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The road to porn goes through the office of Jim South's (James Souter) World Modeling. "Behind an unmarked door lies a room the size and shabby complexion of a one-man private-detective agency," writes Susan Faludi, "dust-covered vertical blinds quiver in stale air circulated by a floor fan. A tired gray-blue carpet with a permanent crease down the middle is flanked by two chipped desks, each with an overflowing ashtray and five-line phone, which blinks and rings ceaselessly from nine to six. The company sign, with a blue-globe logo, has presided over the street for fourteen of the firm's nineteen years, an example of discreet advertisement from a more decorous time: "Figure Photography Films. Wanted: Figure Models for Immediate Placement. 986-4316. Suite 203." The ad is for the World Modeling Talent Agency, central casting for the nation's pornographic film, video and magazine industries.... In a world where desire is packaged in videocassettes and marketed in magazines, where self-worth is quantified by exposure, World Modeling has become the last-chance opportunity for a generation desperately seeking "immediate placement"." (The New Yorker, 11/30/95) Los Angeles magazine gave a glowing profile of premier porn talent agent Jim South in its April, 1997 issue. A tall man in his fifties who wears a black pompadour and big cowboy-style belt buckles, South grew up in a conservative Catholic home in Dallas. He sold insurance for several years before moving to Los Angeles in 1968 and opening a fashion-modeling agency in Sherman Oaks. In 1975 he married a Hispanic woman who later gave birth to two sons. Jim moved to his present location at 4524 Van Nuys Boulevard in 1976. Two years later, a pornographer offered him $200 a day to find girls to appear in Super 8 movies. By the retirement of agent Bill Margold in 1984, Jim ranked number one. He cites several reasons for his success. "I've never moved my location. I'm in fifteen newspapers. I require a mandatory AIDS test. And after my girls do their first job, I get their Polaroid replaced with a glossy print." Other reasons at least as important to Jim's success include a deal on the mandatory insurance all shooters must carry and other savvy business practices. South tells media such as Los Angeles magazine that he doesn't socialize with his clientele and that he has a strict "no dating the clients" rule for his employees. "It wouldn't be fair," Jim says. "It would be taking advantage." In the mid'80s, a thug broke Jim's arms. He's suffered sundry other beatings and bruises from unhappy pornographers and unhappy boyfriends of porn stars. South also feuds with veteran performer Mike Horner. Jim forbids producers who want to work with World Modeling from using Mike. Horner criticizes Jim for, among other things, procuring women new to the biz for the exploits of sadists Max Hardcore and John T. Bone. Rival agent Reb Sawitz says he doesn't work with men like Max "who abuse women." Both Jim South and Reb Sawitz come across as low key and direct though Jim appears more slick and a better businessman. Jim's World Modeling is a one-stop for porn production. South not only provides talent for pornographers, he also connects them with scripts, locations, editing facilities and liability insurance. Nick Long (NICKLONG@delphi.com) says: "Agents are licensed in California by the Department of Labor. Others in the biz are classed and represent themselves as managers and/or business managers, and any other associated description. An 'agent' is treated under California law as if they were an employment agency and have specific reporting and record-keeping requirements, as well as needing an annually renewable license and a bond. This allows an agent to collect fees for talent, deduct their fee, and pass the money along. In 'practice' it doesn't work that way. Virtually *all* talent is paid directly by the company and the agent 'bills' for his part of the service." "As in any 'licensed' status, there is no problem until the state receives a complaint about an individual, and then they will perform an investigation and proceed accordingly against an 'unlicensed' individual/company, just as they would on a complaint against an unlicensed building contractor, etc." (From the Director's RAME FAQ) S. Andrew Roberts: "Neither agency is a *talent* agency. They do not represent the interests of the performers and do not negotiate on behalf of the performer. Both agencies would better be termed *Producer's* agents as they provide talent to producers and receive payments only from producers." (RAME) XXX writes: "Steve Austin was Jim South's right hand man at World Modeling for so long. This is the guy who would tell everyone he'd left South, get them to open up and then run back and rat them out to South. Can't tell you how many times it >happened. Left a lot of people on a meathook. Steve was Jim's mole." 1/16/99 Steve Austin left World Modeling in June, 1997. He’s been doing blow-job scenes and assisting Director Cash Markman. Steve called me Wednesday night, 1/13. "World Modeling has bad-mouthed me to many directors. I’ve not been a saint in this industry. I’ve made my mistakes. I originally did not want to give an interview about World Modeling when I left there in the summer of 1997. But I’m not going to sit back and be bad rapped by a company that I gave 100% loyalty. If the statements by Jim South do not cease and desist immediately, I will give you a complete lowdown on World Modeling and all the antics that go on there. If they want to have a war, we can have a war. I might lose but both sides are going to get hurt. I’m being accused of taking things from World Modeling… Agency fees. I do not want to get into every director’s agreement with World Modeling about appropriate agency fees. Even to this day, I do not bad mouth World Modeling but that will completely change… I have just as many clients as Jim does. I don’t want to go this route but if I am forced to, I will. Jim South has done more for me in this industry than anyone else but in return I was a friend and the best employee he ever had (which Jim has stated many times). I was willing to piss off producers and directors just to make sure that Jim got his agency fee, putting my acting career second. I’m disappointed that since I left World Modeling, Jim hasn’t shown the same loyalty towards me that I’ve shown towards him. Make no mistake about it, Jim was limited by the amount of work he could get me because of the type of scenes I did – BJs. So I understand my phone not ringing off the hook with Jim saying he’s got work… But I should’ve gotten a call now and then. I don’t want to affect his business. Jim, please don’t affect mine. To this day, I have not bad rapped World Modeling to a single person. I just wish they would show me the same courtesy." 4/6/99 There are more allegations about sexual misconduct at porn's leading talent agency - Jim South's World Modeling. Scotty Schwartz, the child actor and former World Modeling assistant, wrote to www.geneross.com about Jim South's talent agency: "I know for a fact that former employees and current ones at World Modeling have indeed have had sex with some of the girls. Steve Austin was notorious about it, a new girl would come in, decide to do video work, he would call whatever company and want to shoot her that night in his apartment... "Check out Gina Ryder's scene in Dr. Fellatio, it was shot in his tiny bathroom, as was a few other scenes. And if any girl wouldn't work with him, he'd take her number home and try to do phone sex with her promising a job, which there of course wasn't. And due to the fact that she wouldn't work with him, he wouldn't recommend her for work unless she was sitting right there in the office and someone needed a girl. I know for a fact from several girls that this went on with only this guy. "Before him [Steve], there was another guy named Brad [Gunches] who also worked for Mark Carrier's company. He, too, would get a new girl and rush her into a scene with him, either regular or BJ. Both of them were talent, if you could call either of them that. That is a direct conflict of interest, but Mr. South let it go on for sometime. Jim [South] Jr., has also dated several girls in the biz, the longest to my knowledge was Celine Deveaux. They dated for about 6 months or so, and dating definitely means having sex with him. He's a good looking kid, not out to hurt anyone, but sleeping with the owner's kid definitely would help you get work as she did a s---load of jobs and whenever someone needed a girl, she was the first to get a phone call. Also, he dated Kristi Mist for some time..." www.geneross.com Scotty, who now has good reason to fear for his life, says he never had sex with any of the talent represented by World Modeling while he worked for World. "As for Mr. South's relations with the talent, I'm sure that a few girls in the 20 years he's been in business have had "personal" relations with him. A select few of the talent, and only those that instigate contact, but it is not policy, or a requirement...World has definitely straightened things out and now running the way a talent agency should." World Modeling owner Jim South told www.geneross.com: "This is funny. Steve Austin has been a friend of Scotty's for about ten years. What is he really saying? Is Scotty indirectly bad-rapping World Modeling? I never heard anything about Brad. Indirectly, it still falls on me. I don't know what to say." Called Monday evening, Steve Austin said (after talking to Jim South): "It's beneath me to even comment on this." Austin performed in half of the BJ scenes for Elegant Angel's Dr. Fellatio series (shot by the late Israel Gonzales and the former hubby of Stephanie Swift). Various sources back up Scotty Schwartz's allegations about twelve year porn veteran Steve Austin. In a brief interview shortly after Austin was fired from World Modeling in the summer of 1998, Jim South indicated that he got rid of Austin for conflict of interest reasons (Austin performed on camera as well as assisted Jim). 4/10/99 Child actor turned porner Scotty Schwartz earlier this week told www.geneross.com that while at World Modeling, he never had sex with any of the talent. Luke's heard from agent Regan Senter that this is not true. Regan says that porn girl Dalny Marga says Scotty did her in the World Modeling hallway while he worked at Jim South's agency. Regan says Jim South had Dalny give his friend Lance Kincaid a blowjob. Regan asks: "Is it true
that Jim South implied to Dalny that Jim and Lance used to get regular
BJs from the porn girls?" 05/12/87 Noel Holston; Staff
Writer After Colleen Applegate's suicide in March 1984 she was the subject of a "tribute" in Hustler magazine, for which she'd posed the year before. "She was young, she was innocent, and she was beautiful," read Hustler's eulogy of Applegate, a native of Farmington, Minn. "And almost from the moment she arrived in Hollywood with high hopes of becoming a major movie star, photographers were clamoring to take her picture. As hard as she tried, however, her big break in serious films never came. "Eventually she suffered from a depressing series of personal and financial difficulties, and at the end she was alone in a luxurious Palm Springs, Calif., home when a .22-caliber bullet rammed through her brain. Colleen's sad and tragic story was one of youthful dreams shattered by harsh reality. We'll miss her." Yeah, the Hustler gang was deeply touched - so much that they ran several pages of nude photos from her various magazine layouts and from the X-rated movies she made (using the name Shauna Grant). The exploitation continued even after her death, with Hustler showing no awareness that it may have played some part in the "difficulties" that had pushed Applegate to suicide. Denial of responsibility within the pornography industry is a recurrent theme of "Death of an American Girl," a grim, disturbing "Moore Report" (Wednesday, 9 to 10 p.m.) that WCCO-Channel 4 coproduced with Boston public-TV station WGBH for subsequent showing on PBS' "Frontline" series. "I don't equate what I do with X-rated films whatsoever," Penthouse photographer Steve Hicks tells WCCO reporter Al Austin. Hicks also says he warned Applegate to get out of the nude modeling business quickly, because it could lead to jobs posing for hard-core sex magazines and appearing in porn flicks. He gave her that advice after he had shot her for Penthouse, of course. *** Film mirrors Channel 4's documentary of porn star Noel Holston; Staff Writer 03/09/88 Star-Tribune Newspaper of the Twin Cities Mpls.-St. Paul WCCO-Channel 4 tonight will have the unusual distinction of televising a network movie that tells the same tragic story as a documentary the station produced and aired last spring. CBS's "Shattered Innocence" (8 p.m.) thinly disguises the story of Colleen Applegate, a girl from Farmington, Minn., who went to Los Angeles seeking fame and attention when she was 18. Two years later, when she committed suicide, she was a cocaine-addicted pornographic-movie performer. But "Shattered Innocence," though produced and acted skillfully, doesn't have the impact that WCCO's "Death of an American Girl" had. The movie is too clean. That is not to say that WCCO's report was lurid or that CBS's movie should have shown more of Pauline Anderson (the name of the Applegate character has been changed, as have the names of all the people involved). But, for the movie to succeed as the cautionary tale its producers clearly want it to be, it needs at least to hint more strongly at the XXX-rated trade the young woman got herself into. During her brief career as porn star "Shauna Grant," Colleen Applegate engaged in hard-core sex on camera with more than 40 men. By showing some judiciously edited clips from her movies, along with some of the milder photos for which she had posed, WCCO's documentary made it clear what a sexual treadmill Applegate's life had become. The movie, either in the interest of telescoping time or out of misplaced discretion, gives the impression that Pauline Anderson made only two or three films; it conveys little sense of the gradual crush of her self-esteem. And what is shown of Pauline's movies is less titillating than the average lust scene on "Knots Landing" or "Miami Vice." Where the movie really falls short is in its depiction of the porn world. WCCO's documentary derived its power not from the cautionary elements of the Applegate story, but from interviews with the men who helped her career along. From the agent who gave Applegate her start in nude modeling to the photographer who shot her for Penthouse magazine to the director of her first porn flick, they shared an amazing knack for denying responsibility and for rationalizing what they did to earn a lucrative living. They're all represented in "Shattered Innocence" but, perhaps because TV has such great difficulty getting down to gutter-reality, they seem much nicer. One does not catch the same whiff of sleaze when they appear on camera. Agent Lou Gates, the character based on real flesh-broker Jim South, borders on the avuncular, so concerned does he seem about "the girls." Everyone around his cluttered but pleasant office, from his secretary to the models who drop by to pick up assignments, seems as chipper as a lark. Likewise, the sets where Pauline makes movies seem pretty much like any movie sets. With scarcely a hint of what actually goes on - or even an allusion in anything but the vaguest terminology - it doesn't seem remotely demeaning to the young woman. Again, the motivation for Pauline's rapid emotional deterioration is clouded and diminished. Actress Jonna Lee is affecting in the lead role even though she never looks quite as fresh-faced as the schoolgirl Applegate was or as seductive as the porn star into which she was transformed. Lee's best scene, and perhaps the most telling one in the movie, comes when Pauline goes home for Christmas in 1983 because she needs "to be a little girl awhile." While shopping with her mother (Melinda Dillon), Pauline realizes that her mom, who goes out of her way to avoid crossing paths with friends, is deeply ashamed of her. *** X-rated star was a minor Video stores told to remove tapes JAMES EWINGER; PLAIN DEALER REPORTER; 11/02/91 The Plain Dealer Cleveland, OH For the second time in a decade, the adult video industry is doing damage control because of an underage girl's roles in X-rated movies and videos. Revelations within the industry this week sent video store clerks rummaging through shelves nationwide to remove dozens of films made by an 18-year-old Canadian woman whose stage name is Alexandria Quinn. The starlet, who began making racy videos last year, turned 18 on March 25, but sources in the adult video industry said she misrepresented herself as having been born in 1968, which would have made her 22 at the time she started making films. A discrepancy on an identification card led an adult-video production firm in California to investigate, revealing Quinn was Diane Purdie Stewart, born March 25, 1973, in Hamilton, Ontario. Employing minors in adult films is a violation of federal law. One man indicted in that [Traci Lords] case, James M. Souter Jr., also known as Jim South , runs World Modeling Agency in Van Nuys, Calif., which also represents Quinn. Souter declined comment. But a spokesman for VCA, one of the film companies for which Quinn has worked, described World Modeling as "the main clearinghouse for talent. There really is not competition for them in the field." AN UNEASY PEACE; VALLEY'S PORN INDUSTRY THRIVES - QUIETLY Reed Johnson 03/29/98 Los Angeles Daily News "We have become so legitimate that it's unbelievable," declares Jim South , a laconic Texan whose 21-year-old World Modeling Agency in Sherman Oaks serves as a kind of X-rated Ellis Island for the hundreds of women and men lured West by dreams of fast bucks and full-frontal celebrity. "John Q. Public thinks we're all such dirt bags, that we beat our wives and have sex with our children. We're just like you," South says. He has a point. South makes his home with his wife and two sons in the staunchly unrisque community of Thousand Oaks, in a Spanish-style house with a pool, and commutes to work in a '91 GMC van. ...... Nasty1 writes on RAME: Legitimate agents work on a percentage. Even if the agent is paid directly, the performer *has* paid the agent since the performer only gets to keep his/her share. For IRS purposes the performer is only on the hook for the NET compensation. "A legitimate agent that works on a percentage has a strong incentive to see to it that talent gets the best deal possible. The more money the talent makes, the more money the agent makes. Not so with Jim South and others. Say a girl has a scene rate of $600.00 for a B/G scene. "Now say the girl has a car payment due and some producer offers her $500.00 to do TWO scenes with anal. Does Jim South care? No way. He gets his flat fee no matter what kind of deal the talent gets. South and others operate as a PRODUCERS agent not a talent agent. "A legitimate agent would always negotiate the best deal possible for talent. Once the client attained some success a real agent would see to it that the talent had the right CPA, financial planner etc. Real agents always have an investment of time and money in their clients. "People are always bemoaning the lack of *quality* new talent in porn. Others complain that some girls are only around for six months to a year and than disappear. "I don't think it is all because of the "social stigma". It sure as hell isn't because of Luke F-rd's web page. I think it has to do with the fact that these girls have absolutely nobody watching out for their best interests in any responsible way. "Thanks to the Freeman decision, porn is a perfectly legal business in Ca. Unfortunately, the industry is infested with "predators" who continue to treat it as an underground business. Until the talent realizes that they ARE the business and gets organized, porn performers will be no better off than old time athletes were before free agency." August 30, 1999 Jeremy Steele says: "At one point, I was hearing a different rumor [by World Modeling] about me every week. That I do gay movies. That I have gonorrhea... Steve Austin started the rumor that I shoot my dick up to get it hard... I know there are guys in the business who do that but I've never needed to do that. But he concocted this story that talent had seen me walking out of the bathroom with my dick up and a bag of stuff in my hand. "I was going to beat the f--- out of [former World Modeling talent coordinator] Steve Austin at the XRCO Awards in January of 1997. Gene Ross at AVN told me directly that Steve Austin had called him to tell him that I am shooting my dick up. "I planned to confront Steve Austin. I didn't even care that I would be taken to jail. I was going to make a f---ing point. Because you don't f--- with people's money... You might as well break into my house and steal my s---... "But anyway, at the XRCO awards, TT Boy rushed Santino Lee [a black male performer]... Santino had a falling out with World Modeling as well. He never registered with them. He feels that their policies are racist, because they have questionaires about whether you will work with black people. It's the only race that's addressed. And that World Modeling was charging fees to companies that Santino was working for even though he wasn't even registered with them. Santino speaks his mind... So we had a similar animosity for them. "Anyway, TT Boy rushed him, saying why are you telling people that I have AIDS. Santino said, I never told anyone that you have AIDS. Then it turned out that the story came from World Modeling. "World Modeling wanted to f--- with Santino Lee but they did it at T.T. Boy's expense. TT Boy is a regular guy who hangs out there and f---s the girls in the bathroom and has at least a relationship with World Modeling. But they put him through that mindf--- to attack Santino Lee... "I had told Solveig that night that I was planning to beat the f--- out of Steve Austin... World Modeling, these guys are f---ing evil scum... "Next time I see Jim South is at the Nena Cherry, John Stagliano HIV scare at the back of VCA. And I noticed that Jim had this disturbed look on his face. Steve Austin must've told Jim about my threats... Jim South was giving me this look, a combination of hands caught in the cookie jar, he knows that I know he's been saying s---, and this angry look... You're actually going to attack me? And an angry look and a disturbed look... I kept seeing him glance at me from the other side of the room. "It was really taking a toll on him emotionally. He was just sitting up in that office like a sitting duck and if someone wanted to do something to him, they could. My ex Eden Rae and I had a lot of violent fantasies that we would like to do to Jim South and Steve Austin. We'd never carry them out but we had some comical ideas." Los Angeles Times, 3/11/87 Police say they have at least temporarily blocked the hiring of hundreds of performers for sexually explicit films with arrests at two San Fernando Valley modeling agencies in the past two weeks. The agencies, World Modeling Agency of Sherman Oaks and Pretty Girl International of Van Nuys, allegedly provided producers with about 80% of the actors and actresses employed in sex films in the United States, said Lt. Kenneth Seibert of the Los Angeles Police Department's Administrative Vice Division. Even so, the arrests of alleged principals in the agencies will not deal a fatal blow to the sex film industry, he acknowledged. "I'm sure we'll shut down these operations for a little while, but anyone can come in and fill the void," said Seibert. "I understand producers are putting out the word that they're starting to hire directly." That could be a time-consuming chore for the fast-moving, high-volume sex-film operations. "These agencies filter out a lot of unacceptable talent," said Seibert. "They keep meticulous records on file cards listing what the girls will do and what they won't do. They'll push them as far as they can. If a producer calls up and says, 'We need 10 girls for a lesbian scene,' the agencies will be able to send them over." James Souter of World Modeling was arrested for pandering March 4 after sheriff's deputies raided the business and his Thousand Oaks home. In a separate case, he was indicted under federal child pornography statutes last Thursday for representing porn superstar Traci Lords when she was just 16. On Monday police seized records and nude photographs of more than 500 models at Pretty Girl International and arrested Craig (Reb) Sawitz, 42, of North Hollywood on suspicion of pandering in connection with the appearance of a 16-year-old girl in a sex film. In an interview Tuesday, Sawitz said he believed the girl was not a minor and he had been "set up" by the girl's mother. He also denied a police allegation that he owns the agency, which he described as a legitimate business specializing in nude talent. He said Pretty Girl models have appeared in Hustler, Playboy, Penthouse and other magazines and performers have had roles in "many motorcycle movies" as well as productions at major studios. The agency took pains not to represent minors, he said. Lured by classified ads for "figure modeling," models were required to present a driver's license or birth certificate plus another corroborating ID. But those precautions were lax, police say. The IDs were "the kind of things you can buy at swap meets, check-cashing cards from supermarkets, you name it," Seibert said. Even novice performers would be handsomely paid, according to police. A beginner could fetch $250 for each filmed sex act, while such box-office draws as Traci Lords received as much as $7,500 per day. In addition, each performer would have his or her own fee schedule for "the kinky stuff -- bondage, anal sex, things like that," Seibert said. By comparison, the agencies' take was modest -- $40 per day for each referral. Dallas Morning News 7/21/95 James Marvin Souter is remembered for his gruff voice, his ability to defuse a charged situation and, most of all, as someone who devoted his life to the Dallas Police Department. The former assistant chief, credited with beginning the department's intelligence division, died Tuesday at Baylor University Medical Center. In addition to Patrick Souter, Mr. Souter is survived by his wife, Robbie Souter of Dallas; two other sons, James Marvin Souter Jr. of California and Steve Souter of Farmers Branch; three daughters, Margaret Jean Keeler of Los Angeles, Phyllis Harris of Dallas and Becky Senini of Los Angeles; 11 grandchildren; and one great-grandchild.
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