Adult industry pro Rob Black appears in the movie as an adult moviemaker. The movie's lead character, played by comedian Spencer Rice, gets addicted to Internet porn. His affliction drives away his wife, whom Black recruits to appear in a bukkake title.
Despite the subject of his movie, for which Rice wrote the story, he said he doesn't believe in the existence of porn addiction.
"I don't think porn addiction exists, really," he said. "It's not like you're taking anything in, like heroin or alcohol or anything like that. So, that said, I think that my time spent with pornography over the years is somewhat normal, average guy, you know — nothing nearly like the character Mark Tobias. To me the challenge was to write a traditional romantic comedy in a different genre with a backdrop that was completely inappropriate."
Rice also called Black the most "pernicious" pornographer in the United States, in reference to Black's prosecution for obscenity on behalf of Extreme Associates.
"I don't know if you've seen his stuff," Rice said. "It's ... disgusting. This is how ballsy Rob is. One of the first lawsuits against him was for a bunch of movies he did that simulated rape. The seven of them were actually banned, censored by the U.S. government, and he went around and put them in a boxed set to sell them."
But Rice added that he just wanted to make a "sappy" romantic comedy in an unusual setting.
"The scene I'm most proud of, of course, the bukkake scene where I walk in and she's covered in semen and we do the most lame, 'I love you, please come back,' the most garbagey kind of love scene, but she's covered in semen, which is of course Cetaphil soap," he said. "That's a proud moment for me somehow. I think that's where the two worlds really collided and in a way, pardon the pun, was the climax of the whole project. Just to get to that scene, find a way to get to that scene."
Rice and his screenwriter/director Duncan Christie have their work cut out for them. Kevin Smith's porn-based romantic comedy "Zack and Miri Make a Porno" barely made back its budget.
"Confessions of a Porn Addict" opens Friday at the Mayfair Theatre in Ottawa, Ontario, located at 1074 Bank Street. For more information, call the theater at (613) 730-6552.
