New Zealand- It’s not the worst career a good Quaker girl could have, says the star of 300 porn movies.
But RayVeness, who is in Palmerston North as a guest artist at this weekend’s Erotica Expo, admits it’s hardly ideal either. In fact, her story sounds like an episode of Jerry Springer.
Born in 1972 in North Carolina – right in the heart of the Baptist Belt – she was married a year before she left school. She and her husband heard about amateur porn movies on the Sally Jessy Raphael show and decided to send in one of their own.
She started out making movies only with her husband, but now works with various men.
“We made about 170 movies together once we moved out of North Carolina, but when we went back there, the first person we met was this girl we were giving a lift home to.
“She was drunk and giggling and she said she’d just seen us in a porno movie. That’s when it hit me what I was doing.”
RayVeness is vocal about the porn industry, defending some areas of it and deriding others.
On the plus side, she says she loves sex. But she is unhappy with industry trends to try to “outgross” other films, and fetish flicks that try to shock.
And the twice-divorced actress still goes to church, as any good Southern-born Quaker should.
“Every second Sunday and I pray to God every day. My sins are between myself and my God and what I do is my business,” she said.
“I’ve got a sticker on the bumper of my car that says, `Christians aren’t perfect, but they’re forgiven by a God who is’.”
Her movie career earns her a reasonable sum each year, but she is pinning her financial hopes on her newly launched website.
“It’s only just gone up and I’m still making it. I’m doing it myself.”
Intelligent, educated and possessed of a genuine Southern charm, she is also outspoken about what she would like to see happen in her industry.
“I’d like to see educational funds set up for some of the young girls coming into the business these days. They’re just kids and they are doing real hardcore stuff. I say to people, if your children are in the industry, you haven’t been a very good parent.”