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I began talking with Bill Margold around 11 AM, 5/1/98. We sat down alone together in a spare office across the hall from the PAW office and talked straight to each other, eye to eye. "Paul Vatelli was buried with his teddy bear?" LUKE: Yes, from several sources. BILL: Fascinating. Paul used me as a character actor in several of his movies. You posted at midnight, May First, about Marc Wallice. That meeting was confidential. It was supposed to come from PAW. PAW will be, whether Hart Williams likes it or not, the disseminator. My past with him is extensive and vituperative. If he wants to come after me, fine. He threatened me legally with one post but I did not understand what this was about. I am unsuable because I have no property. I am at PAW because I believe in what I am doing. I make no money from it. I've been paid by my last 25 years in the industry. The X-rated industry gave me 25 years of its time. Now I give back. My suffering now is a perverse payment for my 25 years of pleasure [in porn]. Somebody has to be here. Apparently you [Luke] are going after Sharon Mitchell and Jim South with every arrow, sling and dagger. It is dangerous. If you turn over enough rocks Luke, you will find a mirror. I can't have witch hunting in this business. Twelve years ago I told the Meese Commission, "Leave us alone. We'll destroy ourselves." People in this business, desperate to accuse somebody, eventually run out of targets and accuse themselves. Remember that statement that came out of the WWII: "First they came for the communists, and I paid no attention. Then they came for the Jews… When they finally came for me, there was no one left to protest." Will you be the last person on the mountain of your own misery? You [Luke] have made yourself the most hated person in this business, which is amusing. You did not start out that way. It all turned around on you last February when you ran with the John Stagliano -Nena Cherry HIV story. You got on the internet and went crazy with something that was very sensitive to this industry. Stagliano and Wallice will always be heroes and legends in the eyes of the X-rated industry no matter what you do. The more you go after these people, the more you will fall upon derision, which is what you want. You showed up at that class [PAW meeting 7/97] and were removed. Gloria Leonard leveled a volley at you and sent you spinning into the cosmos. But you have the net and it is a net of fools. I overreacted in the beginning to the net because I've been told that the net is not very important. You notice that I don't post much anymore. At first I thought the net was the information superhighway, the wave of the future, but I suspect this wave will crash on a disenchanted shore. The net allows those who have nothing else to do with their tragic lives, can get on the net and bray. I sensed that when I got on. But I thought that if I got on and told the truth, that people would want to read the truth. But they don't. They prefer fantasy and friction. They want to find out about the miseries of this business. Millions of people get off on this business, jack off with one hand, and push it away with the other. They may well get what they deserve - no business. The business may go back underground where we can do what we want. When I came into this business, we did not worry about disease. We worried about going to jail where you catch diseases. I've spent my time in and out of jail. I've paid my dues. When you [Luke] posted last Friday, without substantiation, that Wallice was HIV positive, you could've been sued. And it may still happen. Which may take the whole net down with you. Unless you can prove that Wallice was positive and knew he was positive, last Friday, you can be sued. If Wallice for nothing else than frivolity, in the time that he is going to have now, decides to sue you, don't be surprised if a bunch of pro bono lawyers climb into bed with him to get you. You want that though because you think it validates you. But with validation, comes excoriation. Be careful of what you want, because if you get it, you will have to deal with it. I am glad you came. I want to see if RAME posted what I wrote, after I found out that you did not intend to humanize this [porn's HIV outbreak]. Why are you going after Jim South? South is not covering anything up. There have been statements that Wallice knew he was HIV positive. If he knew, why did he come in here on Monday and get tested? If he knew he was positive, he would've imitated certain wise dogs, and gone away to die so their owners aren't distraught. But Wallice came here and got tested. I do not believe in any way shape or form that he knew he was HIV positive. Wallice was a scared gentleman, put in a state of panic by your notice, and he had to call his own bluff. We all prayed and he came back positive. LUKE: You heard no reports before this that he was positive? BILL: No. The meeting [4/30] came at a perfect time. It was supposed to be about condoms. I have the perfect ending for this chapter in your book: Recess is over in the playpen of the damned. All my adult life I have been saying this is the industry which is recess 24 hours a day and the bell of adult responsibility never rings. Recess is over, kid. Maybe you have become the headmaster in a more punitive age. I do not want to go on the net and let you take credit for all this stuff… You just can't use the net for your own field of cream. And you fancy yourself being brutalized. You like being ripped apart on the net. I hear that you handled yourself pretty well last Monday night. I was invited on to it but it is not my style. I did it once to defend the honor of Selena Steele after she had been brutalized by two of your cohorts - J.R. Wolfe and that idiot Mike South. South is so far out of the loop it is unbelievable. He is 3000 miles away and he does not know what is going on. At least you are here. He wants to be the center of attention. First you have to earn the right. How long have you been at this? LUKE: I started reading on the industry in September-October 1995. You were my first real contact in the industry. We met in January 1996. BILL: I get a lot of blame for you but I take everyone in. You came over and looked through my scrapbooks. Then you mishandled the Stagliano situation. You went wrong by taking credit for the scoop and gloried in it. You have to soften your blows. These are vulnerable, fragile, childlike adults. This is juvenile hall. You need to understand who these people are before you rip them apart. If you want to come after an adult, you can take me on any time. I am invulnerable. To take on Jim South… To post that he is hiding the facts… South does not even know the facts, how can he hide them? His primary concern is economic. Do you think he is going to risk his economic stability by hiding facts about people? When we have a trail of tests. We are going to get everything that has ever been done on Marc Wallice. And unless there is anything aberrant, we are going to believe that his very first positive test was this week. We have a whole pile of negative Elisa tests. Wallice, like the other legends in this business, operates to a different tune. They call their own shots because they've earned the right. He wasn't trying to hide anything. T.T. Boy just came in for a PCR/DNA HIV test and was negative. TT had just taken Elisas and did not feel that he needed to take a DNA. Because no one is going to challenge TT Boy. He is built like a fire hydrant. He could f--- cement blocks. I think that your post woke Wallice up to the fact that he needed to come in and take a DNA test. He is now going to be subjected to other tests and find what level… Apparently Nena Cherry has negative results. You've keyed her into an interesting hate monger… What does she want? LUKE: She is very upset. BILL: At you. LUKE: She feels like she has been maligned by me, Mike South, Brandy… BILL: If she's negative, then we barbecued someone unnecessarily. No one took into account her lupus, and cat bite. We probably (and it is very sad) that to preserve the legend of Stagliano, we sacrificed the specious legend of Nena Cherry. Both of them came up at the same time [2/97]. It is easier in this industry to sacrifice a female. Someone had to be the villain of two different horror stories and no one is going to villainize Stagliano. That's where you and I fell out. Stagliano lived an interesting lifestyle. Racecar drivers, bull fighters and sky divers live the same lifestyle. They smash into walls, get gored and slam into the ground. Stagliano will outlive all of us. Guaranteed. Stagliano funneled money to Nena Cherry and to PAW. We would do anything to bring Nena Cherry back into the fold, if she wanted to come back in. And with open arms and legs. If Nena needs to vent on the net… In my mind, I built up the net as the ultimate way to get the word out but no one wants the word. They want to read between the lines. The next move is yours. To extend an olive branch to the industry, that you want to help disseminate the truth, rather then perpetrate viciousness and lies. Or at least half truths, or misguided thoughts. Or theories or rumors, societies' farts. I despise gossip. That's the reason I never wrote about AVN before, because it's a gossip magazine. I finally wrote my first column in the February issue. I cried writing that column because it was dedicated to Viper [Stephanie Bishop]. I have not written another column because I've been waiting to write about this. It was going to be called: "Vultures of the Great." Because of the fire selling between the three clinics. We are only open three hours a day. [PAW Clinic] People have a lot of fun coming here. They feel like they are in the center of the universe. They feel cared for. They get teddy bears and jelly beans. Those other two clinics [Norton and North Hollywood] have lowered their DNA prices to $85 so they can put us out of business. We don't make any money out of this. We just funnel it back into PAW. The five dollars will enable us to build… Blonde woman comes in to ask for the PAW web site. There is none. BLONDE: What is the address for the information that has gone out? She is on the phone at home and she wants to read about…. BILL: Why would she want to go there? I give her the name of the rec.arts.movies.erotica newsgroup as well as my web site address and that of the Free Speech Coalition. BILL to Luke: I don't know if you want to be nice or loved or looked upon as someone we can count on for support rather than derision. It's your move now. That's what I offered in my email to you this morning. Subj: New scoop Date: 98-05-01 20:24:54 EDT From: masrom@earthlink.net (Michael Summers) To: luzdedos1@aol.com Luke; Ground Zero Entertainment decides to only shoot all rubber scenes both vaginal as well as anal. They are currently producing 4 titiles a month for Metro home video(BACKSEAT DRIVER SERIES, f--- YOU ASSHORE SERIES To Name a few)As well As all their productions for Elegant Angel(Bunghole harlots series) And Finally their Series for Leisure time Ent. (Prime time pussy and Beachside Bitches)... Producers called a meeting last night to talk about condom only porn. It just so happened that we got that afternoon the Marc Wallice test result. We told people to reflect on their own pasts. Had they worked with Marc over the past six months? If they had not tested DNA twice since last working with Marc, they should do so. VCA and Vivid and Wicked have donated $5000 each to FSC to pay for most of these tests. A lot of people cried last night. We love Mark and Stagliano. Patricia Kennedy got up and cried and that was cool. We don't love our women as much as we love our men, because none of the three women who recently tested HIV positive, have worked long enough in the industry to justify such adoration. And it is tougher to be a man. You have to prove yourself over and over again. Marc proved himself. A special person. Viper worshipped Marc. They worked together a lot. I know that Viper will be hurt when she finds out. And I ache for her. I adore her. She is my great love. It's sad that there is now going to be pain that goes in shock waves. I do want to see the net behave itself and extend the same consoling arms and minds that they did for Tricia Devereaux. I don't know if they consoled Brooke Ashley much. And I have not heard a damn thing about Caroline. You kept writing about Carolina. LUKE: I distinguished… BILL: Even distinguishing calls attention unnecessarily to someone's psyche. It hurts her. [Carolina makes several thousand dollars a month off her internet site by pleasuring herself with a dildo while avid fans fork over $3 a minute.] This [HIV positive status] is not a rumor to bandy about. It's like suggesting that someone in Nazi Germany was a Jew. You think the Nazi's would've investigated that accused man's bloodline? No, they would throw him away. You [Luke] do use your Judaism as a bloody flag. I was born Jewish. I was adopted. They say I'm three-quarters Jewish and one-quarter Irish Catholic. I believe that HIV was a genetically created aberration to rid the world of gays, minorities… I broke down when I called Marc last Friday. I am so sick of this created disease which has stumbled into our business. I did not know about Marc until you put it up there. How the hell was I to know that you did not have the facts to prove your case? Last night at the meeting, Jeffrey Douglas [chair of the Free Speech Coalition] stood up and said: If there are any reporters in this audience, they are not to report what is being said here. PAW will disseminate the information. Obviously someone told you. And you weren't there, unless you were hiding behind the curtain. Someone told you and violated a trust. PAW was put here to take care of the tragedies that take place in this industry, one far greater than HIV - the peer pressures, societal damnation, the economic upheaval, parental repudiation… PAW started just after the Barbara Doll situation (1995?). Do you have proof positive that Lisa Trego DeLeeuw died of AIDS. LUKE: Various sources. BILL: If you are going to be a good journalist when you grow up, you better get these death records…get some substantiation. What if Lisa Trego were alive? Do you want to climb out the morass or do you want to stay there? LUKE: I came here to let you speak to… BILL: The world? (Laughs) Which you consider the net. LUKE: I am just going to take what you say, transcribe it, and put it up on the internet. BILL: Are you going to transcribe what you just saw here? [Sharon Mitchell breaking into tears. She questioned if she was up to the task. Luke and Sharon hugging. Heartfelt feelings shared all round.] That Mitchell cried and you held her? That is what PAW is all about. We're allowed to cry. We are allowed to fell. PAW is a unique form of stuffed animal [teddy bear] that has feelings. I think Sharon is one of the great people of this business. She came along at just the right time to handle the horrors being perpetrated against this business. I don't think I could do it. I am the pillar of strength. I thrive on my enemies. I feed off their vindictiveness because I outlast all of them. I am eternal. That is my role. Somebody had to be. What drives me is the memory of Viper. She went crazy on speed and left at the end of May in 1991. Then after all the suicides, I decided that there would have to be something like PAW. Savannah was a name big enough to justify this. Viper told me that she had ruined me for anybody else. When you get the best, when you have driven a Rolls Royce, why settle for a VW? I enjoyed being a tour guide to Hades for Harris Gaffin - author of Hollywood Blue. I have become a monk in the business. I am not allowed to do anything [sexually] because it would violate trust. If you can't trust PAW, if you can't put your faith in an office full of jelly beans and stuffed animals and people who care… then you have nowhere to go. We are the last and the first stop in the cycle of truth. Marc always lived a life that seemed ragged. I've always referred to him as the adult industry's version of Eric Roberts. He looks exactly like him. You always wonder why Eric Roberts is so cut, and so lean, and so chiselled. Its like he's been hewed out with razor blades. I always wondered how Marc could be like that? Such a finely tuned machine…a race car… who finally slammed into the wall, because he lived at race car speed. Live fast, die young, leave a good looking corpse. That Marc is with Stagliano today is magnificent. Stagliano is one of the great comforts that we have in this business. He is worshipped as a hero for standing up to the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune that you slung at him. You needed a launching pad for your career and he was your launching pad. He put you in the eye of X. You haven't had anything else. Let me look at that interview you did with Spallone? Do you know that we gave his clinic our testing facilities so they can have the best price. We only want peace. Why would I want to fight with him? Is this guy interested in the welfare of this industry? LUKE: I don't know. I just transcribed the interview. BILL: Is this going to make me very, very unhappy. I AM A DYKE? LUKE: [I have spoken softly all day.] Yes, that is what he said. BILL: What does that mean? LUKE: I don't know. I just took down his words. BILL: Wait a second. He reads a line from the interview: "Talent should decide what tests they take." No, producers. They are liable. They should decide whether they want to accept the tests. If the producers didn't care, why would Russ Hampshire, Steve Hirsch, Steve Orenstein and John Stagliano give me thousands of dollars? Is this man [Joe Spallone] just ranting? Do you believe everything this man says? LUKE: I don't know. BILL: I can't wait. I will pick this thing apart. Should I do it on the net? LUKE: Or you can call me up and I will transcribe it. BILL: He doesn't want to do this. Does he want to hurt people? His father Joe owns Gourmet with Howie Wasserman. You heard about the controversy with Bowen? When we were looking to hang somebody over Caroline, I was the only person to defend him, and he got mad at me for defending him. He said to me: What business is it of mine who he f---s? And I said to him, I'm trying to clear up who you didn't f--- to get you off the loop. I owe Bowen to a certain extent because he was kind to Viper early in her career and I never forget people… A lot of people hated her because they thought she was dirty. Because she had a tattoo. One day a lot of people blamed her for an outbreak of gonorrhea. They said a snake crawled up her. Viper did not have anything wrong with her, but they blamed her because a snake crawled on her. How dare Hart Williams attack Jay Ashley? He does not even know Jay Ashley. If we get into Hart Williams… I will not hold back. You do not know him but I do… I brought him into the business, like I did for you. I thought he was going to be one of the kids, but boy did he turn. I would love a lawsuit from him, like I loved the one from Carriere in 1990 for nine million dollars. You can't defame the defamed. I deal with the truth, kid, because I can't remember lies. I think that even you have hinted that I tell mistruths… Recess is over. The kids have to come in from the cold and rally. We are going to have "creative condemnation." We have to create a way to make the condoms look like they belong in the movie. Before the sex scene starts, say, "Let's not get pregnant tonight." Or, "let's play with this new toy I've found." Or, "wouldn't you like me to put this on for you?" Or, "See how this feels?" Cum shots will be away from all mucous membranes, preferably on the breasts. PAW may soon have drug testing for intravenous drugs. If I accomplish nothing else in my career, I want to incorporate the NFL (Naked Fun League) to get rid of those playing Russian Roulette with the rest of the business (intravenous drug users). This is dedicated to Viper, who said "What the f--- do I want to stick a needle in me for?" Using needles is reprehensible. If these tests show that someone is using dangerous drugs, they will be banned from the business. The LA TIMES got things wrong in its article. Barbara Doll was not in 1993. It happened in 1995. The Times does not need to make these kind of mistakes. They got the date wrong the industry meeting. It was not April 20th, but April 13. Who do they ask for this information? They just take it off the top of their head and slam it in there to see if they can get away with it? I nodded at you at the Erotica LA [4/98]. A lot of things I say are for shock value, but they work. What do you want to be now? Do you want to be pro-industry? Do you want to be one of us? LUKE: I just want to be accurate. BILL: Then talk to me. If you can't believe what I say, then I do not know who else you can go to? I can't lie. I'm dedicated to Viper, Shauna Grant…and all the others who died. Shauna Grant, in 1982, was going to meet with me. She told me that she could not talk to me because I was a bad man. We've been testing with the North Hollywood clinic for months. We strongly recommend it. I don't know what Rob Spallone is talking about. We are not trying to corner the market. These people are not to be bartered like sheep. I am not happy about this [Rob Spallone interview]. I've always worried about people who proclaim that they are one of the few guys in the industry who does not fool around. Anyone who has to say that has a skeleton in their closet. I fooled around and admit it happily. There is no one in this business who has not fooled around. Whether you have f---ed people physically or mentally, you have probably used your position in this industry to get what you want. You can f--- a person mentally as well as physically. …[Former LAPD vice officer] Lloyd Martin [a big liar about child porn and the porn industry]. No one knows where he is today. I used to meet with him regularly. One of the things I hated about Boogie Nights was that it never portrayed the tension we worked under. We were the last oultaws. It was Les Miserables. We were the Jean Valjeans, the vice cops like Martin were Javert and our loaves of bread were between our legs. I will be speaking at the World Conference of Pornography. Your name [Luke F-rd] was on that list [to speak] but I notice it is no longer there. What happened? LUKE: (Surprised) I thought I was on it? BILL: Are you on it again? Luke reaches for his registration packet which just came in the mail. Luke looks furiously through the brochure, looking for his name. He can't find it. No "Scoop Luke," or "Rabbi Onan" either. BILL: It is symbiotic that I am number 28 in the panel, as 28 is my favorite number. That was the number of my first sports idol. Which panel were you going to talk on? LUKE: I don't think I am on a panel. I think I was just going to give a speech about the history of porn. BILL: That's a panel. LUKE: Umm… Long pause as Luke keeps looking (in vain) for his name. BILL: I did not really study the book but noticed some inadequacies in it… Good ol' Will [Jarvis] who… Will is Will. I don't know… You have to have a panel. LUKE (plaintively) I thought it was just a talk. BILL: No, it has to be a panel. No such thing as just giving talks. This is very prestigious, I guess. What puzzled me about that is that we are paying to participate in our own panel. [$100 registration fee for panelists. $175 for everyone else.] LUKE: Let me just turn this tape recorder off. Luke keeps looking for his name. Miffed, he finally gives up and interviews Jacklyn Lick. Ron Miller chatted with Bill Margold during my time at PAW 5/1/98. He ran Erotica LA with his soon-to-be-ex-wife Alisa. Ron boasted that he had Marc Medoff banned from the event, referring to the director of Communications for Ray Pistol's Arrow Productions. Ron boasted that he had told Ray Pistol that he would reimburse the airfare for flying Marc out, just so that Marc could be kept out of the event. At the first Erotica LA, Marc was the emcee of a deep throat competition. Ron's ex Alisa overeacted to a gag Marc pulled about a live sex act, and almost caused a riot. She rushed to the stage and interrupted a performance, injuring Jacklyn Lick in the process. Deeply embarrassed by her mistake, Alisa, with help from Ron, poured all the blame (through letters in AVN) on to Marc Medoff. Marc Medoff did attend this year's Erotica LA event at the LA Convention Center. I know. I got the pass for him to enter. We chatted for about 20 minutes. Giles Whittell 01/10/98 The Times of London Bill Margold was in love once. The object of his desire came to LA 11 years ago, at the tail end of what he calls the Golden Age of porn . She was determined to get into "adult" films after being thrown out of the marines for fraternising with her senior officers. She was hooked on crystal meth and had a tattoo of a snake winding from her pierced left nipple to her clitoris. Her name was Viper. Bill is fond of nicknames, too. He is a veteran of 300 movies and 500 sex scenes who calls himself the Papa Bear of porn and talks with grand nostalgia about his last, lost love: "I didn't know I had a heart until she broke it. She was tall, thin, titless... magic." For five years he and Viper shared a shambolic Hollywood flat he still calls home, hugging and having ordinary sex - but mainly hugging - as an antidote to the anatomy-defying coital combat she went through for the cameras by day. She made 70 hardcore films, with names like Voodoo Lust and Mystery of the Golden Lotus. In something called Loose Ends NoNo4, says Margold, her body exceeded its design limits far enough to make her "a cult figure in perpetuity". Things started to go wrong when she decided breast implants would earn her more work. "I want to get breasts because then they'll think I'm stupid and maybe they'll use me," she said. Instead she went crazy and left town W X without warning. Margold's diagnosis was "implant schizophrenia". He last saw her in 1991, anorexic and 40lb below her fighting weight. He says there have since been Viper sightings all over the world, but has no idea if she is still alive. So Viper came and went, like most porn starlets. But for her ex she was a reminder of the pioneering days of hardcore, when an on- screen erection was shocking, rare, rebellious - and illegal. Those were the days before video made pornographers of every enterprising voyeur with a Handicam, and Aids made the exploding porn industry police itself with blood-testing and rubber. They were the years between Haight-Ashbury and full-blown Reaganism (1972-1984, says Margold, an avid historian of the genre) when sheer experimentation could make porn professionals feel special if not rich. Cult porn films such as Deep Throat and Behind the Green Door were shot on film then, not video, and shown in full-size cinemas to guys who dared. They were rare enough for aficionados to have seen them all, and new enough to be reviewed by The New York Times. This was also the age 26-year-old director Paul Thomas Anderson chose to recreate in Boogie Nights, which tells the story of one Dirk Diggler's rise from staggeringly well-hung teenager to reigning porn stud. (The "filmmaker" who gives him his start is played by Burt Reynolds.) Dirk Diggler is based on a real woodsman - as male porn stars tend to be called - John Holmes, aka The King, who died of Aids in 1988. Many have suggested Margold was the inspiration for the Reynolds character. He hopes not. He says he doesn't like the film, calling it an adolescent wet dream, but it may simply be too close to home. Margold is known as the Papa Bear for his weird brand of paternalism. He calls the troubled women of the hardcore scene his children, and with his performing days behind him - he refuses to be tested for Aids - he spends much of his time looking after them. "These are the cubs in the tree of X," he says. "When they fall down on their heads I put them back in the tree so eventually they can crawl down on their own." Those he has helped give him teddy bears, and scores of them sit around the grubby, porn -strewn flat he calls The Cave. Some women fall into his makeshift safety net via a helpline called PAW - Protecting Adult Welfare - which he set up after a star called Savannah shot herself in 1994. (PAW came too late for Shauna Grant in 1984 and Megan Leigh in 1990, and could not help Cal Jammer or Alex Jordan in 1995. All were suicides.) Other women are passed along to the Bear by word of mouth. A few he personally adopts as their informal agent, flatmate and, occasionally, lover. For all his scorn about the alleged mainstreaming of the business, Margold is in a sense the most mainstream person in it. He lectures, twice a year, at a respectable Orange County college as part of a course on Advanced Human Sexuality. He made his mark on porn history writing a series of hardcore scripts that got their producer, Hal Freeman, arrested and convicted under California's prostitution laws. When the state's supreme court overturned the conviction in 1984, the floodgates opened. Although the US Supreme Court did not formally ratify the Freeman decision for four more years, the decision effectively legalised hardcore pornography by classifying its protagonists as performers rather than prostitutes. In Boogie Nights, the villain is video - the quick, cheap medium that opened the industry to all-comers. In Margold's memory, the villain is legality. "When it was against the law only the strong survived," he says. "It's lost its special quality, its flavour, and I don't think it will regain it until it's made illegal again."
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