Porn Valley- I guess the moon would have to be in the Seventh house and Jupiter aligned with Mars for Otto Bauer to pull the unheard of, off. Bauer, who bears a passing resemblance to Howard Stern if for nothing else, the hair style, is nominated this year for Best Male Newcomer. His wife, Audrey Hollander is nominated for Best New Starlet. Think of the story that would make if a husband and wife team scored that coup.

But judging from what I saw on Skeeter Kerkove’s set Saturday, team Bauer could be at least half way there. Otto is an extremely physical, very assured, very impressive performer with the ability to fuck from some pretty contorted positions.

And twice Bauer teamed up with Alberto Rey to annihilate some female ass for Skeeter’s new MILF series for Metro, as yet to be named. Though Alberto and Otto sounds like a Vegas ventriloquist act, you wouldn’t get that impression from watching the two in d.p. tandem, first with Katanya Blade and later in the afternoon with newcomer Chelsea Zinn.

Bauer describes his meeting Hollander when he was “On a mission away from the snow, sand, rain and cold and a New York Jets defeat.

“I flew from New York on a standby flight to somewhere warm,” Bauer continues. “I ended up in South Beach Florida where I came across Ms. Hollander who was vacationing with some friends to see a Fish concert. Our paths crossed and starstruck lovers we were, she immediately moved to New York with me.”

According to Bauer, this all happened in January, 2000. “We’re a millennial couple. We met actually on January 1, 2000.”

Bauer described himself at the time as cold , tired and in need of a vacation. Hollander had left the concert which was on an Indian reservation and then went to South Beach with her girlfriend where Bauer met her.

“She was sitting at a sidewalk bar on Ocean Blvd. My buddy and I were walking along enjoying the nice weather and the change of scenery. My eyes caught Audrey. I saw her red hair and her beautiful little self. I sat right down and charmed her out of her little pants.”

I asked Bauer what his opening line was. “I can get pretty close,” he laughs. “It was something like you know I think I’ve met you before. Where are you from?”

I groaned.

“I know,” says Bauer. “But she was only 17. And so it went right over her.”

I asked Bauer if he also had any clue that he was dealing with underage material. “I wasn’t sure at the time,” he said. “She looked a little young. But she turned 18 right just after that. We were legal and she’s been all mine as of the last 5 years.”

Bauer explained that he and his friend had flown standby. “We would have gone to the Bahamas; we’d have gone to Hawaii- anywhere- a standby flight that was cheap. I had no hotel room, no nothing. We were just wandering around- probably would have slept on the beach. Who cares. We just wanted to get drunk till 4 am.”

Bauer also points out that Hollander was being chaperoned by a friend’s uncle who was gay. “Not that there’s anything wrong with that. He was a bit charmed. He thought it was so romantic that we just hit it off as we did at the sidewalk cafe.”

Affecting a bit of a lisp, Bauer repeats the uncle’s comments, ‘Honey you’ve got to go with this man- this is for you.’ I have to thank that guy.”

His friend evidently out of the picture at this point, Bauer then got a hotel room with Hollander.

“And we’ve been together ever since. We rented a car and I drove her back home to Kentucky where she’s from. I met her folks. And I produced my registration for my Harley which impressed her dad so much that he allowed me to take his just 18 year-old daughter off to New York City. That says something for biker brotherhood.”

According to Bauer, this is all happening in a couple of days time. “This happened really fast. We drove back to New York City. A few days after that- you may find this interesting- I was out in the East Village at the Horseshoe Bar a place I frequented. A friend comes up to me. I had done maybe 10 or 15 low budget east coast pornos at the time. And so he comes up to me and says, hey, man. Are you still doing pornos? Not knowing that this girl was someone I was really super interested in. Her eyes lit up. She’s like, wow. you’re in porno? She was taken aback at first. I was like no big deal. She was like, wow, can we do it together? Oh man. My heart just blossomed. My love for her could overcome anything at that moment.

“We became sincere about studying scenes,” Bauer continues. “She had me put a static camera in the corner of our bedroom so that we could run her through the positions, film her. And she’d study them. So when she started in the industry about a year ago, she had 300 or 400 scenes under her belt, although they were in our bedroom. So she really stepped in with an advantage over a lot of girls and her rise has been very fast and very steady. I’m very proud of her.”

As you might imagine, I was curious how Bauer got his start in New York porn.

“Now you’re going to get some names out of me and I’ll appear to be a dick,” Bauer laughs. “You probably know some of these people- Rick Savage, Neville Chambers, Candida Royalle, Dirty Dave Copeland…Jim Gunn. That’s the little circle I ran in.”

Bauer explained that this was in the late 90’s, so I was curious about what he had done since those moments to tide things over.

“I was a starving musician,” he laughs. “A graduate student. I have a Masters Degree in Ancient Philosophy from New York University.

“There’s a lot of money in that,” I commented.

“When one is so well trained in Greek and Latin, one quickly turns to Porn Valley,” Bauer concedes.

“Have you been able to use the Socratic method while in the adult business,” I ask further.

“Yes I have,” says Bauer seriously. “Like you’re doing with me right now. You can get a lot out of people when you ask your questions just so.” I had to ask Bauer what he could possibly have been thinking with that type of degree. I imagined that he wanted to teach at some point.

“That’s true,” he admits. “It was my goal at the time to pursue a Doctorate.” Bauer mentions that he took a sideline and went to St. John’s law school in Queens for awhile. “That’s the period of time when I met Audrey. It was all in the first couple of weeks that we were together that the moment my friend mentioned the porno thing. She was like, hey, we can do that together. This is the way to get you out of the library and into the sack more often.”

Bauer mentions that he, like many before him, started doing scenes by answering an ad in a newspaper. “I came about Rick by having answered an ad for Neville Chambers. Neville and Rick were buddies at the time. I did New York Video magazine and Streets of New York. I loved it. I loved the exhibitionism of Streets of New York. I was in a few of those. Then I met some other people down in Philadelphia. There wasn’t a lot of money being a male performer in New York City so this was more of a novelty, more of a sexy thing to do.”

Bauer then had an opportunity to do a scene with Shauna McCullough. “I did really well and she referenced me to some people out here in the Valley that I’m no longer associated with. But that gave me my foot in the door out here. And naturally when I had my wife Audrey- as beautiful as she is- it was a piece of cake for us to get booked all we wanted.”

According to Bauer, he did his first pro scenes before Viagra. I asked him about that.

“This is when it’s mind over matter more so than it is nowadays,” he says. “In the sense that you really had to be a freak- not that I’m any less of a freak now. At the time it was freaky. But because I was friends with Rick he told me, listen, this is fantasy. Find something in your head that makes you comfortable. You go there, and he was right. He sort of mentored me a few weeks after that as I was getting started in earnest in the industry. But to answer your question it was very unnerving. But I was very fortunate that there were only 10 or 12 people on the set that day.”

Bauer’s being sarcastic, of course. “It was really different. It was very, very, very hard. But I had the luxury of working with a very beautiful lady by the name of Angel Smith. She was really nice.”

“Did she chew gum while you were fucking her?” I asked Bauer. “Basically,” he replies. “It was one of those times. It was her first anal. It was my first anal. I was clueless. I didn’t know how to post my leg up or do any of those things.”

“I saw you engage in some contortions today which were extraordinary,” I tell Bauer.

“Thank you,” he says.

“It was some of those Charley Horse inducing positions.”

“Yes,” Bauer agrees. “Those moves. “It’s really important to me as a craftsperson in this industry to get the clearest possible shot of penetration for the viewer. Because I know as someone who watches porn as a fan, and as someone who’s a beat off artist, it just eats me when there’s shadows and you can’t say- man, just do that one more time! Oh no, I missed it! Oh crap. So I’m a stickler for that.”

Bauer watched a lot of porno growing up. “I’m a major pervert,” he states. “Probably not watching so much pornos as coming across the Hustler magazines- not so much video.” Bauer mentions that he grew up in Houston.

“In Houston there’s a lot of strip joints and porno stores. If you get in town it’s a very seedy place. I grew up in a very nice suburb but I quickly found my way to downtown and made my way to the porno stores. Like any other red-blooded American male, dick in hand, will travel.”

Asked how he wound up in New York, Bauer said he wanted to go somewhere he wasn’t from. “I applied to colleges all over the country and New York University gave me a scholarship so I went. I was intrigued. I had never been to New York before in my life. I was a southern boy. A momma’s boy as well. I went for a visit and fell in love with the place. I stayed for many years after college.”

When his father found out that he was doing porn, he pretty much gave Bauer a that’s my boy pat on the back. His mother having found out through a friend of a friend reacted differently. “It wasn’t a good thing for her,” says Bauer. “My folks are split up so they didn’t have to deal with it in concert together. I wish they would have because my dad could have soothed my mom a little bit. But they’re both cool now. It’s not something that we talk about. Every now and then my dad will be, how’s business, ha-ha. But he knows business is damn good.”

Bauer and Hollander began working together- pretty much like other couples.

“When we first started we worked together quite a bit,” says Bauer. “It was for both of our comfort levels. It was really her needing to be comfortable enough with herself and working with other guys and not thinking that she was doing something wrong. In other words, her trust in me. Maybe that’s what I’m trying to get at. When she could trust me that I wasn’t jealous about it- that this is a good thing- we began working with other people quite a bit. I’ve got almost 200 scenes just this year. Maybe a fifth of them are with Audrey. [Bauer notes that Hollander has done maybe 80 scenes.]”

Bauer says the fact that he’s worked more is not without purpose.

“She has the opportunity to work every day if she wants to. But we’re trying to be very meticulous and conscious about how we approach her future. We plan very carefully that she does only the best scenes- only the best companies and only the best male talent. She has no crappy scenes to her name. I’ll say that truthfully and with pride. She has not done a throwaway we need the money kind of scene. I won’t have her do it. I have. But who cares?”