Las Vegas Review-Journal (Sunday)
Becoming a porn star
Q&A: Vegas model talks about how she got started in the business
It’s an interesting enough story that Vegas model Ariana Marie has been selected as a Penthouse Pet of the Month. However, more interesting is that she was tricked and blackmailed into the world of adult movies.
At first, she didn’t want any part of the sex tapes, but now she has become her own porn producer and was voted Vixen of the Month for her on-screen shenanigans. She was also nominated for Best New Star of the Year at the AVN Awards show, held in January at the Hard Rock Hotel and named Twisty’s Star of the Month and then Twisty’s Star of the Year. But Ariana is trying to cross over to mainstream reality television.
She told me: “I’ve done some reality show pilots, so I’ve done that kind of stuff, but nothing that’s on TV, yet, so I’ll just do adult films until something mainstream hits. I got the Penthouse Pet award after just six or seven months into the porn industry.
I was webcamming at first, and then I gradually got approached to do some film work, which at first I didn’t really know what it really was. It was a little sugarcoated for me, but then I came out to L.A., did my first shoot, and kept with it.
“The guys that got me into the industry — they weren’t licensed; they weren’t bonded; and they weren’t agents, but they posed as that. They were just trying to get girls to come in and make them some money, but I was 20, so I didn’t really know what I was doing — like if it was all legitimate — and it seemed that way when I met with them, but it wasn’t until I got on set and I realized it was like actual porn.
“I was like, “Oh, my God.” They told me that I was going to do some films, but nothing was going to be shown in the U.S., so I didn’t have to worry about my family knowing or anything like that. I was completely tricked.”
Q: What on earth went through your mind as you walked onto the set and realized you had to do what you were going to do?
A: I started crying, I was so upset. I think I was more upset because they lied to me and they didn’t tell me what it was at first. But I got myself together and it was weird because I felt like I was doing something wrong, but at the same time, I still wanted to do it. Does that make sense? I still had that little tingle about going and doing a scene or something. Maybe it was curiosity? I don’t know. I’ve always been kind of a shy, quiet person, but I’ve always been the one to go do something crazy, I guess you could say.
I never gave my parents a reason to ever question what I was doing because I was always like a goodygood. Then to my horror and shock, I found out the movie, “Porn Pros,” was going to be right here.
Q: What ran through your mind right then?
A: I thought maybe I can keep it quiet, like maybe no one will obviously see it until it comes out. It was just a boy/girl/girl, and I had never been with another girl before. It was just a scene that I did. I got through it. Then the next day, I had another scene and another scene and everything, so I just kept going with it, but then I started realizing that the guys that had got me into the industry obviously weren’t good. They were no good. I left them after six months of being with them. I’d been completely bamboozled and they were taking 40 percent from me when I first started.
I was kind of bouncing around from agency to agency, because I was so traumatized by what I had been through. And then came Penthouse Pet.
Q: How do you go from being traumatized to — I take it — enjoying it?
A: It took me a minute. I had to go home for about a month and just kind of regroup and try to figure out if this is something I still wanted to keep doing or if I wanted to stop. Then those horrible guys blackmailed me. It’s a crazy story. They did that to some other girls, too. But yeah, they sent an anonymous letter to my parents’ house. That’s how my mom found out.
She was mad at me – and at them because they sent a picture, a degrading picture, and she had to see it, so she didn’t know if it was real or fake. She called me and she’s like, “Is this real?” And I’m like, “Yeah.” I didn’t know how to tell her though, like beforehand. Before they blackmailed me, I didn’t know how to tell her because how do you tell your parents that you’re doing porn? I was only 20 years old and that was four years ago.”
Q: How do your mum and dad feel about it now?
A: They’ve accepted it, Both my parents now know. They are supportive, but we don’t talk about it or anything. When I tell them, “Oh, I have work tomorrow,” they know what work is, but they don’t ask questions. They just want to know that I’m safe and like no one’s disrespecting me. I’m very safe about it all now.