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Born 10-9-70 in Laguna Beach as Shannon Michelle Wilsey, she used the porn name Savannah, based on her favorite childhood movie about a rich girl who reforms criminals - Savannah Smiles. Savannah had that innocent unattainable child-woman look that porn buyers crave. The blonde porn star appeared in 78 X-rated movies and at her peak earned $4000 per sex scene and $1000 for posing for the video box cover. She stood 5'6", weighed 105 pounds and measured 34D-22-30. "I was standing on the exit for Laurel Canyon Boulevard," writes Savannah in her Fan Club Bio form for manager Nancy Pera, "holding a sign that said "HOT BLONDE WILL f--- FOR BIG MONEY IN PORN MOVIES". This porn executive pulled over with a dump truck full of money and said, "You've got yourself a contract." The rest is HISTORY." "Savannah reminds me of a Chinese emperor's concubine with bound feet and a doll-like appearance who exists solely for providing sexual pleasure," says Pat Riley. "The problem comes when you see her in action (in-action?) - she lies like a log." (X-Rated Videotape Guide 4) Savannah filled out a Fan Club Bio form for her manager Nancy Pera. In answer to the question: "Maybe some info on yourself (growing up, relationships, whatever)," Savannah scrawled "NONE OF YOUR BUSINESS!! f--- you. Unlike all the major "Bulls---" publicity I received when I first got in the business (1990-1991) I am not willing to tell about my current or past relationships or anything not pertaining to "Savannah"." In the same form, she listed her favorite food as mashed potatoes, her favorite music as The Beastie Boys, Nirvana, Stone Temple Pilots and Soundgarden and her favorite persons to work with on camera as Randy Spears, Jamie Summers and Jeanna Fine. To the question "What do you look for in a relationship?" Savannah wrote "SEX, ROCK-N-ROLL/MONEY/HAVE YOUR OWN LIFE, FUN, FUN, FUN." "She was a professional party doll," says smut scribe Marc Verlaine. "She loved sex with rock stars. She loved the rock scene. She was a supergroupie. In porn, she was a big fish in a small pond." "She wanted to be somebody special," says Savannah's manager Nancy Pera. "Even though she acted like a rebel, she wanted everyone to like her. And when they didn't, she'd act more wild." "She was a scared and insecure little girl who needed unconditional love all the time," says veteran porn actress Jeanna Fine. "Savannah tested people. She pushed them to the limit to see how they would react. Although she feared rejection, she'd on purpose make people dislike her. So she could avoid the possibility of someone rejecting her, she'd reject them first." Shannon Michelle Wilsey was born at Hawthorne hospital in Southern California 10/9/70. Her mother Pamela Longoria was a 17 year old runaway and an unwed mother. Her supposed father, Mike Wilsey, was an year old 18 Post Office clerk. He doubted that Shannon was his child. Pam told E!: "Once she was born, his words were, 'Oh, I wanted a boy.' Then he left." Pam and Mike married 18 months after Shannon's birth. They divorced angrily three months later. Pam moved to a suburb of Fort Worth, Texas, and found work at a grocery story. She married Joe Longoria, who had four kids of his own. The couple had three more kids. They renamed Shannon Wilsey as Shannon Longoria. She was a cute girl who got lots of attention and popularity because of her good looks. Shannon blossomed into a beautiful teenager and told people she was destined to be a movie star. Shannon didn't see her father until she was 13 years old. Watauga Middle School officials told Shannon that she could not enroll under the last name "Longoria." It was not legal unless she was adopted. So Pam and Joe told Pamela that her birth father was Mike Wilsey who lived in Southern California. Shannon was stunned. E! True Hollywood Story put it like this: "Almost overnight, Shannon Longoria, popular A student, became Shannon Wilsey, angry rebellious teen." Pam: "She started hanging around a certain girl who got her to skip school. We caught her one time and asked her, 'What were you doing in that field across from school?' And she said, 'Smoking marijuana.'" (E!) Pam sent Shannon to live with her uncle Mike Winnett, Shannon's uncle, who lived in Mission Viejo, Southern California. Shannon was too much trouble and quickly shipped back to Texas. Over the next three years, she bounced between half a dozen different homes in Texas and California. "Her mother and I had problems," says Mike, a plumber in Ventura, California who was born in 1952. For years he didn't believe that Shannon was his child. "I feel remorse that I used my anger against Shannon. A man should love a child no matter what." (GQ) At age 16, Shannon went to live with her dad in Ventura, California. "Once she got there," says Pam, "she realized that she wasn't what she thought she'd be - daddy's little girl. He already had other kids and she didn't fit in." (E!) In 1986, Mike Wilsey sent Shannon back to her uncle's home. Mike Winnett: "I remember taking her, walking through the Mission Viejo Mall and I was just amazed at all the heads cranking left and right." Shannon was a beautiful young woman. E!: "During those years of being passed from home to home, the young teen was allegedly molested sexually by someone close to her. In 1986, 15-year old Shannon told her uncle about an incident she claimed happened years earlier." Winnett: "She had just come back from the pool and his spouse wasn't home. And Shannon had been dating some of the other boys in this apartment complex and he figured that she lives here and doesn't pay any rent. She's going to pay one way or another. That's the way she interpreted it to me." A childhood fantasy that stayed with Savannah all her life was to date rock stars. In her five years in porn, she conquered rockers of the past three decades - Slash, Greg Allman, Billy Idol, Vince Neil, Marky Mark, Axl Rose, David Lee Roth and Pauly Shore. The only one who remained her friend was Pauly - the son of veteran comedian Sammy Shore and Comedy Store owner Mitzi Shore who didn't like their nice Jewish boy going out with a porn star. A few weeks after Savannah's death, her former lover Billy Idol entered St. Joseph's Hospital in Burbank - the same facility where the porn star died July 11th - for emergency treatment of a drug overdose. In 1986, at age 16, Shannon Wilsey obsessed over her face and figure. She rarely left the bathroom, let alone the house, without wearing makeup. One day in San Juan Capistrano she spotted a tour bus belonging to Greg Allman. At age 40, he was the eldest of the Allman Brothers, a 1970s rock band. With a friend, Shannon pulled up to the bus and asked who the rockers were and where they were playing. That night Shannon connected with Greg Allman, on the rebound from three failed marriages, including one to Cher. A few nights later, Allman, Shannon and her uncle Mike Winnett did cocaine together before a concert. During the 1980s, Greg Allman's drug excesses became well documented. Shannon toured with Allman around the country the next two years. Off the road, Shannon lived with Greg at his apartment and with her uncle Winnett. Mike Winnett: "He was calling her every night. He'd talk to her for two to three hours on the phone. And I thought, 'Wow, this guy must really care for her.' And she was talking about, he wants to marry me..." (E!) Pamela Longoria: "She liked the fact that he bought her expensive things that we could never could. And that he was famou. Maybe a father figure..." (E!) Winnett: "He had some good connections. He'd been in the business a long time. He told me that he was going to get her into the modeling business." Winnett remembers Shannon receiving packages in the mail from Florida. She'd take them and go into the bathroom. One day he discovered her in the bathroom with a spoon, a lighter and some tar heroin. In the late 1980s, Shannon got background parts in three of Allman's music videos. "Initially she was sweet and regular," says Kirk West, Allman's assistant tour manager. "She went out a snotty little s---." (GQ) Greg Allman refuses to talk about Shannon Wilsey. After Shannon turned 18, Allman ended their affair. She returned to California and told her family that she was pregnant. She eventually miscarried. Shannon moved back in with her dad Mike Wilsey in Ventura. At age 19, She worked in a clothing boutique on Main Street in the San Fernando Valley, went to the beach every day and studied for her high school diploma. The blonde stood 5'4", weighed 105 pounds and measured 34B-24-34. She missed the attention and excitement of her time with Allman. Shannon found the attention she sought by showing off her body at the beach. She met model Hillary Halbert. Hillary told E!: "I thought she was really pretty. So I introduced myself to her. And I asked her if she had ever done any bikini contests. She said that she would be interested in doing something like that." In October of 1989, Hillary and Shannon entered a bikini contest in Ventura. They encountered the future porn star Racquel Darrian who won the contest. Shannon finished third. Racquel recalls that she was a poor loser. Darrian introduced Shannon to her friend photographer Mickey Ray. Ray told E!: "I'm always looking for new talent. Racquel broke the ice and got her attention and I was able to talk to her. I thought she was really pretty. She was like clay ready to be molded. But after I got to know her more, she probably had more street smarts than I did." A few days later, Shannon posed topless for Mickey Ray. Ray: "She had no problem with it. She was very open about it..." A few days later, Shannon moved in with Ray, "sharing her body and her dreams with the photographer." (E!) Shannon asked Ray if he knew where she could get heroin. She used to steal his prescription medicines. One evening in 1990, Shannon met bass player Billy Sheehan. She became his girlfriend and took him to see her first movie The Invisible Maniac. "The youthful actresses bare their bosoms about every five minutes... The morbid, puritanical effect, axiomatic in schlock exploitation fare, is that sex, represented by all that bared flesh, just has to trigger a wretched excess of violence." (LA Times) Shannon Wilsey played Vicky in 1990's Invisible Maniac, a cheerleader murdered while showering in a girls locker room by a crazed high school physics teacher. She also appeared in the 1991 R-rated film Legal Tender where she cavorts topless in a bubble bath with right wing talk show host Morton Downey Jr. Shannon's other B grade R-rated release was 1990's Sorority House Masacre 2. The beautiful blonde wanted the fame and fortune of a star actress but she wasn't ready to work for it the conventional way. While leafing through Chic magazine one day, Billy Sheehan saw his girlfriend spreading her legs. He felt shocked. Savannah cried that she needed the money. Billy made her promise not to do it again. A couple of months later, Sheehan walked by a newsstand in New York and saw on the cover of $16 Squeeze magazine, his baby wearing a tiny black dress he'd bought her. In her mouth she had a guy's prick. (GQ) Savannah had drifted into the sex business. First she did lingerie modeling, then nude modeling, then softcore bondage and fetish work under her first stage name Silver Kane (a reference to a heroin syringe). Sharon did her first explicit work for VCA - a girl-girl scene in 1990's No Boys Allowed. Mickey Ray tells E!: "I was...putting together two movies - Racquel's Addiction and an all girls movie No Boys Allowed. She called up wanting to do a layout. I told her I'm not shooting any layouts right now but I am shooting a movie. "She liked girls. She felt more comfortable doing girls..." In mid 1990, Shannon began doing Mickey Ray's porn movies. Her first appearance paired her with Racquel Darrian. Shannon was scared. Racquel: "It was strange for me just as much, because I wasn't into women. I've never even fantasized about them... I was more of the shy person but now I had to be the aggressor. Part of my money was in this movie and I wanted it to look good." E!: "Nervous and unsure, Shannon arrived for filming two hours late. Before she could have sex on camera, Shannon suddenly demanded a heroin fix. "In place of heroin, Mickey Ray coaxed Shannon through her first sex scenes using doses of prescription drugs." Ray: "I had a prescription to Valium. So she says, 'I need another V.' I said, 'You're not going to be able to talk if I give you another V.' Over the course of a day, I gave her five Vs." The movies were shot over a two day period and released later in 1990. Ray: "The editor called her a fish when he edited it. 'She didn't make any noise. She didn't move.' Probably because she was all V'd out. She probably just wanted a place to lay down." A few days after the shoot, Shannon begged Ray for more work. Ray: "She wasn't into being a hooker or using sex to make money. She was more into fame and being popular, a star." (E!) In August 1990, low end porn distributor Video Exclusives (aka Leisure Time) signed Shannon (through sleazy producer Perry Ross) to a one year contract to do 25 pictures a year at $250 per scene, plus an extra $250 if she featured on the box cover. Mark Carrier's Video Exclusives (VE) put out all types of X material - black men with white women, shaved pussies, women who squirt when they come, obese people, huge breasts, chicks with dicks.... "We take sevens and turn them into tens," says Mark who ships his women off to a plastic surgeon in Utah. V.E. paid for Savannah in 1990 to have 435 ccs of saline solution pumped into her breasts to make them bigger. Mickey Ray told E!: "Everything I've heard about these people [Video Exclusives], particularly Perry Ross, has been bad. I've met him a couple of times and he came off as a big mobster gangster kind of guy. But she signed with him anyway." As a bonus, VE bought Shannon a sports car and rented her a studio apartment near Hollywood. They also bought her a breast job. She chose the porn name Savannah. Savannah became close to Perry Ross who supplied her with the pain killer Percoset. Hillary: "Shannon would get her Percosets from her dentist. She got her dentist through Perry Ross. Perry was nice to Shannon. They liked each other." In January 1991 at CES, Shannon met veteran actress Jeanna Fine. They hit it off immediately. Jeanna: "It's girlfriends and then some. It's watching movies late at night under the covers, sharing popcorn and cuddling and smooching. All the things you love about women are the same things that I love - they are soft and sweet and smell good. Plus we get to share clothes. It's the best of all worlds. But I also felt like her protector. Sometimes I felt like her mother." (E!) During 1991, Shannon began doing a gram a day of cocaine. Her relationship with Perry Ross changed. Ross and his friends made sexual demands. Ray: "They would come in a limo and pick her up and she had to do certain things. She had to do favors. The way I understood it, she just got in the car and went for a ride and once or twice she came back in with tears in her eyes. It was weird." (E!) In the Spring of 1991, Ross was found dead in Amsterdam with a syringe of heroin up his ass. E!: "No charges were filed but the peculiar circumstances of Ross's death surprised noone in porn." Ray: "He had a lot of enemies." Journalist Mike Sager writes in GQ: "Savannah enjoyed acting. She learned her lines and suggested nuances. But her sex performances were mediocre. She had the self-absorbed exhibitionism of a high-fashion model. Once the sex started, she seemed to excuse herself from her body. Editors dubbed in moans and groans. "Most women in the industry say they enjoy the sex and that you have to like it or you'd go nuts. You show up for work and you let yourself get carried away; you fall in love with your scene partner for as long as it takes to get the film shot. Then go home. It's like getting paid for a one-day affair." (GQ 11/94) Savannah didn't even try. One story had her on all fours on a bed, taking it from behind. Out of the frame, she fingered the leaves of a potted plant on the night table. "Come on Savannah," said director Paul Thomas, "Say 'f--- me' or something." Savannah looked over her shoulder at the actor inside her. "f--- me or something," she said, then went back to playing with the plant. (GQ) Despite her uninspired performances, men loved her sweet innocent face and she covered dozens of boxes of X-rated tapes. In the summer of 1991, Savannah moved on to Vivid Video for another one year contract. Vivid signs about half-a-dozen beautiful women a year, making about eight movies with each one, and spending big money on advertising. Owner Steve Hirsch, whose father Fred worked for porn godfather Reuben Sturman, hired mainstream art directors and fashion photographers for the box covers, spent more than $100,000 per film and used six days to shoot a script. "Vivid didn't just sell movies, it created porn superstars." (GQ 11/94) Savannah outsold all other Vivid movies six to one writes GQ. Her success was part of the reason she was so widely hated. Vivid paid her $4000 per movie plus royalties and shot her in eight movies a year. Steve Hirsch told E!: "She had a beautiful face. She had an angelic look. And a beautiful body and she had that something special that allowed her to connect. People would look at her and just go, 'Wow, I can't believe that this girl is doing adult movies.'" Other porn actors felt jealous of her mainstream star status gained by dating rock stars like Billy Idol, Vince Neil of Motley Crue, David Lee Roth (who's never been the same since), Danny Boy, etc.. (GQ 11/94) "No matter who Savannah went out with, whether it was Pauly Shore (they ate take-out from Chin Chin together and got massages on Sundays), Vince Neil (they shared lines of coke) or Billy Idol (they attended orgies while on ecstasy) the progression was similar. After a hot-and-heavy few months, when the novelty of dating a porn star wore off, the men always broke up with Savannah." (GQ 11/94) David Lee Roth and Greg Allman came to ignore her. Slash broke her heart when he left Savannah after nearly a year, and married his ex-girlfriend. Savannah fell apart after that break-up which she refused to talk about. "Give me a few years to get over it," she said. The blonde porn star's hold over men diminished as they got to know her. Literary pornographer Anais Nin described women like Savannah in this passage: As June walked toward me from the darkness of the garden into the light of the door, I saw for the first time the most beautiful woman on earth. A startling white face, burning dark eyes, a face so alive I felt it would consume itself before my eyes. Years ago I tried to imagine a true beauty; I created in my mind an image of just such a woman. I had never seen her until last night. Yet I knew long ago the phosphorescent color of her skin, her huntress profile, the evenness of her teeth. She is bizarre, fantastic, nervous, like someone in a high fever. Her beauty drowned me... By the end of the evening I had extricated myself from her power. She killed my admiration by her talk. Her talk. The enormous ego, false, weak, posturing. She lacks the courage of her personality, which is sensual, heavy with experience. Her role alone preoccupies her. She invents drama in which she always stars. I am sure she creates genuine dramas, genuine chaos and whirlpools of feelings, but I feel that her share in it is a pose. That night, in spite of my response to her, she sought to be whatever she felt I wanted her to be. She is an actress every moment. I cannot grasp the core of June. (The Diary of Anais Nin. Vol. 1, p. 20. New York: Swallow Press.) "Such people know they are lost," says Dr. Robert Stoller. "So they are vulnerable to those who promise them a connection. They are not just willing to serve as fetishes; they have no other options. Their need is as fierce as addiction. The fetish wants quickening; will that not happen in the stabbing aliveness of sexual excitment? Imagine: millions of men. "...[Men] use her as their whore, cheaper than the cheapest, an uncomplaining target. They deal with a female, who, being only a piece of paper [or videotape], is defenseless and unthreatening." Savannah clipped and saved every article about her, blacking out with a magic marker any mention of her real name Shannon Wilsey. Those who worked with Savannah hated her. "Ice Queen," "Cold Bitch" and "Evil Cunt" were frequent descriptions. When she made it to the set, Savannah was either animated or detached, depending on how long it had been since her last fix. During 1991, Savannah's addiction to cocaine increased. With Jeanna Fine, she partied frequently with rock stars like Billy Idol. Rolling Stone editor Peter Wilkinson told E!: "You're talking about two communities that share certain qualities and certain vices and a certain uninhibited character. Porn actresses could be considered exalted groupies. From the rock star perspective, there's a certain aspect of conquering. If you can notch a porn girl, that validates your inner sexual soldier." E!: "In the summer of 1991, Savannah thought she had found a rock star who wanted more than a conquest. Romance blossomed after Jeanna Fine unselfishly arranged a date for Savannah with Motley Crew front man Vince Neil." Vince told E!: "She was beautiful. I loved everything about her. She was gorgeous. Great in bed. There was nothing she wouldn't try or do." Jeanna Fine: "I told him several times, 'Don't her. Don't tell her that you want to have a relationship if you don't mean it because she doesn't need to hear that.' Then I would hear from her that he had said, 'Let's start looking for houses. Pick out any house you want. Jeanna can have her own room." E!: "In August [of 1991] Neil took Savannah to Hawaii where he gave her some bad news." Neil: "I think that she thought that we were boyfriend and girlfriend. But I was going through a divorce at the time and she thought it was a little more serious than it was. We were more like party buddies." E!: "Neil dumped Savannah without even a goodbye, a pattern of rejection that marred Savannah's life had once again resurfaced." Jeanna: "She was heartbroken for a while but picked herself up very quickly and moved on." In September of 1991, Savannah moved on to comic Pauly Shore, son of Mitzi Shore, owner of LA's famous The Comedy Store. Pauly Shore said in 1994: "She was just different. She was unique. And my mom saw that. My mom...wanted her to do standup." Jeanna: "He was the first one to ever introduce Shannon to family. And she just basked in it. She loved his mom. He was a really good influence on her. "She started becoming comfortable with being Shannon. She also started to become uncomfortable being Savannah." But not uncomfortable enough to leave porn. Pauly Shore said in a teary 1994 interview: "She was just so caught up in the whole Savannah thing. In being this starlet. And this was one thing I couldn't dig. I couldn't deal with the fact that she was doing porno films." (E!) In 1992, Shore ended the romance. Savannah sought relief in cocaine. In January 1992, Savannah won the Adult Video News award for Best New Starlet. The Award show takes place in January each year at the Consumer Electronics Show (C.E.S.) in Las Vegas. In her acceptance speech, Savannah said that she knew everyone hated her and she didn't care. Pornographer Ira Levine aka Ernest Greene is a regular at such gatherings as the CES. "When you're surrounded by people who study each other's faces for a new line or blemish, you see how important externals are in our business. "The performer's do a remarkable job of making themselves appealing. Many of them as raw material are not that wonderful. "Packaging is what the show is all about. "Most of the X-rated production companies have booths where one or two female stars will sit around in revealing attire and give autographs with lewd inscriptions to passers by. The vast majority of people who line up for these are not related to the industry and have nothing to offer, which, after a while, makes for a cranky girl. "On the one hand, it's flattering to see a line of drooling lechers here to get your signature and spend two seconds looking down your cleavage. On the other hand, it's, 'When will these guys go away?' " "At night there are big functions orchestrated by the companies. Everyone gets dressed up, and they stand around, drink in hand, and make deals just like at the Cannes Film Festival. Then they stagger back to their hotel rooms and collapse. "There's a dramatic division between the performers and the creative people versus the business people. The atmosphere in porn gatherings tends to be predatory, with the rules of street culture in force. What you have are bosses, primarily male, trying to get a little more than they're paying for from talent, primarily female, trying to give them a little less than they're buying. That many of the performers are insecure, dysfunctional, and frequently in need of a few hundreds bucks worth of employment frequently renders the contest uneven." (Porn) After receiving her 1992 Best New Starlet award, Savannah left the stage and made her way through the crowd. She sat tonight with her girlfriend Jeanna Fine. "They were lovers, fellow junkies. Jeanna was a few years older, a sort of journeywoman in the industry who'd worked herself up to become a feature performer. "Jeanna knew Savannah was demanding. Sometimes, when Savannah started her s--- - "Honeyyy, I'm getting pissyyy" - Jeanna would look at her and laugh. "Feed me, do me, buy me," she'd chant, "the Savannah national anthem." Jeanna had dark hair and dark eyes. Her film persona tended towards dominatrix: at one time she'd done private outcall as such, commanding $1000 an hour. "Jeanna said she was "totally, completely, in love with her." She went slowly, got to know Savannah as few did. Jeanna knew how fragile Savannah was, that her bitch thing was really a protective force field, that she was so insecure and needy that her relations with the world were skewed. Jeanna knew about Savannah's passion for fuzzy slippers and macaroni and cheese, and for pink things and for flowered sheets and lace. "Jeanna knew the way Savannah rubbed her tits all over after she shot up; the way to touch her, the way to talk to her, to make her moan. Savannah needed constant care. She was dead inside, very lonely. Jeanna pampered her, sometimes ordered her around. Jeanna knew that a woman's clit was between her eyes." (Mike Sager, GQ 11/94) With her time in the spotlight passed, Savannah returned to her table to find Jeanna talking with Amber Lynn. "I don't want to hang out with Amber," Savannah whined to Jeanna. "This is my night." Savannah turned her back on them and marched to her room to look at her fan mail. One letter read: "Savannah, you're terrible. Why don't you retire? Stix R." The porn queen replied in her round careful schoolgirl print. "Stix: "You don't even know me and you never will. All you know of me is what you see on my movies, which you have obviously taken the time to see in your pathetic "terrible" life. You know that you could never be with someone like me. I am the BEST/CLASSIEST woman ever to be in this business. You should feel lucky to have seen me on film. Get a f---ing life, asshole!!! Save your hand for jerking off - not writing stupid letters, you worthless piece of s---. Savannah." Savannah wouldn't give her father her phone number. His born-again Christianity made her feel even more guilty about her lifestyle. He wrote long letters in printing similar to hers. "Please don't think I don't care. I do very much. I hope you can talk to me more. I'd like to have your phone number." *** Mike Wilsey wrote his daughter: Dear Shannon, may daughter. I love you. Too much time has gone by since we talked on the phone - I'm glad you could be honest with me about your situation. Please don't think I don't care, I do, very much. I hope you can talk to me more, I'd like to have your phone number. I've started to write lots of different times but have not been able to get out the right words. This time I won't analyze, I'll just speak from my heart. I know you are in a very tough place - I wonder why I don't come down there and save you from all that stuff I worry about but I know its not me who is going to save you. I am here to help any way I can but unless you ask me, I fear I'd just be pushing you away. I want to remind you of some things I know about you. You have a sensitive and loving heart, your love runs very deep but it has not even been to the surface of your emotions. You have a beautiful and strong love inside you and also a very deep need to feel the same kind of love. I remember the looks on your face that telegraph your feelings and thoughts - seeing you make the same expressions I made. I remember the picture of you in Texas with the fish and the sadness I feel when I think of you growing up there without me. I am sorry that you had to be exposed to all the pain a child goes through without love from both parents and it breaks my heart to think that pain is still at work inside you. Shannon, your life has been hard - but I want you to know that the only God who made this place and you has also made that deep love that is in your heart. There is nothing that can overcome love - not anything in your life or mine can kill that love. Things may try to cover it or hide it. But once it is found, it will grow and conquer all things. Never believe the lie that love has left your heart! I am sending you this kids book (Tell Me Secrets). I just thought, I didn't intend it for you but I know I should give it to you. The pictures in there make me want to cry - they stir that love in me, and that love in turn causes me to think of you. Please call me. I LOVE YOU. Dad PS Although this book is for kids it has some good answer to life's secrets. I like the ones on victory, love & greatness. Don't forget that I love you just the way you are! *** In a vitriolic two-page reply, Savannah wrote: "You do not care about me and you never have. If you're "there for me", where were you 23 years ago? Where were you when I bounced from "relative" to "relative" because NO ONE WANTED ME? Where were you when I was 17, going out with Greg, a 42 year old man (looking for the father I never had)... You are so fake and I will NEVER FORGIVE YOU. YOU THINK "God" has - but if there is a god he sees the torture and pain I have been through since I was born and couldn't possibly forgive you! You will die knowing that YOUR 1ST BORN CHILD HOPES YOU ROT IN HELL WITH ALL THE PAIN I HAVE - INSIDE OF YOU." Mike Wilsey never received the letter. After his daughter's suicide, he found the letter among her stuff, folded neatly and placed, along with torn-up pieces of another of his letters, inside an envelope thatshe had addressed and stamped, but never mailed. Savannah's dad had prayed about hiring a private detective. Her mom acted indifferent though Savannah showered her with presents and money. When Savannah returned home to Austin, Texas and revealed her heroin addiction, her mother dismissed it as a phase. (GQ) Savannah said in 1994 interview: "Both my parents know that I am in the business and my mom thinks it's great because I make so much money..." In the Spring of 1992, Savannah connected with Guns n'Roses guitarist Slash. But on April 3rd, 1992, Savannah acted up at the New York celebrity hangout Scrap Bar. A smashed Savannah fellated Slash in the middle of the bar. Then she got up, walked up the stairs and collapsed. The incident hit the pages of People magazine a week later. Angry and embarrassed, says E!, Slash denied the incident ever happened and then married his former girlfriend. "That was it for Savannah," says Rolling Stone journalist Peter Wilkinson. "She told friends that she was not going to talk about it for years, she was so hurt." Savannah coped with the pain by using heroin. Savannah and Jeanna broke up after a big fight in the summer of 1992. They'd gone to Palm Springs with a sugar daddy. Savannah held the heroin, thirty bags. The two had a spat and Savannah refused to give Jeanna her fix. Jeanna wouldn't beg. "While Jeanna waited in the hotel lobby for a car to the airport, dope-sick, wishing she were dead, Savannah strutted past in a thong bikini, another girl on her arm." (GQ 11/94) In 1992, Rolling Stone photographer Ian Gittler began a book about Savannah and her colleagues (eventually published in 1999 as "Porn Star". Ian told E!: "Every few years a porn actress comes along who raises the visibility of the entire industry... And Savannah was definitely that person and I think that everyone in the industry knew it." In July of 1992, Savannah returned to Pam Longoria's home in Texas and told her brother Jeremy that her life was wonderful. Jeremy: "It always put a smile on her face to see one of us because she was giving us something. She seemed very happy." But during the week with her family, Savannah ran out of heroin. Her happiness turned to vomiting. Pam: "She was going through withdrawals but I thought she had the flu... I didn't know it was because she had run out of drugs." (E!) Later in the month, Savannah traveled on a publicity tour to New York and successfully begged Nancy to buy her a heroin fix. In December of 1992, Savannah made her last trip to Austin. Twenty pounds overweight, she bounced from heroin to cocaine. In an industry that shoots on a shoestring, Savannah was known for pulling such stunts as walking out in the middle of a production when a beloved rock star came to town. Vivid eventually fired Savannah (early 1993) for her erratic ways and she returned to Video Exclusives, a step down. Ian Gittler told E!: "Savannah had seen just how big a porn star can be. And I think that when she was there, she realized 'This is it, this is what it is?' I don't think it was satisfying for her. It didn't erase whatever emotional baggage she'd been carrying with her up to that point." Vivid director Nancy Pera was a rare porner to befriend Savannah. Nancy began acting as Savannah's manager and mother figure. Pera: "She liked fame. She liked attention. She liked being someone. She liked adoration from fans. I don't think she ever knew what love really was. I don't think she had a grasp on being loved, how it felt to be loved. And she wanted so desperately for everyone to love her. "She had IRS problems. She had a big home up in the Hollywood Hills. She bought art work. She lived a Hollywood starlet's lifestyle on a porno starlet's budget." Savannah also had a $200 a day heroin habit. In March of 1993, a judge in Ventura County issued a warrant for her arrest. She had never reported to her probation officer for her 1990 drunk driving conviction. Randy Spears: "She was very uncertain about what her future might be, as a lot of us are in this business. What do you do after porn?" Desperate to revive her career in the Spring of 1993, the 22-year old blonde made a series of cheap sex videos for Video Exclusives. She got her breasts enlarged again, to DD. And after a week long struggle, she kicked her heron habit, replacing it with cocaine, alcohol and pills. Gittler: "Savannah was drinking Saki bombers. And she actually opened up her vest to show me her new breast job and it was a new breast job. And that to me was a sign that her career was definitely in decline." (E!) She took up John Bone on an outrageous offer in June 1993. Savannah did an eight man gangbang for seven-and-a-half hours, the longest time she ever spent on a set. By contrast Nici Sterling did 20 men in 1997, every one anally as well as nine Double Penetrations in just two-and-a-half hours. In Savannah's typical style, she interrupted production every fifteen minutes for makeup or coffee and only allowed four of the eight men to penetrate her. Director John Bone: "I came up with this idea of taking the world famous ice queen and putting her into the most intense pornographic situation...that was so removed from anything she had ever done...that it would stand the industry on its ear. I got lucky." (E!) Nancy: "Yes it was pretty bizarre. One, she needed the money and John paid her her price." (E!) Savannah earned $9000 and this review from Adult Video News for Starbangers 1. "She's an active slut hound in this tape, taking on eight guys at once, sucking dick as thought there were a penis famine in the Ladies' House of Corrections, allowing her body to be doused in champagne, then immolated with the searing heat of jizz. And you thought Savannah was a boring f---." Savannah's phone stopped ringing with offers for work. At the end of 1993, she told her friends to start calling her Shannon. Gittler: "Even though she didn't articulate it particularly well, I think that she knew that this life in porn was a bust and pretty close to the end of her life, I think she may have been looking for some kind of a way out." (E!) Needing money, but receiving few video offers, Savannah took her strip show on the road. She fueled her act through cocaine, which she called "dance medicine." "That gave her a sense of power," Peter Wilkinson told E!. "She could feel in charge. Because you had these guys salivating at the stage and tossing one and five dollar bills at you... At the end of some of these shows, her knees would be bruised and bloody." In April 1994, Savannah filed a police report, claiming that she was being stalked and someone had broken into her Studio City home (at 3802 Multiview Dr). Later she bought a watch dog and a large handgun. "She used to sleep with it under her pillow every night," remembers Nancy Pera. "But she didn't have a clue to the reality of a gun. She treated it like a water pistol. She'd wave it around. She'd point it at people. She'd come to my apartment and put her purse on the floor and it would fall out of her purse." In May 1994, she turned down a lucrative dance booking in Canada so she wouldn't have to cross the border without her drugs. "Because of that incident," says Pera, "she lost a lot of jobs." In early June 1994, Savannah was fired by a Florida nightclub for starting a brawl. In mid June, a Las Vegas club let her go for skipping a performance. Other clubs became wary of hiring her. Savannah threatened to sue Vivid Video for money she claimed was owed her. The threat was ignored. The IRS sent Savannah a letter claiming that she owed thousands in unpaid taxes. Panicked, Savannah begged Vivid to take her back. Savannah called her mom. Pam: "She told me that she wanted out of the industry. That nobody would accept her into regular TV because she'd been a porn star. She said that sometimes I wish that I could just blow my brains out." In June, Savannah began doing telephone therapy sessions. She recalled a haunting childhood memory of being molested. Nancy Pera: "She remembered someone close to her putting her on a bean bag and dressing up in women's clothing and molesting her sexually. It was very traumatic to her. It affected everything about her life after that." (E!) "Julie Smith [nude model] was horrible to Savannah and Savannah adored her," says Pera. "Savannah would come over here hysterical after she'd been out with Julie because Julie had talked so badly to her. Julie would say to her, 'Shannon can come visit but leave that f---ing porn slut Savannah home.' "And yet the reason she became friends with Savannah was that she was Savannah. And that bothers me. Everybody who was not in the business discriminated against the Savannah persona. But that is what originally attracted them to her. She'd always been rejected and dumped and shipped around as a Shannon. "Even Paulie Shore did it. He did an interview which, thank God, she didn't live to see. He really badmouthed the industry and said what a schizo, what a scatterbrain porno women are, and he mentioned her several times." .................................. With the IRS and others closing in on her for money, and with an out-of-control drug habit, Savannah partied Sunday night, July 10th, 1994, with an acquaintance Jason Swing. She'd phoned Danny Boy of the rap group House of Pain, but learned from Jason, Danny's house sitter, that the Boy had been on the road touring for a week. Four of Savannah's other 'friends' told her they had plans. Unable to be alone, Savannah spent Saturday night and early Sunday morning with Jason at her place before driving him home. They never had sex. Sunday night, Savannah and Jason hit the Renaissance Club in Santa Monica but it wasn't exciting enough so they drove to Danny's house for a couple of hours. After midnight, Savannah drove Jason to her place, speeding recklessly in her white Corvette. Eighteen months later, another porn star - John Stagliano's girlfriend Kristi Lynn - drove recklessly to her death. As Jason screamed at her "Slow down", Savannah ploughed into a fence a few hundred yards from her home and smashed into a tree.The collision sent a fence post right through the radiator, banged Jason's knee, bloodied Savannah's face and sent her into hysterics. They nursed the car home. Savannah's face dripped blood and muccous. They washed off in her bathroom. Jason wanted to call a doctor but Savannah said no. Savannah called her manager. "I was in a major f---ing accident. Please come over right now." Used to Savannah's pleas for help, her manager Nancy Pera dawdled for 15 minutes before leaving. Jason suggested to Savannah she slip into the jacuzzi. He turned it on for her. Savannah stumbled to the garage curled up in a fetal ball beside her wrecked car and cried, just as Alex Jordan would shed final tears a few months later over the death of her bird. Jason found Savannah in the garage and stroked the top of her head, avoiding the blood. He told her she'd be ok. Then he said he was going to turn off the jacuzzi before it overflowed. As Jason walked out, Savannah reached for her 40 caliber semiautomatic Berretta. Jason shut the door. Savannah pointed the gun at her head. (GQ 11/94) As Jason shut the door on Savannah in the garage, Savannah shot herself through the head. At first Jason told police that he was walking Savannah's dog when she killed herself. Now he admits that was a lie. He didn't want to be blamed for not stopping Savannah's suicide. Closing in on Savannah's place, her manager Nancy Pera saw the 25 feet of fence that Savannah ripped up. Pera passed a rescue squad which couldn't find Savannah's place. She arrived to find Jason throwing up on the front lawn. Pera went back down the hill and led the rescue squad to Savannah. Her exit wound looked like a tropical flower in her hair. Friends and family gathered around a brain-dead Savannah at the hospital Monday morning, July 11th, 1994. At 11AM, Savannah's father requested that the life support system be shut off. It was the first time that he'd seen his daughter in four years. An odd assortment of 40 persons gathered for Savannah's funeral. Some only knew Savannah by her real name of Sharon Wilsey, others only knew her as Savannah. Some knew her as both. Savannah's family limited the number of her porn colleagues at the funeral. "People ask me if pornography is wrong," says Savannah's father Mike Wilsey. "I say you can judge a tree by its fruit." (GQ) Savannah's peers says that if the industry contributed to her demise, it was by turning her into a pampered star whose whims were indulged and tantrums endured. "I don't blame the industry for mistreating her," says porn actress Danyel Cheeks. "If anything, they spoiled her rotten. They put us on such a high pedastal. The limos are sent out. Anything I want is pretty much done for me. Sometimes it makes the real world hard to deal with." Pauly Shore hosted a reception after the funeral. He told Savannah's mom that it was inevitable that Savannah would commit suicide. Given the way Savannah lived, she was sure to die young. Savannah's suicide shook up Pauly. "She was the nicest, most beautiful girl I ever met," he says. "Her suicide was a very dramatic thing for me. "She became Savannah. She became her character, who was into drugs, and needed reassurance all the time. She forgot who Shannon was. "I knew she wanted out [of the porn business]. She said to me: 'What do I do? I don't know anything else.' "Her looks were starting to fade - that was tough for her. She wanted a family, but she felt that her past was going to haunt her so much. "That's the main thing in this business. Don't become your character. Grow up and learn. Life is your biggest teacher." (LA Times) Mike Wilsey adopted Savannah's eight-month old Rottweiller. The porn star's wardrobe was auctioned off. After Mike cleaned out her place, he left this note written on the back of a manila envelope, addressed to Savannah's soul: "Dear Shannon: "I'm sorry for not being there - I'm here now and I will always be there. See you in heaven! I love you and now I hope you know. "Love. Dad." Savannah's mom Pamela Longoria told E!: "I would like her to be remembered as a sweet little girl that I raised that I was such a good sister to her brothers and sister. Past that, I guess she'll have to be remembered as a great X-rated star because she was well known..." A year after Savannah's death, Pam filed a wrongful death suit against rock star Greg Allman. It was settled out of court. Jeanna Fine told E!: "She depended so much on her youth and her beauty to get her everything in life and the people only loved her because she was young and beautiful. I think that if she had started to grow old, she wouldn't have. I really think she would've stopped the process of time. She did. She got to do that. She's young and beautiful forever now." Screw headlined the news of Savannah's suicide "DING DONG THE BITCH IS DEAD". "Everyone knew that she was an airhead, and now she's got the hole in her head to prove it," read the text. At the bottom of the page ran a picture of Savannah with X's drawn over her eyes. The picture was inside a coupon to clip and mail. "I'm not brain dead! I'll subscribe!" A young man wrote to HEVG editor Michael Louis Albo. "I went to the local newsstand to look for your new issue which, by the way, wasn't present yet. Well, I looked at another brand X, totally lame magazine [Adult Video News] and was shocked and saddened to hear of the death of Savannah. She was only 23. She once danced near where I live. Maybe there is something you or I can do, like start a foundation in her name to help our troubled youth. It was so sad to read her father's farewell notes in yet another lame, aimed-at-the-mentally-impaired magazine. I believe that some of these adult stars need our help and our prayers. I'm so sorry that this had to happen to Savannah and her family. This tragedy will be remembered and heartfelt by her fans. We should pay tribute to this woman who made others happy." Albo replied: "We do not choose to become involved with any type of money-making plan, no matter how well intentioned it might be, to help out our youth or any other similarly disenfranchised group. The only thing a weak-willed, self-absorbed thing like suicide does is leave a horrific mess to be cleaned up by the people left behind. Yes, it's sad that Savannah felt life was no longer worth living, but please don't make her into some kind of pole-axed sacrificial lamb led down the slaughterhouse ramp to satiate the lusts of a corrupt and sexually twisted society." "The thing I dislike most about pornography today," says Christian Shapiro of Hustler magazine, "is that I am going to die. My death may be four decades away, but it surely is due to arrive sooner than I want it to. Each day I have less time left. Each passing second becomes a treasure to be savored, and anything that robs the moment of its glory is robbing me of my very existence." Though obviously a sensitive soul, there's more accounting for Christian's torment than a heightened vulnerability. He knows too much. His brain holds far more guilty knowledge than it can assimilate. A few years ago, heroin became the refuge of choice among established porn starlets. "One can overlook the addictions of any three or four actresses, but I must shut down a section of my grey matter, rendering myself a little more brain dead than I was when I began watching whichever junkie of the moment began sucking cock." Suicide is a touchy subject notes Shapiro. It seems that the only time a porn star can get on prime time TV is when she puts a bullet in her brain. "That some of the women would rather obliterate themselves than tongue another asshole for the home-pulling public, tends to take the fun out of viewing." (HEVG) Savannah's death and heartfelt pleas like the above failed to dim the tide of persons eager to perform in porn. Across the hall from Christian Shapiro's office at Larry Flynt Publications, HEVG editor Michael Albo received this note. "Please read this letter and give it to a successful producer or casting director. I don't have an address, so help me out. I am an attractive male in my 40s and I have 25 years of anal sex experience with my wife and my collection of huge sex toys. Over the years, I have developed a fine set of anal lips. We've always thought it looks great and I would love to do someone like Rambone, Robocox or Long Dong Silver. I am just as good as any woman, and I would do it for an agreed-upon price. And if I didn't do it with actors, maybe I'd just use my toys. And if not that, maybe a trained, restrained orangutan or donkey - only where legal, of course." The owner of Hollywood Movie Posters, a memorabilia store in Las Vegas, Erik Dorr, maintains a shrine at his home to Savannah. John Bone's 1998 contract girl Zoe, who resembles the late porn queen, visited the shrine along with AVN (3-98). A conspiracy nut, Dorr now owns almost everything Savannah ever owned, including her clothes, drivers license, date book, an empty pill bottle, and the autopsy report. Fox Files 5/25/99
E! True Hollywood Story 1999
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