The Hardest (Working) Man in Showbiz

Ron Jeremy

The Hardest (Working) Man in Showbiz

Ron Jeremy with Eric Spitznagel

To my role models:
daddy Arnold, mommy Sylvia, and cousin Eliott Weiss, whose service and sacrifice during World War II helped make this world a safer place, and allowed me the freedom to choose this career. In addition, I’d like to give a special thanks to Arnold and Sylvia for raising three children who never touched drugs, never smoked a cigarette, barely drink, and have each been through a six-year college master’s degree program. Nice work.

The fox knows many things, but the hedgehog knows one big thing.

—Archilochus

CONTENTS

Epigraph

Prologue

Part One

1. Portrait of a Hedgehog as a Young Man

Photographic Insert I

2. Catskills-a-Go-Go

3. Lions and Tigresses and Bears, Oh My!

4. A Star Is Porn

5. The Human Ouroboros

6. Swinging in the Rain

Part Two

7. Days of Porn and Roses

8. Of Vice and Men

9. How to Talk Dirty and Make People Laugh

10. I Fought the Law (and the Law Lost!)

11. Hollywood Nights

12. The Ambassador of Porn
(or, a Midsummer Boogie Night’s Dream)

Photographic Insert II

Part Three

13. Goin’ Mainstream

14. It’s Good to Be the King

15. Dude, Where’s Your Penis?
(or, “John Wayne Bobbitt, Superstar”)

16. Vertical Reality

17. The Ron Jeremy Show, Starring Ron Jeremy

Epilogue

Acknowledgments

Special Thanks

Appendix A: Ron Jeremy Fun Facts

Appendix B: King of DVDs

About the Authors

Credits

Cover

Copyright

About the Publisher

On the set of
This Lady Is a Tramp
, 1980. (Courtesy Chuck Vincent/Video-X-Pix)

PROLOGUE

It isn’t even noon
and I’ve already had sex with fourteen women.

To be fair, it wasn’t entirely my doing. A company called Zane Entertainment hired me to star in a new porno flick called
Put It in Reverse, Part 3
. It’s a little different than most gang-bang films. Rather than a bunch of guys doing one girl—the typical formula—they pick one lucky stud (in this case, me) to bone over a dozen lovely ladies. I’m not so jaded that I don’t feel incredibly fortunate. How often does a guy get to be the center of attention, the “meat” in an all-girl sex sandwich? But it’s not nearly as much fun as it sounds.

“You okay, Ronnie?”

I look up to see Chuck Zane staring down at me. Chuck is an old friend, and the producer and founder of Zane Entertainment. He’s been in the business almost as long as I have, and with his slicked-back gray hair and the stogie that never seems to leave his mouth, he looks the part of a porn producer. He’s always been good to me, which is exactly why I’ve continued to work with him for well over a decade, starring in such features as
I Love Juicy
and
America’s Raunchiest Home Videos
.

I can tell from the concerned look on his face that something’s wrong. He knows that I’m a dependable performer and that I’ve never failed him yet. But with everything that can go wrong with a gang bang, today’s shoot is making him nervous.

“I’m fine,” I tell him. “I’m just taking a break.”

I’m sitting by myself in the corner of the room, naked save for a small towel and covered in a syrupy layer of my own sweat. The crew is loading the camera with a new roll of film, so it seemed like a perfect opportunity to sneak away to recover. I’ve been having sex for well over three hours straight, and it’s beginning to take a toll. I’m drinking bottles of water like my life depends on it, and given how dehydrated I am, it just might.

“Are you sure you don’t want some Viagra?” Chuck asks me.

“What? Of course not. Does it
look
like I need it?”

“No, no, you’re doing great out there,” he says. “I was just wondering if maybe you needed a little pick-me-up.”

“I told you, I’m fine. And even if I wasn’t, I sure as hell wouldn’t take any goddamn Viagra.”

“Okay, okay, calm down. I just wanted to make sure. We have a case in the back if you change your mind.”

“If I see so much as one blue pill, I’m going to flush it down the toilet. I’m serious, Chuck.”

He starts to back away. Chuck knows he touched a nerve. “You’re a pro, Ronnie,” he says, flashing me a toothy smile. “Sorry I doubted you.”

I don’t know why the very idea of Viagra bugs me so much. I guess it’s because I consider it cheating. Most male porn stars today use some form of Viagra or VigRX or ExtenZe, but I’ll never touch the stuff. The minute I need a pill to get wood, I’m going to retire from the business. I don’t care how old I get. I want my boners to be
au natural
. Maybe I’m being too old school about it, but that’s the way I feel.
*

The girls are lounging in the living room, enjoying their brief break from a hard morning’s work. They’re like a cross section of every man’s fantasy: there are blondes and brunettes, blacks and whites, big titties and tiny titties. What more could you ask for? Am I a lucky bastard or what? I can’t believe that I get to have sex with women half my age.

Most of these girls are in their early twenties. Only Angella Faith and Jessica Jewel could pass for porn veterans, and they’ve only been doing films since the early 1990s. I’m a dinosaur compared to them. I was making porn when most of them were still zygotes. I don’t even want to think about it. It’s too depressing.

Funny thing is, it’s impossible to say how much longer any of them will be around. Very few performers stay in the business for longer than a few years. They come in, make a few hundred films, and then disappear. You almost don’t want to remember their names, because they might be gone before you get a chance to work with them again. It’s not like it was back in the 1970s, when I was getting my start in adult films. Back then, it
meant
something to be a porn star. Everybody knew your name, and you felt like you were part of an extended family.

A radical, on-the-edge, sexually liberated, hippie-dippie family, that is.

Yeah, I’m one of those. I can wax nostalgic about the old days with the best of them. There was a time when porno was still shot on film, and we had actual budgets and sets and scripts. Nowadays, porn is all about quick turnaround. They’ll knock out two or three pornos in just one weekend. Hell, I’ll be done with this particular shoot before lunch. Back in the day, that was unheard of.

It’s also gotten more complicated. Remember when condoms used to be the last thing you’d see in a porn film? I do. You’d just show up, stick your dick in whatever girl you happened to be booked with, and be on your merry way. Now, condoms are required. Or at least they were. Three porn actresses tested HIV-positive, and the industry went under lockdown. You couldn’t so much as look at another actress without wearing a condom. For this shoot alone, I have to wear a different condom for every girl. That’s fourteen girls, dozens of sex acts, and a different condom each time. You do the math. I’ve already gone through a Dumpster of condoms and we’re not even at the halfway mark yet. I’ve taken rubbers off and on so many times my penis looks like it has windburn.
*

Matt Zane, the director and Chuck’s son, walks over and sits down next to me. He’s a good kid, though, like the women, he’s very, very young. He couldn’t be more than twenty-two. He joined the family business last year, and he’s already become the new face of “Gen-XXX Porn.”