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Wednesday, December 9, 1998

Gloria Leonard writes: "Although I shouldn't even give you the time of day after your astoundingly unethical behavior last week, I am compelled to respond to the vitriolic vomit pouring out of your site
regarding Paul Fishbein and AVN. It's really interesting how all the losers, who obviously have nothing better to do with their time, attack the winners, the people whose accomplishments have made the adult industry what it is today. Trust me, after being around this biz for 23 years, I am one of the few people who can attest to the strengths and weaknesses of many of the players. I have known Fishbein since virtually day-one of AVN and while we may not always see eye to eye on everything, he is a f---ing genius, which is essentially what all those yellow-bellied yahoos are jealous of! There isn't a business on earth that doesn't generate criticism of its major players and we're no different! Damned if you do, damned if you don't and I like, Paul, think most of the wretched ramblings submitted to you, originate from the shriveled dicks and brains of cowardly wankers who wouldn't recognize real talent if it smacked them in the head, which is what most of them deserve to have happen!

"Just remember, if it weren't for AVN, the FSC, VCA, Vivid, and many others who have also fought all the legal battles to keep the government out of our bedrooms and video stores, there would be
no adult business."

Gina Ryder writes: "I would like to clear up some issues that have been previously printed on your site. I do not believe that I am better, smarter, or better looking than other girls in the adult industry. I believe that in making the decision to get into the adult industry it shows that the individual has courage, strength, and dignity. We have made a choice that will effect us for the rest of our lives and have made the choice to be in the adult industry based on our own feelings and not on what society has portrayed. Therefore, I do not think and would never say that a girl in the adult industry is a dumb bitch. I do not think that a girls ability to become a star is based on whether or not she does anal sex, or does drugs, or even if she does or doesn't have breast augmentation. It is based on her ability to be reliable and to perform. I have no reason to attack talent with such trashy statements that have been printed on this site. I do not judge a persons character based on gossip or
rumors. I make my decisions based on my own personal experiences with that individual. And in doing that I have found that there are a lot of unique and wonderful individuals in this business and that the rumors are basically b.s. Moving on, I do not and have not provided Jim South with oral pleasures and I do not f--- for free or use my pussy, cunt, or mouth to get work. I am registered with both Reb at Pretty Girl International and Jim South at World Modeling and I have no reason to hide that from anyone. I was also briefly registered with Damien Michaels. I do presently and have in the past had lunch and dinner with Jim South, along with other directors and talent. And yes I have accepted the invitation to sit at the World Modeling table for the AVN awards show. I would like to clear up that I have f---ed TT Boy, however, I was NEVER RAPED. I don't believe that he wants or needs to do that to anyone. As far as my marriage is concerned, I am separated and I am in the process of getting divorced. I did not leave my husband for PORN; my decision to leave him was based on other issues that I do not wish to discuss. Since the separation he has said and done many harmful things including fabricating lies that have been printed on this site. I would like to end this by saying that I am not interested in outf---ing or outacting anyone. Therefore, I will have to decline the offer to have WAR with any talent."

Who Gave Scoop To Luke?

Smoking hot interviews coming up with Gene Ross and Rob Black, whose general manager delivered a dozen roses to Russ Hampshire this afternoon to apologize for Rob's nasty comments. Rob says, "I'm a beaten man. AVN whipped my ass. Paul Fishbein beat Rob Black. I'm in shock."

I talked Gene Ross from noon to 1PM, Wednesday.

Luke: "Is there more bellyaching this year about the awards?"

Gene: "Luke, I don’t know. Maybe all the bellyachers are using you as the vocal front? We used to get all these scattered calls. But now you’ve become Complaint Central. Better you hearing this stuff… Now all I have to do is read it. It looks like you’ve been updating every hour."

Luke: "Did you have any thoughts on my Paul Fishbein interview?"

Gene: "I’d love to know who the hell was writing your script because you’re certainly coming up with better questions."

Luke: "Yeah, it’s not me. They’re sent to me."

Gene: "It reads like a lawyer is putting this s--- together. One question leads to another. It’s like a cross-examination process. It’s well constructed, like someone with legal training.

"This is like the movie Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid. It’s like this anti-AVN cabal out there. It’s hysterical. If some of this stuff wasn’t so out there, I’d have to laugh at this. It’s amazing.

"Again, we always talk about perceptions and reality in this business. You can take five totally disenfranchised events that have nothing to do with each other and with a little creativity you can
weave a tapestry that is so complex and outrageous, that you have to say, ‘that makes sense.’

"It almost has me playing guessing games. It’s like an Agatha Christie novel [who’s feeding Luke these questions?]. Who dunnit? Who’s the suspect? This question might come from this source and this question might come from this source? Now wait a second…"

Luke: "Yeah, it’s somebody who knows Paul. I wonder if it is someone still on the inside?"

Gene: "My suspicion is somebody who follows the industry and has been around a long time. I’m reading stuff I’ve heard, this is folklore tales. Now, if you’re in the industry long enough, you’ll hear that this happened, and this happened and that happened… If it gets told often enough it almost becomes truth through repetition even though it might have little substance in fact.

"As long as I’ve been with AVN, I’ve heard ‘bribes, bribes, on the take…’"

Luke: "What did you think of the Premiere article?"

Gene: "I thought it was very funny. Being on the inside of the business, and knowing it better than the average reader, I saw errors in it. I thought ‘they got this person wrong. They were physically describing somebody as Greg Dark. No, it wasn’t Greg Dark. It was somebody else.’ Greg Dark doesn’t wear a feodor. On the whole, it was absorbing. It added a few vocabulary words to my lexicon."

Luke: "Do you feel that Paul Fishbein was being 100% forthright in his interview with me?"

Gene: "The only thing that I kidded Paul about in that whole article was when he said I was running a ‘family’ trophy business. I said, ‘Paul, that was my business. Family doesn’t have anything to do
with it. And when you start saying ‘family business… East Coast,’ Luke is going to think, ‘they’re Mafia. I’ve proved it.’"

Luke convulses with laughter.

Gene: "Yeah, the trophy business is really attractive to organized crime.

"It was my business. I had it for seven years… When I moved out here [1991], that was the end. Goodbye. I’m close with my family and Paul made the logical assumption that it was a family business. I still have contacts with trophy distributors, so I’m able to get distributor prices on behalf of AVN."

Luke: "Ok, these questions were prepared for me. I’ve heard through several sources that you’ve accepted bribes for good reviews. True or false?"

Gene: "In my life at AVN, I have never been offered a bribe. No one has so much as even hinted or suggested. However, I want to take this opportunity since this is an open air forum, to throw in
something that has been gristling at me for a year and a half. There is a producer or company owner out there who accused me… He started spreading word around that he knew for a fact that he knew
that Gene Ross was on the take. And he knew for a fact that there was a secret desk at AVN where envelopes of cash were deposited on a regular basis and taken by the staff. I was the head
disperser. This guy never had the guts to confront me face to face about it, yet he openly threw that around for a while. And I just want this guy to know that I know who he is and I want him to feel
extremely uncomfortable anytime he is my company. That I am looking deep into his black heart and knowing what a piece of crap he is. You’ve written about him from time to time on your web site. So I’ll dangle that in front of you and let your sources try to help you put that little thing together. That riled me [18 months ago]. Everyone who works at this magazine is conscious about what is said out there, and so we go to even greater lengths to maintain our sense of propriety. There’s always the suggestion out there that these guys are on the take…"

Luke: "Has any porn star offered you sex in exchange for an interview or a good review?"

Gene: "Luke, I only wish that they did. No one ever has and I feel really bad about it. It’s made me self-analytical and wonder what is wrong with me. No, that has never happened. Although there was
one time I did interview a girl who felt compelled to take her clothes off and sit naked in my office while I was interviewing her. Perhaps that was a subtle suggestion on her part, but idiot me, I did not pick up on the hint."

Luke: "Is the awards show fixed?"

Gene: "Oh God, again. No. Every reviewer who participates votes with good conscience. They go out of their way to do the right thing. But it all starts with the pre-nomination process which takes all year. I put together a master list based on reviews and feedback from reviewers… ‘This was a great scene. This was a great tape.’ So I put all of this together. This year we had a 70-page list to wade through. So over the course of ten days we lock ourselves into a room and send out for Chinese…and taking leak breaks… Almost sequestering like a jury. Going over each and every category. Arguing the pros and cons of each and every possible nomination. Someone made the joke, ‘here’s a bunch of college graduates arguing about anal tapes.’ If the awards show was fixed, it would our lives easier. But we chose the path of most resistance and try to do the right thing. The people here work too hard and I really resent hearing that this thing is fixed."

Luke: "Some people believe that the Savannah Best New Starlet Award was fixed?"

Gene: "Again, popular urban myth. I was around then. Her chief competitor was Angela Summers. It was the first test of the premise of that award, in that we vote for the woman who has made the most impact on the adult business. The argument was that Savannah was everywhere. The counter argument to that was – Savannah was the beneficiary of a company that put her on a bunch of boxcovers. She was a Video Exclusives girl long before she went to Vivid. But she competed for Best New Starlet. But her high profile mostly came from Video Exclusives run by Perry Ross, who was putting her on every doggone boxcover coming out. They’d have four or five releases a month and Savannah was every one of them. She had an advantage. The critics? Everybody was saying ‘Angela Summers. She’s like the girl next door. I love her. I love her. I love her.’ Whether the critics were being forthright with me? I voted for Angela.

"I’ve been totally astounded by some of the outcomes in the past so nothing surprises me about the final tally. Sometimes critics bulls--- you. ‘Oh yeah, I voted for this girl…’ I never counted the ballots…

"Angela was a much hotter performer. I’d look at Savannah on the screen and say, ‘she’s just going through the motions.’ I vote for a starlet who has that screen presence of a hot sexual performer.

"A few years ago, Asia Carrera won for Best Female Performer of the Year in a year that I don’t think was representative of her work. She’s nominated this year. This was a much more powerful year on her behalf."

Luke: "Summers was certainly a more classy person than Savannah."

Gene: "Well… I think Angela just had accessibility. Savannah was cold and aloof. I had been to sets and she was just as aloof off camera. I was told ‘you weren’t in her inner circle unless you were a rock musician.’ I never fit the description."

Luke: "Were you ever a rock musician?"

Gene: "I’ve long had aspirations, but you know…"

Luke: "How about Alex Jordan? Is it just a coincidence that she wins Best New Starlet then is given a contract by Odyssey, a company that Paul Fishbein admits to being a consultant to. How do you feel about Paul being a consultant to companies? Do you think this is a conflict of interest?"

Gene: "I don’t know the extent of Alex’s deal with Odyssey. I’m not sure about that. Alex was another interesting case. Industry producers said, ‘who’s she?’ She was looking for a contract with a lot of different companies and I remember the comment that was generally voiced, that she wasn’t box cover material. So again, AVN took heat that she won that award. Again, it was the critics coming to the fore, saying this woman… I don’t know whether she was considered photogenic or not, but every sex scene I saw her in, she was a dynamo. I think the critics voted with firm conviction. It was a good choice. But we took a lot of s--- over that one.

"Paul does what Bryn does and I do… We’ll talk to companies and offer them suggestions. I can’t sit here and tell you conclusively what Paul did. Paul is the publisher of this magazine. We shared an office building with Odyssey [from ‘91-‘96]. He was aware of the apparent conflict of interest. I think he was sensitive to that perception. He wanted to get out of there."

Luke: "Do you get paid for consulting with companies?"

Gene: "No, it’s never been offered. I feel bad. This is an industry where people are always trying to get s--- for free. I’m always getting pumped for free advice."

Luke: "How is Paul Fishbein as a boss? Is he as difficult as many say?"

Gene laughs. "Paul can be antic but it comes from AVN being his baby. He’s very protective of it. You have to understand his roots. He developed AVN from a four page newsletter. He was a video store manager when he came up with the idea for AVN. AVN was his midnight oil occupation. He worked during the day while at nights he’s slaving over AVN. He cares about what he does, to the point where he’ll drive you crazy sometimes… He’s follow-through oriented. He eats and sleeps AVN 24 hours a day, seven days a week. He takes many of the criticisms to heart… He’s sensitive to them. I can understand that. I’ve been there with him almost from the beginning. At one time, he and I were the only two editorial people putting AVN out. I used to put in 18 hours a day, taking work home at night and on the weekends. Before computers got really sophisticated, I typed every word of AVN. Reviews came in, not on computer discs, but type-written. Or hand-written. And I’m transferring all the information to computer by hand [1987, when Gene started fulltime. He began as a freelancer in 1986.]."

Luke: "How did you and Paul meet?"

Gene: "I knew his office manager but I didn’t know that she worked in the adult industry. I knew her from a mutual stomping ground. We had a breakfast club. A bunch of us would hang out at a certain nightclub and afterwards we’d go to a diner and shoot the breeze. My little shtick was to see mainstream movies and do off-hand humorous reviews. Apparently, she got word to her boss who was editing the magazine. ‘Hey, this guy might be good to write reviews for AVN.’ I got contacted by him and it was just a matter of being in the right place at the right time. The original managing editor John Taone decided to leave the business. His wife didn’t want him to be involved in adult anymore. She wanted him to go out and get a "legitimate job" in the printing industry.

"I’ve worked in editing and publishing all my life. For a few years I balanced the trophy business and AVN. I worked for a suburban newspaper in Philadelphia for 18 months… Then I took a job in
public affairs with a Fortune 500 company. I had ten years experience in corporate PR. Then I went into the advertising game as a hired gun, as a public affairs advisor, for marketing products…
I was involved in many things. I introduced Bailey’s Irish Cream to the United States…"

Luke: "Is Gene Ross your real name?"

Gene: "I’m not going to comment one way or another."

Luke: "That’s smart. Did CDI offer you sex with Buffy?"

Gene laughs. "I saw that from Rob Spallone one time… They never did. Buffy is a sweet heart of a girl but hardly my type."

Luke: "Are you married or single?"

Gene: "Single, which makes it real easy for me. I don’t have to deal with that whole wife dynamic and that insecurity factor…"

Luke: "Does Paul Fishbein have sexual relations with any of the girls in the business? Particularly Jill Kelly, Chloe, Kylie Ireland and Alisha Klass?"

Gene: "I think Paul mentioned in his comments to you that Jill Kelly, he’s probably seen twice in the last two years and she wouldn’t know him to trip over him. Chloe I see from time to time. Alisha
Klass comes in from time to time. I haven’t seen Kylie Ireland for ages. Is Paul having an affair with them? I’d love to know how he’s pulling it off. I’d have to seriously doubt that. Paul is a married man
and this is a high profile situation… He’s a healthy red-blooded American male who, I’m sure, finds these women attractive, the temptation is there… But you’d have to be crazy. No."

Luke: "Do you know of Paul having sex with any of the girls in the business?"

Gene: "No, but if I did, there’s job security." (Laughter)

Luke: "Is it true that you are not allowed to review any of John Bone’s or Rob Black’s movies and if so, why?"

Gene: "We do have that policy. And I think the John Bowen thing was fostered by you after you started writing that s--- about me having a financial interest in Cream. That part was to keep it above
board. The Rob Black thing. Rob is a friend of mine. At AVN, we’re in a fishbowl where so many people know who hangs out with other people. Rob and I are good friends… We have a mutual
interest in professional wrestling. We go to wrestling matches… And Rob is like a kid brother to me. He’s a good person. He’s kind of whacked sometimes but he’s…creative… He has an edge
that many people don’t care for… I volunteered not to do his stuff because I don’t want to be in a position in print or otherwise to have to tell him that I don’t particularly like this or get into that
whole line of s---. So I take the path of least resistance and say better to have a friendship than sacrifice it over a couple of reviews. Somebody else can do that job.

"I arbitrarily pick what I want to review. I take a look at the box cover. I like anal tapes. That’s a well documented fact. I love the Evil Angel stuff… The Bowen situation prevails because I’ve known John for 15 years… I don’t want to put myself in the position of being the cause of bad feeling. It’s just not worth it."

Luke: "You were with Paul Fishbein in Philadelphia when he had the mainstream video business that failed. Why do you think it failed?"

Gene: "I think Paul was way ahead of time with that. He was promoting Japanese wrestling. It’s just now that wrestling has become a real big pop culture thing. Had Paul done it down now, it would’ve been enormously successful. It’s a timing element that was involved. Paul was way ahead of the curve. Paul was an avid wrestling fan. He’s drawn away from it over the last few years. The market wasn’t sharing the passion he was sharing. The market has now caught up to him but he’s like, ‘yeah, I could take it or leave
it."

Luke: "How good a businessman is Paul Fishbein?"

Gene: "Paul does all the right things. He is a list compulsive list maker…items of things to do and he follows through on it. He’s relentless on accomplishing goals. He’ll get ideas at 3AM and get
up and write lists. He does all the right things. I don’t know if he always hooks up with all the right people to accomplish those things… He’s intelligent, sharp…"

Luke: "Why did Sexpose fail?"

Gene: "I was the editor. You have to understand the magazine business. You have to be well-capitalized. You have to be able to withstand… Paul and I used to go to these magazine seminars in New York where they told you that you had to have capital to cover you for a year’s worth of publication. Sexpose was every other month. Sexpose had to, theoretically, be out there for two
years to catch hold. Paul had a business partnership…50-50.

"It was a combination of impatience to see results… You need capitalization and I don’t think they thought that out… And Sexpose never had a real clear idea of what it wanted to be. Sexpose wasn’t even the original name. The original intention was to be the adult equivalent of Premiere magazine. And it was going to cover the adult business as an entertainment art form… Then someone came up with the idea of let’s do it like National Enquirer. We had six months of meetings where we were going to do it one way, then all of a sudden, it was…try this. Then everybody looks at the first issue and says, let’s try this. I think the key to success on a magazine is that you follow through on your idea from beginning to end. Have one unifying vision.

"If it had been given time, it would’ve become enormously successful. And the stock of paper it was printed on didn’t do justice to many of the photos."

Luke: "How well do you know Yoram Dohan and what is your opinion of him?"

Gene: "Paul’s not going to like this… I like Yoram. Yoram is a slick operator. Smooth. Smart. I respect him. He was an Israeli commando, an office in the Israeli army. You have to have a certain
strength of character to have the background he had.

"The only contact I had with Yoram at AVN was that sometimes we would chat in the morning for 15-20 minutes. We’d have a cup of coffee and shoot the s--- about a lot of different things. Yoram had some ideas about where he wanted to take AVN. I don’t know about what went on between Paul and Yoram. Just boom, after 18 months, that thing went to hell. Paul relied on Yoram. Yoram was the go-to guy for everything and he was the guy able to carry-through on a lot of things. He started making inroads with different advertisers that we had never had before and he was aggressively opening up different markets for AVN. We were getting foreign editions of AVN. I don’t even know where that sits anymore. That’s pretty much gone by the wayside. Yeah, he was an innovator and I liked the guy."

Luke: "With Darren Roberts, do you resent that Paul brought in an outsider to run the company, in effect passing you over?"

Gene: "Paul at one time offered me that situation, to move from editorial into that. I saw a whole different set of headaches involved. Collecting money and that crap. I was just comfortable in the editorial niche because that’s what I’ve done all my life. I don’t want to put myself in position of going to ask people for money. That’s why I could never be good at taking bribes. ‘Oh by the way, what about an envelope?’ I’ve always been kind of funny that way. I just can’t knock on people’s doors and hound them for money.

"I had the Editor title. That’s like asking a Brigadier General whether they’d like to be a Lieutenant Colonel [lower rank]."

Luke: "Were there personal repercussions over the Rob Black award last year? The story is that the entire editorial department was banished to the warehouse as a form of punishment, and you, the most visible employee, was given a much smaller office. Do you resent that?"

Gene laughs. "A casual observer could say that… I’ve heard people say that. ‘What did you guys do to be out here in the warehouse?’ You get that crazy look in people’s eyes. ‘What are you doing out here?’

"Plans were already being made to expand AVN well before the awards show of last year. They were already building the office here. This was looked on as a temporary thing. We were growing and had no place to put people. True, I moved from a larger office space to a smaller one. But before I was in this glass enclosed thing, I was bubble boy. I had no privacy. Everybody coming in would stare at me as though I was on exhibit. So while it was a larger room, it was an uncomfortable feeling, to feel that I was on display. So where I am now is off the beaten path. Nobody interrupts me. I get a lot of work accomplished. I come in here at 6:30 in the morning and by 9PM I get more work done than many people do all day."

Luke: "I hear that AVN is on a youth kick and with your age and salary, you are considered expendable, particularly because the company is overextended?"

Gene: "I guess Paul’s admission that I’ve got a job for life rules out the expendable thing. Let’s make everything crystal clear here, with the exception of one person recently in editorial, I’ve hired everybody who works in editorial including Bryn Pryor. I don’t think Mark Kernes would represent a youth movement nor Tod Hunter with his salt and pepper hair would represent the youth movement."

Luke: "I’ve heard that you and Bryn Pryor don’t get along?"

Gene: "Somebody must’ve picked up a comment that Bryn supposedly made a couple of years ago, before he got to know me… He supposedly made a crack about "the mustachioed editor with the f---ing tan." An isolated incident that became folk legend that’s grown into this whole Hatfield and McCoys rivalry. Nothing could be further from the truth. Bryn and I have the same personality except that I’ve mellowed. Bryn is a firebrand. I hired him because he came with a reputation for fighting on behalf of his people. When he was over at Champion, he made sure that his people were taken care of. That’s a military mentality that a leader takes care of the people who follow you.

"Also, it took us by surprise that Mark Kulkis said, ‘I’m leaving.’ And suddenly we had to fill a major position. Bryn was at the right place at the right time."

Luke: "Have any video companies or magazines approached you with offers?"

Gene: "Absolutely. Not magazines but video companies… In roundabout ways… Nobody has ever said…"

Luke: "If you left AVN, would you stay in the adult business?"

Gene: "I’d want to become a porn star. Yeah, I’d stay in the adult business. I saw my first adult movie at 16 years of age. At that time I said to myself, ‘I want to work in the adult film business.’ This is 1963. I came from a background and an area where that could’ve been accomplished, but son of a gun, it worked out that way. I’ve found my niche. I’ve done the corporate suit-jacket and tie routine and I always felt like I was a square peg in a round hole. I’ve found my niche. The industry was made for me."

An email: "First of all, I would like to identify myself so no one considers me a coward and hiding behind my screen name. My name is Nikki. I was Robert Black's girlfriend from July 97-July 98.

"I have been reading all of this bickering back and forth from the various people in the industry who believe that last years award show was rigged because AVN staff "liked" Robert Black personally as well as saying he won all those awards because of the amount of advertisement spent with AVN. I can no longer keep my mouth shut from saying, "Those of you who don't know the whole story should keep your trap shut." I can assure you not only as Robert's girlfriend, at that time who saw things firsthand, but I was also in a "know all" position while working at Elegant Angel, that all of this is crap. If it were true that AVN was "bought into giving the awards" to the directors being attacked, then why did Patrick Collins tell Mr. Black, Mr. Byron, Mr. Damage that they didn't deserve those awards. Mr. Collins believed that last years videos were good however, they didn't merit an award. As a matter of fact, Mr. Collins wasn't happy about many things that happened at last year's award show. Mr. Collins didn't even attend the award ceremony. So please tell me, if these awards were given because Elegant Angel spent a lot on advertisement wouldn't you think Patrick Collins would have expected to win those awards instead of bitching to the directors telling them all they didn't deserve to win?

"Also, those of you who attended last years award ceremony saw what Robert Black had to say during his acceptance speeches (e.g. Russ Hampshire) as well as, I'm sure you heard the many actors and actresses make comments regarding Mr. Black during their own acceptance speeches? If Mr. Fishbein was partial to Robert why was Robert cut out of the AVN award show tape? Why was he cut out of the AVN award show that was run on Playboy? Why was everyone's acceptance speech that included reference to Mr. Black cut out? In my opinion, I thought that was extremely rude and juvenile. I believe this is enough proof to stop all this s--- about Paul Fishbein "rigging" last years award show because he liked Robert Black.

"Also for the record, I am not sending you this e-mail because Robert and I are friends and I wanted to stick up for him, As a matter of fact, the man hates my guts and walks around calling me "Psycho" because we had a bad break-up. Regardless of the personal s--- between Mr. Black and I, I wanted everyone to know they had the story wrong and I hope that by exposing the REAL inside scoop it will help put all the jealous gossip to rest!"

Folks who loathe Paul Fishbein, AVN, Vivid and VCA combined to produce this:

Vivid owner Steve Hirsch is dating the receptionist at Video Team. Does this suggest that Video Team is the new power player in the industry alongside VCA, Vivid and Wicked?

In a costly decision, AVN moved last year’s award show to Caesar’s Palace, thus upping the ante on award show tickets because of Caesar’s incredible overhead. The move, however, was made simply to cater to heavy metal music musician Mark Stone’s whims. Stone, head of Moonlight Entertainment and the brains behind the awards show, apparently had long harbored a dream of
playing Caesar’s Palace. Fishbein, and the rest of the industry, paid for the dream. A former Moonlight employee still close to Stone, says that Stone pushed for Caesars in the belief that a high visibility venue would secure a record deal for him. Stone apparently was being scouted by a record company and wanted to be seen performing in a prestige venue. But nothing came of the deal, says the source, because Mark’s talent is all in his head. He’s a garage band musician at best.

Paul Fishbein’s comments about a vanity project Smells Like Sex during Luke’s recent interview with him prompted response from a crew member who worked on Smells Like Sex. "Smells is a good word for it," says the person, "the script was bad and the shoot was botched from the very beginning. It actually had to be done twice. Fishbein handed the project to a crony of his the first time around and the scenes were shot so badly that the whole feature had to be scrapped and started over. Nothing was salvageable. Probably in an effort to bring Ben Dover more into the Fishbein loop, the British director was tabbed to do the remake. It obviously didn’t fair any
better. Outside critics gave the feature a thumbs down. So much for Paul Fishbein’s attempt to produce porn movies."

Chuck Zane has really been pushing for son Matt to win AVN’s Best Director Award. Matt was nominated for Depraved Fantasies 5. Sources say that Zane’s pressure on Paul Fishbein has been
incredible and if Matt wins, the fix was in. Zane was also pushing hard for Matt to win the Breakthrough Award but to no avail.

This email came from a fan who calls himself "Tessio." The fan writes: "Paul Fishbein has no one but himself to blame for the leaks out of his office. He cannot control his liquor. Fishbein gets a couple of glasses of wine in him and winds up confessing to everything including the Kennedy assassination. He’s racked with guilt. And you might want to ask him about Jill Kelly. Ask him about those little afternoon trips to the Airtell Hotel down the street. Most of Fishbein’s girlfriends made the Best Performer list this year. Amazing coincidence isn’t it? Paul’s the cause of his own problems. He doesn’t know how to keep his mouth shut. Now it’s coming back to haunt him. What makes this whole mess really funny is that he is getting sucker punched by Darren Roberts. It’s the whole Yoram thing all over again. Roberts is setting himself up for the takeover. Roberts is a slick little s--- and by the time he is through with Fishbein, Fishbein will be begging for Yoram to f--- him in the ass again. Fishbein will never know what hit him. And Fishbein’s flunky Gene Ross had better watch his ass too. Managing editor Bryn Pryor [Mark Logan] has been out to get him, trying to make him look bad. Ask Pryor how he pimps girls for Fishbein. Ask about Chloe. Isn’t f---ing a porn star a conflict of interest for a managing editor? Fishbein said it is."

XXX of VCA [supposedly] controls who does and who doesn’t get on a company boxcover. Many say that women have to sleep with XXX to get boxcover consideration. [Russ Hampshire of VCA replies: "I control who gets the boxcover. It's decided on the basis of who is the star of the movie. If someone does three sex scenes, they go on the boxcover."]

AVN has been covering up a story that Elegant Angel is being sued for $5 million by the wife of the policeman who was gunned down by Elegant Angel employee Israel Gonzales at the company’s
warehouse last year.

Another email from a fan: "Paul Fishbrain must not even attend his own awards show. In his interview with you, Fishbein states that VCA has won only one major award in the last five year. Fishcakes must’ve forgotten all the ones dished out for Shock, Latex and Sex. In the last five years, VCA has won 60 awards [11 of them gay]. You can look it up. What planet is Fishbait and Hampshire on?"

Another email: "Luke, you got suckered. Of course Fishbein produced a bunch of ballots and asked you to count them. They’re all fakes. This is how he does it. Fishbein gets extra copies of the
ballots made up. He fills them in to swing voting whichever way he sees fit, then reattaches the front cover from the original ballot so that what you see, of course, is a signed ballot. It’s all misdirection.
When some people started catching on to that gimmick, Fishbein had to go to electronic balloting to make it look good. But Darren Roberts, being the computer whiz that he is, has found a way to fix that too."

AVN's Paul Fishbein replies:

"Hey Luke: Don't you realize you are being duped? This stuff you e-mailed me is so much s--- that I could throw up. This fake named "Tessio" is getting his information confused. And you're buying into
it. Another phony taking shots, unable to identify himself because he's gutless. the nature of the internet is that anybody can say anything about anyone, no matter how slanderous or libelous. The kind of s--- spewing from this guy is slanderous. And it's criminal that you buy in.

First of all, who is saying that I want out of AVN? Is that you? Maybe I should make this clear. I've just started a couple of major adjunct things for AVN that will take years to develop. I'm not
going anywhere. You got that. I'm here.

I cannot control my liquor? Anyone who knows me knows that I hardly ever drink. There's nothing to confess to. What about Jill Kelly? Same old crap. I've met Jill two or three times and hardly
ever spoken to her. I congratulated her for her work in Skin: Cuntrol but at the Hustler party last week, she didn't even know who I was. Darren Roberts knows her and hired her to sign at our
booth. This guy is an asshole.

Yeah, ask me about those little afternoon trips to the Airtel down the street? It's the only f---ing restaurant worth anything in this area and I take clients there for lunch approximately once a week. So f--- him.

"Most of Fishbein's girlfriends are on the Best Performer list?" Again, I'm sitting here denying stuff that i have no right even justifying.

Nothing is haunting me and I have no guilt. Like Bryn said to you, nobody outside this office is going to believe us anyway.

And if Darren Roberts is sucker punching me, then I am the most stupid person on earth. Everybody should have someone like Darren working with them. They should be so lucky.

Bryn already answered the bulls--- about him..

AVN has not been covering up any story about Elegant Angel. We've been reaserching it to get the story correct, unlike the people who post on your site and make s--- up, we actually research it.

Actually, the guy is right about VCA because Shock, Latex and Sex each did win a major award, but Michael Ninn deserved the praise. I was getting my dates confused. It all runs together.

The last e-mail is crap again. Luke, you can sit here and count the ballots and check with the reviewers to see if they really voted that way. What else can I do? Nobody caught on to any gimmick so you know this is crap. And if the ballots were fixed last year, why? For what reason? Let this asshole look at the results and then tell me what my upside was to fixing it that way.

The part about Mark Stone and Caesar's Palace is stupid because I made the deal with Caesar's. Mark had nothing to do with that. It is a moronic statement beyond belief. As to whether Mark had a long time dream to play Caesar's Palace, I have no idea, so ask him. By the way, the Awards Show is a collaborative effort of a bunch of people. Mark's brother Gary actually produces the show and Mark writes all the original songs and directs the show, if you want to get your facts straight.

And with Smells Like Sex, a lot of that is true, but not all of it. The guy from Hustler (Christian Shapiro) who hates AVN and has ripped us in the past, gave it 3/4 erect, for the record. But my
attempt to produce a porn movie was a failure and, like I said in the interview, I realized that it is something I cannot do and will not do again. So shoot me. And it was a good gimmick, by the way.

With Chuck Zane, we've corrected the mistake about Matt Zane. He was nominated for Lust and Lies, not Depraved Fantasies 5. It's funny that the fix is in because Chuck Zane thinks his son doesn't have a chance. Truth is, nobody has voted yet. And if the fix was in, wouldn't it have been easy for us to just give Matt Zane the breakthrough award. They submitted his name, along with 20 other people, so this information is skewed a bit.

Finally, Luke, I don't have the time and energy to keep responding to these people, who obviously have nothing better to do that take shots. So let them say whatever they want, but I'm not buying in
after today, This is it. Anybody can stand behind an anonymous pseudonym and try to "take me down." It's the definition of a coward. Your source who fed you all those questions the other day
is a coward, and the e-mail guy (perhaps Tessio is your entire source) is a coward. And the power of this medium gives cowards a chance to say whatever they want.

All of you out there with your consiracy theories, these pussies who e-mail you without the guts to give their names and all the naysayers who have nothing better to do than take shots: You can all go f--- yourselves.

Luke then asked Paul: "Is Gene Ross's job in danger because of a youth movement at AVN? And were the editorial staff moved into the warehouse as punishment for Rob Black's wins at the 1998
awards?"

Paul Fishbein replied: "On the record, Gene Ross can work for me until the day one of us dies or until he decides to hang it up. He'll always have a job for as long as I'm in business. Gene was there for me when nobody believed in AVN, worked for practically nothing. We moved Gene's position around for his strengths. People who don't like Gene don't understand him. He's shy, defensive and hard to get to know. That's why people say, "oh, Gene Ross hates me." They just don't know him. It's his personality. He's aloof. But when you get to know him he's a warm, funny, generous, nice person. Many people who thought Gene didn't like them today think differently.

"The "banishment" to the warehouse is hilarious. We ran out of space. We are growing so much that we needed to build new offices and people volunteered to go back there or wanted their
own office. For the record, we even took new office space because we have an additional four employees who we don't have room for. So much for AVN's financial troubles or me wanting to leave. I should have taken you over to the new office where our new internet division is. Did you know we have a new internet trade magazine, Luke? Forgot to tell you. Oh well, I must be dying here. Now isn't that more interesting than........I guess not."

I talked to Mark Stone by phone just after 11AM. He burst out laughing several times as I read stuff to him.

Mark: "That's very entertaining. I found much humor in that. I must tell you that the decision over venue is not based on my whim. We [the AVN Awards] pretty much go where they'll take us. There are only a few places in Las Vegas that can handle the show and during the CES, a couple of those places are always booked every year.

"We make deals when we can where we can. Some years there are a couple of places that will take it, some years we are forced to go where we can. One prime example is when we were at the Aladdin. If we didn't do the Aladdin, we weren't doing an Awards show. We were relieved to be at Caesars, there was nowhere else really available to us.

"I've been doing music for years. I know record companies. I am not naive enough to think that if a record company sees that you've played at Caesars Palace, they would sign you. Two. When we do the Awards show, it isn't even the real band. It is a specialty gig. I don't see how anybody could sign a band from that."

Luke: "Do you think the AVN Awards are fixed?"

Mark: "We don't have anything to do with the awards. We just put the show on. But from my experience of being around it, the awards are not fixed. Fishbein bands over backwards with the voting... I believe in the integrity of the awards. Otherwise I might've won one or two awards over the years. They always invite people to look at the balloting. They keep the paperwork in the AVN office... I've looked at it. You see people signing off on their votes for every award. Believe me, people have won that I know for a fact if Paul Fishbein were just doing the awards based on his thought, they would've never gotten the awards."

Luke: "Are you a garage band musician at best?"

Mark: "Music is in the ears of the beholder. We're out there with our balls on the line... I'd challenge any band on the face of the earth to do the wide range of stuff that we do at the show. I'll let the
music speak for itself.

"Dyanna Lauren plays with us now. We've got four or five tracks recorded. And when we get the CD done, who knows what may happen.

"I take umbrage with the heavy metal description. That would insult heavy metal guys everywhere. I'm more of a heavy blues slash hard rock player."