I Went to Buy Vintage Paperback Books About the Pornographic Film Business
Stag movies and superstuds
Who: Alias Books East / The Iliad Bookshop
What: Vintage bookstores
When: See sellers for hours
Where: Los Angeles, Calif.
Why: A nostalgic look at pulp nonfiction books about the adult industry of yesteryear
Recently, I went Alias Books East, one of my favorite used bookstores in Los Angeles. There I discovered a shelf of what I would describe as sexploitation books. Pulp paperback books with sexy covers and erotic tales that were published in the Seventies. Among the titles was Girls Who Do Stag Movies: Intimate Interviews with Female Sex Stars. Originally published in 1973, the nonfiction book is a collection of interviews with women who performed in adult movies. “What makes a beautiful girl do stag movies?” the back jacket queries. “Are the girls really aroused even with the cold eye of the camera and crew lingering on every act?” The interviews were conducted by William Rotsler and Winston Hill. The subjects include the famous (Linda Lovelace) and the not-so-famous (Sandy). There are also photos—of the women posing, of the women making movies, of the women with their male costars.
From “Greta”:
What do you think of pornography?
It’s okay. The bad part is that there’s not all that much money in it to make a really good film, or to get really good writers. But I like it. Maybe girls aren’t supposed to like it, but I do. Especially my own. But porn has its place. People like it or it wouldn’t be around, so it must have some value other than getting a broke girl out of trouble.
Back at home, I googled William “Bill” Rotsler. On Wikipedia, I learned he was an author, a cartoonist, a photographer, an artist, and a pornographer. He wrote sci-fi books, as well. Sometimes he used a pseudonym, which made me wonder if Winston Hill was really Rotsler. There was no one to ask; Rotsler had died in 1997. Some more searching revealed there was a male-focused counterpart to Girls Who Do Stag Movies. This nonfiction book, originally published in 1975 and also by Rotsler, was Superstud: The Hard Life of Male Stag Film Stars. The cover was fantastic: a grinning man’s head superimposed over a roll of film feeding into a pair of movie reels that together resembled a penis and testicles. As luck would have it, another one of my favorite used bookstores, The Iliad Bookshop, had a copy. So I went to the bookstore and bought it. Superstud, I discovered, had interviews with male porn stars and pornographers.
From “Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Porno Stars”:
What is it like to make a porno film?
From the standpoint of the production company, the director, cameraman or crew, it’s a job. Oh, we get turned on, but not nearly as often as you’d think. When you are watching two or four or six people fuck and suck and play around all day it ceases to have much meaning. It becomes, “How difficult will it be to get that shot?” Or, “Will he be able to keep it up? Will he wilt? Is she in the right position? Will he pull out to come? Can you see her expression? Did the light change when they moved? How long is this running? Do we have enough film to run through to climax?”
Reading these books, I realized not a lot about the porn industry has changed over the last fifty years. Film was replaced by video which has been replaced by the internet. But the appeal and the challenges—the transgressions—remain the same.
Thanks for reading The Reverse Cowgirl! If you enjoyed this, please subscribe, like, or share my newsletter. You can learn more about me, work with me through The Fixer, or buy my book. Let’s connect on X, Instagram, Threads, Bluesky, Facebook, and LinkedIn.