the world before; we were going to draw from this new one. If I learned anything from reading 700+ pages on early man, it is this: the only way to survive in life is to adapt. And we wanted to do more than just survive. Evolution respects adaptation.
It was then, that things began to happen fast.
Entertainment got the so-called green light to start up production again sometime in July, and therefore so did porn. We knew the window of opportunity could be short, with so much uncertainty still playing its hand, so we had to generate fast.
Within days, Kayden had drafted something so raw and unique and societally important, that everyone who read it took notice. This concept was something porn has never seen, and neither has mainstream: a hybrid between worlds, where sex boosts story and story boosts sex, and you find yourself attracted to both. There was a real opportunity for character development and ongoing storylines. The end didn’t have to be the end.
It’s rare in porn to read a script that entices you to see beyond the sex, especially so far. What started out as a feature was now developing into something more. Suddenly, we were on the precipice of creating a multi-season streaming series. It’s Netflix and it’s porn. It’s something else. We were finding true what history has always taught — the most profound art is made out of necessity and in unparalleled times.
While the concept was there, and all the excitement, we still had to make it. And in the time of COVID-19 this would prove to be no easy task. Sure, porn was slowly starting to shoot again, but this was an undertaking far greater than any individual scenes. It would require weeks of filming, late nights and early mornings, and consistent, full health screenings for cast and crew. We were worried. How could we create this ambitious hybrid between adult entertainment and mainstream, when Universal wasn’t filming any big projects and neither was porn?
Vixen deserves all the credit here. It would’ve been easier and saved money to make a “pandemic piece.” Something shot quickly with limited story and a small cast. No one would be grading us harshly in these times. We could scoot by with something pretty good. But they were eager and willing to invest in something greater. The system they put in place should be the standard-bearer for not only the porn industry, but a model for entertainment going forward in general. And I don’t just say that because I’m their contract star.
I have to admit, I was nervous at first. How would it all work? How would we all stay safe? Would it be possible to accomplish weeks of straight shooting without any of us getting sick? But my nerves were calmed on day one when I saw everything firsthand. The amount of time, research and effort that went into establishing, and then maintaining, a healthy set with healthy bodies is unmatched. There was a team working day and night on it. Of course, there is always a risk, but I felt confident knowing that it’s a highly calculated one.
We tested every single day.
Every. Single. Day.
Yes, even if you weren’t scheduled to work, you needed to be accounted for. No excuses. Two- and three-day tests that I’ve heard are more the norm around town weren’t going to be sufficient. So, every day we were swabbed right on set by the hired EMT. We’d have to get it done early in the morning, so the results would be back early the next, and we could swab again. If tests didn’t come back for some reason, or they were just late, you couldn’t enter the set.
The set was, for the most part, a private penthouse, secured not only for its palatial aesthetics, but also its safety. No one was coming and going from the place except for us. We had control over how everything was disinfected and cleaned. And there was so much space, it was easy to keep everyone six feet apart. Masks and social distancing were strictly enforced. Only performers in scenes got to take their masks off.
It was hard not to hug everyone on the crew that first day. We had all been apart for so long. But a fist pump across the room to a familiar set of eyes was still a good thing. We were back. In spite of it all, we were creating something again. Maybe it wasn’t the same, but nothing else in the world was either. And I can’t complain. I got to have messy hardcore sex while the masked, separated group all had to watch.
Let’s talk about the sex. There’s a lot of it. Being away so long only served to heighten my enthusiasm to perform again. I was hungry for bodies. Within this series, I will shatter my boundaries, navigating new situations and types of sex. You will see many of my firsts. There’s a trust and ease with Kayden as my director, and as my close friend, that allows me to step out of my comfort zone and explore. Knowing she is there to catch me if I fall makes me want to go even farther.
I start the series by duct taping two men for harassing me because of my sexually provocative media fame — yes, it plays on my real-life persona, which I love. There’s a game of eenie, meenie, miney, mo with the boys and I make threats with a beautiful pair of scissors. One of them gets pleasured and the other one, well … the possibilities from there are endless.
It was exciting to work so closely with Adriana, who is an absolute porn legend. Seeing how comfortable she is in her body and her sexuality is seductive for me. She elevates her scenes and drives them with this powerful, unharnessed energy. I had wanted to work with her for awhile now and this was the perfect opportunity. I think we brought something unexpected out of each other, something the audience will find unexpected as well.
On a personal level, I’m reaching a milestone I set for myself long ago, and I hadn’t fully realized it until the other day. I was talking with fans about the project when it was announced, telling them about the series format and how my character will grow and develop. One longtime fan, who has been with me since those early days of point-and-shoot content on my iPhone 7, said to me, “Isn’t this what you’ve always wanted? What you used to tell us about? A real series that people would watch for the story, and for the acting, and for the really hot sex?”
That made me pause. He was right, and it just hit me. Like that. Another bang, another hush. I have always said this. Years ago, and for years to follow, I put it out there in the ether and here it was being born. The world just had to turn upside down for it to happen. It’s a funny moment when a long-held dream of yours comes true and you hadn’t taken your foot off the pedal to know it.
Last year, when I swept into the industry, I’m sure that made a lot of people take pause. What was my motive? Where was I coming from and what exactly was I trying to prove? Would I be like a Bella Thorne and traipse into their world, garnering headlines and gold-rushing success — and then would I just leave? Sometime in the night, would I tuck away and leave them holding the bag they so generously offered me? I hope today everyone can see that isn’t true. Now, more than ever, I am committed to building a solid bridge between mainstream and adult.
And as my fans can attest, I’m not a person to ease up on my pursuit of a dream, even when it’s been realized. That’s when you wake up, rested, and you start to work. I, more than anyone, know it wasn’t mainstream that offered me these tools and this path. It was porn. And I will proudly holler that as we walk the creaky planks, built with weathered yet tireless hands, and cross this bridge together.
