Porn Valley- Facts are facts.

Kevin Rubio of Ducati Productions filed a lawsuit against Skeeter Kerkove in June of this year. The matter has only come to light now because Rubio chose to make an issue of it by posting a notice about it on various websites last week including Adultfyi. I have seen the lawsuit. It’s in two parts, and the main part is the fact that Rubio is suing Skeeter over Welcome to the Bunghole #1, a movie Skeeter directed for him last year but didn’t shoot.

The fact that “Bunghole” is a word about to repeated and echoed through the halls of the Superior Court of the State of California is alone worth the price of admission to serious jurisprudence in action. The fact that Paul Cambria is one of Rubio’s attorneys in this suit makes it even more thought provoking.

In the suit, Rubio’s alleging a breach of contract, referring to a written agreement he and Skeeter had on March 19, 2005. The agreement states that Skeeter was to provide scenes for Rubio’s exclusive use. But “in or about” February 2006, Rubio discovered that one of the scenes wound up with another company and in one of their movies. Rubio’s telling me he discovered all this from reading Adultfyi and comments made by Skeeter when he was clashing with his wife Bridgette Kerkove.

Earlier this week, Rubio allowed me to compare the two scenes. The only difference being is that Skeeter Kerkove is seen introducing Nicki Hunter who has a threeway with Reno and Bad Bob. In the other movie, the portion featuring Skeeter is edited out, but it was clearly shot in Skeeter’s house and remains the same footage. Instead of addressing the facts pertinent to that allegation, Skeeter has chosen to go on the offensive in recent days regarding matters not necessarily specific to allegations in the lawsuit. Skeeter’s inclined to bring up debate about Welcome to the Bunghole #2, a movie that was shot last August. But, listening to the way Skeeter tells it, the breach of contract allegations regarding Welcome to the Bunghole #1 appear irrelevant in the scheme of things.

When it comes to the specifics of the suit, Rubio’s bone of contention about the second movie is that Skeeter, according to Rubio, agreed that certain actresses would appear in the movie.

Rubio states that he wanted Genesis Skye in WBH #2 but she wasn’t cast because Skeeter’s comment to him at the time was that he called Skye but she didn’t call back. Rubio, in the suit, also contends that the film delivered was of poor quality “and below the recognized standards in the adult entertainment industry.”

I ask Rubio the obvious question. What made the difference between the two movies that he’s got a finger up his ass about the quality of this one. Rubio says Jim Powers, that Powers was the cameraman on the first project whereas Skeeter shot the second. Asked what he didn’t like about the second movie, Rubio says you could hear Skeeter coughing, there were wires in frame and that he didn’t particularly like Skeeter’s style of employing camera figure eights and other aerial acrobatics. Skeeter’s apparent explanation, according to Rubio, is that it’s gonzo. But Rubio says he holds a different interpretation as to what a good gonzo movie should look like.

You can argue the fact that everybody’s a porn critic except Rubio is stating in the lawsuit that he expected “a film of the same or better quality than films normally produced by Defendant Kerkove.”

Rubio’s saying he didn’t get it in WBH #2.

However, issues not addressed by the lawsuit have been brewing on Adultfyi. Skeeter has been particularly critical of the manner in which performers on WBH #2 were paid. Skeeter has cited three major instances to makes his case- Leah Luv, Alex Sanders and Hillary Scott. Skeeter has been claiming that it took months for Luv to be paid whereas Ducati’s records clearly indicate that Luv was issued a check dated August 14 and bank records show it was cashed August 19.

Skeeter also states that Alex Sanders came to him complaining about not being paid but records also show that Sanders’ check was made out August 5 and deposited August 9.

Scott’s case is a little less than cut and dried owing to what can now be perceived as a post office screw up. As he did earlier this week, Rubio brought me a check in a sealed envelope that he originally mailed to Scott. It was dated June 13, 2006 and returned by the post office stating that it was the wrong address, the address that Scott told Rubio to send it to.

Rubio will be the first to tell you that the fault for this was as much his as anyone’s. He had telephone communication with Scott right after the August 2nd shoot last year and claims he told her to come pick the check up. Scott never did. And the matter, apparently didn’t go too much beyond that. But after my meeting with Rubio Monday, he contacted Scott again to resolve the issue and said she was the one giving the attitude not he as Skeeter states.

In any event, Rubio produced a post office receipt to indicate that he sent Scott a registered letter with the check. And the address Scott gave him this week turned out to be exactly the same one she gave Rubio last year. Only this time the check was delivered. And to prove his case even more, Rubio allowed me to open the original post office returned envelope, and sure enough, it contained the June 13th check.

Rubio wonders, now, how much he needed to go beyond his original efforts to pay Scott. He called her. He attempted to send her the check. It was returned, but 14 months went by before Scott’s payment became an issue again- mostly at the doing of Skeeter when he made the Scott check his rallying cry. On other issues, Skeeter is also claiming that Rubio never paid him a location fee.

“He never asked me,” says Rubio quietly. Whether he and Skeeter ever discussed the matter specifically is between them, but Rubio showed me a production schedule and cost breakdown written in Skeeter’s own hand, and it never once refers to a location fee. But it shows Skeeter being compensated to the tune of $2,600 and change. Skeeter, who says the location fee was not included in that amount, also brought up the fact that agents weren’t paid. But it clearly states on the schedule after each performer’s name, “no agency fee”.

Skeeter also challenges Rubio’s assertion that Rubio never made his money back on WBH #2. In his defense, Rubio still insists that. He said just because it appears for sale on Adult DVD Empire and other sites doesn’t mean that it’s selling. Rubio goes on to say that he’s got piles of returns on the movie and suspects that the reasons for its failure are the so-called poor quality of the movie, again, by Ducati standards, plus the notoriety raised by the first film and its maverick scene.

In his litany of accusations, Skeeter is drawn to a strap-on scene featuring Katsumi in another Ducati movie, stating as much that Katsumi supposedly got taken advantage of because that scene appeared in other Ducati movies.

Rubio’s basically saying what does this have to do with the price of tea and china. Monday Rubio told me he bought the scene in a licensing deal whereas Skeeter’s of the belief that Craven Moorehead directed it for Rubio. I had Moorehead on the phone today and he told me he had nothing to do with that scene and has never shot Katsumi. Ever. Because he didn’t like the fact that she “looked like a linebacker.”

Boiled down to specifics, Rubio’s telling me that his major issue is the breach of contract, and that he expected to have exclusivity on a scene. And Rubio will accept the fact that this seems like an argument on principle rather than one of recouping dollars.

“It’s my good name,” he says. “I don’t do sleazy business.”