Portrait: 40 Years in Porn

My name is Bernie Cohen a.k.a. David Christopher. Pussyman. I live in Encino, California. Best fucking dog park in the whole country! I’ve lived in Marina del Rey and Santa Monica. You’d figure Santa Monica would have tremendous dog parks. Rich, liberal, da da da. Terrible. Horrible! Gravel up a hill. Here, in Encino, there are miles and miles of different kinds of fields. Athletic fields. Walking fields. Ponds. Kayaking. Dog parks! So that’s why I’m in Encino. I love dogs.

Before I moved here, I lived in Tarzana, the next town over. It was named for – what’s his name? – Edgar Rice Burroughs. The guy who wrote Tarzan. You should have seen my other house! It was so fucking unique. Unlike any other house in the Valley. I had this huge cabin, you know, like the ones in Lake Tahoe, with gorgeous land and beautiful trees. There was actually a tree growing inside the house, right in the middle, up through the roof. And there were these eclectic homes throughout the neighborhood. Not one house was the same. There was a giant house, next to a modern house, next to some small little nothing. Like anyone, someone making $10,000 a year, could have been living there. That area is tremendous, and I lived there for seven years from 20012008. But when the industry went kaput, I needed a smaller house and moved here.

My friend Glenn was living across the street. I walked into this place and saw the tall ceilings. I thought, Wow! This is perfect. It sort of reminded me of a loft from my days in New York City. Lots of light. Good for shooting. Because the best places to shoot are these little homes. This way, no one knows what you’re doing. And you definitely don’t want anyone to know. That’s the last thing you want! Plus, there was a nice backyard for my dogs. And it was right up the street from the dog park. So here I am.

I

Chapter 1 - The Golden Age

They call the ‘70s The Golden Age of Porn. I don’t think so. For me, The Golden Age was the ‘90s. There’s a big difference. The ‘70s were great for acting because everyone wanted to become a legitimate actor. They thought, Wow! What a great way to break into show business. Go to real acting school and then work on these two-three week movies. These were big movies with big scripts, you know, tons and tons of dialogue, and these people could act somewhat. But the filmmaking was not good. The cameramen didn’t know how to shoot sex. They got all the wrong angles. Seriously. They didn’t know anything!

And then there were people like me who didn’t care about acting at all. What do I care about acting? I don’t give a shit about acting. I wanted to be a teacher. I wanted to be a director. Those were the two things I cared about. Teaching and directing. I wanted to communicate what was happening at that particular time. The liberation of sexuality. I also wanted to explain myself, who I was and what I was doing, why I was making X-rated pictures. Because the model that most people have is that you are an asshole and a jerk if you do stuff like this. They say, You’re in porno? You must be a nasty person. It’s completely wrong. I’ve met tons of wonderful intelligent people in this business. Everyone thinks, Oh, she’s stupid. Why? Because she’s taking her clothes off? That doesn’t make her stupid. She’s expressing her sexuality. She likes to show herself off. What’s the big deal? It’s good. Power! Power of the woman!

That’s what I would always say. I used to have fights with real Feminazis – as my friend Mike Graffone calls them – who fall back to their fundamentalist way of thinking. Even though they want freedom of sexuality, they still think, in porno, the women are getting abused by men. That men are forcing them to do it. I mean, directors will make actors and actresses do things. Because they’re directors. They direct! But that whole other idea is bullshit. On the other hand, I can’t stand chauvinists. Like at the dog park here, when people found out how I was this ‘90s big shot who had directed, produced, and starred in X-rated movies, they absolutely loved me! Certain guys, mostly blue-collar guys, they thought I was like an unbelievable hero. They’d ask me all of the typical male chauvinistic kinds of questions. And after I gave them my raps, you know, they would look at me like, What the fuck are you talking about?

I promote the power of female sexuality. There are probably some directors doing that now, but for years, no one did. That’s why Pussyman was so different. I didn’t care if the guy had an orgasm. In X-rated movies, you know, the scenes end with a male orgasm. The quote unquote pop shot. To prove to the audience that the sex was real. That’s how it started. Proof is in the pudding! Over the years, it’s gotten to the point where if you don’t cum at the end of a scene, then you won’t be working much longer. I never really believed in that, but because of the nature of the business, in my movies, I’ve had to follow suit. And I’ve made a lot of movies!

*

I started in porn to help pay for grad school. That was 1975. So, you know, half of the ‘70s, the ‘80s, the ‘90s, and since. What’s that, four decades? I’ve been in and out of porn for 40 years. Wow! Not many people have been in the business all this time. One other guy: Joey Silvera. There might still be a few people sitting behind a desk, but no one is working on the sets. Just me and Joey Silvera.

I had other jobs in the meantime. I taught high school for a while. And I managed this huge record store in New York City called Disc-o-Mat. On 34th street near Penn Station. And then I went back to work for my dad. He called me up and said, It’s an emergency. So I came home to Boston and would drive back to New York on the weekends. I was married then, to Lisa, my first wife. That’s when her father offered me the territories of Long Island, Westchester, parts of New Jersey, parts of Connecticut. He sold lighting fixtures, you know, chandeliers. He told me that he was retiring soon and his business was worth a couple hundred grand a year. So I put on my sport jacket and went around the suburbs. After like four months, he said to me: I want you to try and break into Manhattan. Okay. Here I am, doing this job, you know, bored as shit, but there could have been a lot of money in it for me.

One day, in Manhattan, I passed a place called Show World. The biggest sex emporium in New York City. Famous for years. It had five floors. On one floor, there was a regular strip theater. On another, there were girls in booths. All different things. So I’m walking past, and my friend popped out. He said, I’m the manager here. You want to work? I got some girl, and you can have sex with her. He was really begging me! I did it one time and hated it! Well, I did do some live shows later, you know, private things, 50 people on a Saturday night. But a live show in front of an audience of strangers that had just been walking around on the street? I said, Listen, Joe. Oh yeah! It was Joey Silvera. He was the guy! I said, Joe, I can’t do this. The whole thing was just stupid. They’re staring at you. Some are probably jerking off in the corner. Who knows? Those theaters are dark, you know what I mean? And you’re up on fucking stage.

So I continued selling chandeliers. Of course, a few months later, my father-in-law came to me and said – can you guess? – he said, I’m sorry, Bernie. I’m not retiring! I’m not giving up so quick! I have a couple more years left in me. That’s about when I said, Fuck this! and began making movies full-time. But now I’m kind of ahead of myself! Should I tell the story of how I first got into porno? Quickly. It’s a great story. How I did one scene and went on from there. Because I was really just doing a lot of commercials. As a PA, you know, Production Assistant. I got the job from my friend Michael, my roommate in college, who wanted to be in the film business. There was this pocketbook called The New York Guide to Something or Other. He went around to every little company in the book until he found a job as a PA. One day, he asked me: Do you want some extra work? You could be a PA, too.

The first movies that I worked on were commercials. I remember a few with Joe Namath for some shaving product. Schick, maybe? They would bring in a crew and make a film. Director. Cameraman. Lighting man. The whole bit. And, in those days, people that made commercials also made porno movies. Same exact companies. They made commercials. They made industrial films. They made porno movies. Many times, someone might be great at shooting a commercial, so they’d hire the guy for an X-rated picture. It was horrible! He would get so flustered by seeing naked people that he couldn’t shoot straight. He was out of focus. He was over here somewhere when he should have been over there. And they didn’t really concentrate on sexuality, you know, they would just shoot it like a regular film. They didn’t care about angles. It’s all about the angles! But no one knew that then. No one even brought it up! No one.

And that’s how it went. For years.

*

I’ve always wanted to do a book and tell every aspect of the business from my perspective. Why I went into it, what actually takes place on the sets, the lifestyle, the different people, through the decades. Acting, writing, directing, running companies. Because I’ve done it all. And I’ve always wanted to, well, communicate. I’m a communicator.

Seven years ago, the year before Obama, I was set up with a writer. He had done biographies with some famous sports people. Joe Namath? Could have been Joe Namath. Or Nolan Ryan? That name sticks out for some reason. We had four or five meetings, and then he went to Vermont. Just for a trip. He was married, but he met some girl on a hippie commune farm up there. Yeah, he met some girl with two kids and fell in love. He sent a – what do you call it? – Dear John. But for a female. What do you a call a female Dear John letter? Dear Whatever. Dear Mary. I don’t know. I only know Dear John. Dear John is you’ve been dumped. A guy has been dumped by a girl. But the opposite? I don’t know what the opposite is. Anyway, he dumped his fucking wife here and married the girl with the two kids and became a hippie commune guy in Vermont. I didn’t realize they still had those places. Vermont’s a great state!

And that was the end of the bookmaking for a while. I did try to write it myself, but that was terrible! I just can’t focus. I probably have – what’s that called when you can’t focus? – A.D.D. Yep. I definitely have slight A.D.D. I had a friend with heavy A.D.D., and she gave me these pills, but I hated them. It was horrid! I was up all night. They made me like speedy, you know what I mean? At times, though, I definitely have a little A.D.D. Focusing just ends. You could be telling me anything, and I won’t hear it. Any time you talk about machines that happens to me! My whole life, I’ve had this battle with machines. It’s bad, man. Many people have tried to teach me computers. I even paid this guy, you know, to come to my house and give me lessons. Everything he said just went right over my head. It was like a wicked science!

Science was always my worst subject. I was good in English and History. And sports! And pop culture! I had so many records. Hit the Road Jack was my first 45. And my father gave me Mack the Knife by Bobby Darin. That was 1960 when I was ten years old. Roses Are Red (My Love) by Bobby Vinton was the first 45 that I actually went out and bought myself. It’s My Party: Leslie Gore. Locomation: Little Eva. The Four Seasons first record: Sherry. I remember them all. Like I just saw Clint Eastwood’s movie about the Four Seasons called Jersey Boys, and they were singing these old songs from the ‘60s. I knew every single one of them – boom! – I could name their first seven hits. And yet, I can’t remember my favorite movie director from, you know, last week. But I remember every single record and when they came out in order. I can remember that perfectly! So I still remember things. Don’t worry about that!

I just can’t remember... Christopher Nolan. He’s my favorite director! I loved Inception. I thought Inception was spectacular. I watched it seven times. And I loved the way he did Batman. His original picture was called Memento. Tremendous. I watched the whole movie – this is like a year ago – and when it ended, I went to bed immediately. I don’t know. I must have been tired. Anyway, I woke up the next morning and – guess what? – I couldn’t remember the entire ending. I had no idea what happened! The picture Memento is about a guy who forgets constantly. Like he’ll see you, and ten seconds later, he’ll forget who you are. So he illustrated his whole body with pictures of things that were important to him. And he took little snapshots of everything. He had like a 1,000 snapshots. And he would write on them where and when he saw this person or that person or whatever. So he’d write and take his little Polaroids and he was like an illustrated man.

As opposed to now, these porno girls are all like illustrated women. They’re all tatted up from the bottom to the top. Across their tits. Everywhere! More and more and more. I just shot a movie and like four out of the five girls were entirely illustrated. I see more girls with tats now than guys! Because, originally, who got tats? Military men. They got shipped to some foreign post and put their mothers or their girlfriends on their arms. I remember, in like 1990, there was only one actress who had tats. And hardly anyone would hire her. She was basically blackballed. No one wanted to see tats back in 1990. This tat thing started like five years ago and has just gotten bigger and bigger. Every new girl that comes into the business now is covered in tats. Like tons of them! Amazing! Why am I talking about tats?

*

I think my father might have had a little tattoo. I can’t remember. If he did, then it wasn’t a very good one. Because they didn’t really make good tattoos in those days. They would just throw a little something on for the army guys. My father was in the army, but he was on the planes. You didn’t have to be in the Air Force to get put on a plane. And if you were a Jew, then they would make you a shooter, right in the open part. Oh yeah. I found that out from different places. Here and there. Jews go to the open part of the plane, you know what I mean? Of course! They’ll be the first ones to get shot! But they’ll also be doing the shooting.

During the war, no one really knew much about the camps or anything that was going on. But afterwards, my father was obsessed. When he wasn’t working, or working out, he would sit in front of the television. He’d either watch the Sox game or anything that had to do with the Nazis. He spent hours and hours watching shows about the Holocaust. To the point where, me and my sister, we would make jokes about it, you know, I kind of understand. There’s this tremendous new station on television called American Hero. They do the greatest job ever of covering WWI and WWII. From these shows, I’ve learned so much that I didn’t know before. And I knew a lot. I love history! So I can watch these Hitler shows for hours. I’ll be watching a game and then switch over, you know, on the commercial. What’s going on here? Some great battle. Some great general I didn’t know before. This and that. Dwight Eisenhower smoking cigarettes, one after another, after another.

When I was younger though, what did I care? I’m basically anti-war. Vietnam was just beginning. I don’t want to hear about your fucking wars. Okay, dad. I know what you did. I mean, at least I know what he told me. My mother – the Mars! – who knows what she did? She used to always tell me, she’d say, Bernie, it’s alright to have little white lies. Just don’t do anything really bad. Don’t rob. Don’t murder. Don’t fuck with people, you know what I mean? But little white lies are okay... and she had huge white lies! First of all, she had been married before. To a doctor. From New York! Who wasn’t even Jewish! And her mother, my grandmother, pleaded with her to come back to Boston and find herself a nice Jew. Even though this guy she married was a doctor! So eventually, after a couple of years, she came home.

I think that’s when, somehow, her age magically changed and – boom! – she was ten years younger. She had already been married and didn’t want anyone to know. My mother did not want to be an old maid. And here she was, again, in her 30s now, looking for a guy, and needing to be set up. I think they were introduced. I’m pretty sure that’s how it happened. Abraham and Frances Cohen. And the whole time, my father was like five years younger than my mother. But he always thought he was five years older! Yeah, my aunt Rosamond told me that. I haven’t spoken to her in years. I don’t even know if she’s still alive. But when I went back to Boston for my mother’s funeral, she said to me: You know, your mother was the oldest one in the whole family. Look at her birth certificate. You’ll see how old she really is.

I thought she was 81. And she was 91! The Mars was ten years older than we thought! And previously married! That’s two little white lies. They didn’t hurt anyone, though, right? So what’s the difference?

*

Today is the 1st of June. When I woke up this morning, it was cloudy and freezing. I didn’t know how many jackets to wear. An hour later, at the dog park, the sun is shining. That’s the way it’ll be all month here in Los Angeles. June Gloom. That’s what they call it. And I’ll be 65 years old this month. I was born in 1950, right in the middle of the century.

I don’t really remember anything big from the ‘50s. White picket fences. Everyone wore the same clothes. The men wore suits. Unless they were blue-collar workers and then they wore uniforms. Women all wore the same outfits. Everyone was the same! But the economy was doing great. The soldiers came back from the war and received money from the government to buy a house. Start a little family. That’s how people got their original homes. My parents probably paid like $3,000 for the place in Sharon Heights. South Main Street. A few miles from where the Patriots now play in Foxborough. I still remember details from that house. Like when I was seven years old, and my cousin – who now lives in Beverly Hills – would come over. He would take the train to Sharon and stay over at our place for the weekend. I remember playing croquet or volleyball in the backyard. Badminton.

When I was 12 years old, my father set up these bags in the basement. Small bags. Heavy bags. He wanted to teach me how to be a boxer. He was in a lot of amateur fights and wanted me to follow in his footsteps. He was a puncher, you know, lefty, 5'6", kind of small, but a tough guy. Big shoulders. Back then, all of the men wore those little white T-shirts. The guinea Tee – what do call them? – wife-beaters. And that’s what he always wore. Or do you remember those original male bathing suits like the big fat wrestlers used to wear. The one-piece things with the little strap. I’ve seen pictures of my father as a young man, and he was wearing one of those. Striking some pose. Listen, if you run your own business