> posted on www.xbiz.com: LOS ANGELES – The Temptation Awards, an event produced by Canadian News outlet Temptation News, made its debut July 29 at the Westin Bonaventure’s San Francisco Room in downtown Los Angeles.

The Hollywood-style ceremony honored both video and film achievements, along with business-focused awards. The show, hosted by actor and comedian Andy Lauer, recognized outstanding talent and accomplishment by individuals, companies and products spanning the entire adult entertainment industry. Rock band AM/PM provided musical entertainment.

“My heartfelt thanks go out to all in attendance of the Temptation Awards and their support through a very tumultuous week leading up to awards night,” Temptation News CEO George Whitty said. “The show would not have happened without the combined effort of my team of professionals, Dusty Marie with Adult Wire Services, Alison Richards of Canuck in Venice Productions and my diligent staff at Temptation News.”

Whitty was alluding to the Temptation Awards’ rocky start in securing a venue for the show. The awards ceremony was unceremoniously bounced from the Beverly Hilton and the Ritz-Carlton in Pasadena, Calif.

Temptation News also opened up a Hall of Fame. The first class of inductees were Chi Chi LaRue, Julia Ann, Janine, Jenna Jameson, Ron Jeremy, Joone, Chasey Lain, Peter North, Lexington Steele, Suze Randall, Paul Thomas and Vince Vouyer.

Hot Movies, E-Omega Solutions and Adult DVD Empire sponsored the event, while XBIZ served as the official media sponsor.

Winners in several major categories included:

# Best Picture – Film: The New Devil in Miss Jones, Vivid Entertainment

# Best Picture – Video: Pirates, Digital Playground

# Best New Starlet: Kirsten Price, Wicked Pictures

# Best Female Performer: Courtney Cummz, Zero Tolerance

# Best Actress – Film: Monique Alexander, To Die For, Vivid Entertainment

# Best Actress – Video: Jessica Drake, Curse Eternal, Wicked Pictures

# Best Actor – Film: Randy Spears, Eternity, Wicked Pictures

# Best Actor – Video: Barrett Blade, Dark Angels 2: Bloodline, New Sensations

# Best Director – Film: Andrew Blake, Valentina

# Best Director – Video: Joone, Pirates

# Best New Production Company: Teravision

# Best Overall Production Company: Digital Playground

The awards show began with a red carpet reception, followed by cocktails and hors d’oeuvres. Attendees then sat down to a four-course meal.

In attendance was Jenna Jameson and her Club Jenna contract girls, Vivid’s Lacie Heart, Monique Alexander and Stefani Morgan, along with Rita Faltoyano, Tommy Gunn, Barrett Blade, Sunny Lane, Angie Savage, Tyler Faith, Cytherea, Sandee Westgate and Hillary Scott.

> Tod Hunter posts on www.tod-hunter.net: :The on-again-off-again here-there-and-anywhere Temptation Awards found a home at the Bonaventure Hotel downtown, the last-minute replacement for the previously cancelled Beverly Hilton and Ritz-Carlton Huntington in Pasadena. Things got off to a lovely start when I took the Fourth Street offramp from the Harbor Freeway and passed the Bonaventure at the guest-room level. A few turns later (Are there any two-way streets in downtown L.A.?) I’m in the parking area, handing over my keys to a valet and hoping to God that the Temptation Awards validate… I find the place very easily because somebody has placed stand-up signs saying exactly where the Temptation Awards will be held, with the name of the room and the level…

The Bonaventure lobby has been described as “the inside of a tooth” by some architecture critic, but I call it a “Zen maze,” because once you see where you want to go, you have to walk away from it in order to get there… The previously-identical corners of the lobby have been defined by colors, making it easier to find your way around, or at least easier to describe your surroundings when you call for help… The modern flat austere bare walls (the place was built in 1976) have been covered with wood paneling and the nondescript carpet has been replaced with a discreet patterned number, adding some visual texture to the place. Along with the truly horrible sculptures in the pools. One of them looks like a modern sculpture of a face-hugger alien clamped on somebody’s head.. It’s only 7:00, but somebody had to get here first… Two guys take pictures of each other… Publiicist Dusty Marie puts a stamp on my wrist, which starts transferring to my dress shirt, and hands me a parking validation ticket, which brings the price down to half… I sneak into the room where the Awards will be held, get an uncomfortable feeling of déjà vu: Curtains, blue lights, big TV monitors, let’s hope the band doesn’t suck… You got it, I’m stalling, nobody’s here yet…

I spy Dee, who hasn’t been active in a while, looking as good as ever… We chat for a while, then are joined by Howard Levine from LFP… I see an old buddy of mine, a mainstream writer who has just put out a book he co-wrote with a mainstream movie director about the differences between actors and directors… Sounds hilarious… Tiffany Taylor… Brooke Hunter and Don Hollywood. She’s very enthusiastic about her new video, The Reunion, which she just finished editing. Impressive cast (Shayla LaVeaux, Sara Stone, Evan Stone, Eva Angelina, Tyla Wynn, Evan Stone, Nick Manning) plus a 20-plus page script. “If I wanted to star in a film, I had to do it myself,” she grins… I grab my camera and tell her to “look pretty,” so she shoves her fingers up her nose and grimaces… I take the picture, what the hell… The deluge begins: Shy Love, Rachel Worth, Roy Karch, Monstar, Ben English, Angie Savage who I haven’t seen in a long time, Sunny Lane, Jenna Jameson, Kirsten Price, Tommy Gunn and Rita Faltoyano, Jenna Jameson?!??… I’ll be damned, it’s her all right… Jack Lawrence, Hannah Harper and Danny from Wanted List…

Jenna sits at a table with her entourage, her star power, like a force field, keeping people at a distance… Cousin Stevie, Digital Playground’s Cody, who tells me he did a scene in My First Porn 6 with Kelsey Michaels. “She’s not in the business any more”… As if on cue, Joone from Digital Playground turns up. We chat a while, he says he was sad that the venue moved from the Huntington hotel because it’s a beautiful place and suggests I check out the Huntington Library in Pasadena for the same elegance… Andrew Blake… Digital Playground publicist Adella, new husband in tow… Jenna Haze… Heth from Wicked Pictures… Holly Randall… Publicist Janie from High Profile Media… Somebody says “This is like PSK without the music”… I walk into the ballroom, and see a guy who is a familiar face, from back when I was a big Caroline in the City fan, played the nerdy little office assistant who was always on rollerskates. Andy Something-or-other…

The dinner starts, with a glass of Domaine Chandon sparkling wine and a salad with mandarin orange slices and candied pecans…. Beats the hell out of room-temperature cheese cubes and soggy crackers… Dinner comes out, filet mignon, lobster tail, mashed potatoes and crisp green beans… This is already the best Awards show I have been to, ever. Even the Daytime Emmys didn’t feed us this well, and I was a nominee… A short-haired man walks up to me, asks “Are you Tod Hunter?” It’s Jeremy Spencer, here with Adonis Pictures. We catch up for a moment…

The show starts, and the band does a number. They don’t suck. They’re borderline good, even, and can do something with a little intricacy like a Boston number instead of head-bangin’ power chords… As the third song begins, Barrett Blade leaves for the lobby. “Did you come for a concert?” No. “Me either.”… The host for the evening is introduced, Andy Lauer. Lauer. That’s it, I knew it was something like that… Lauer blames the loss of the Beverly Hilton venue on the hotel’s owner, Merv Griffin, and “calls” Griffin on his cell phone to ask him why… The bit falls flat, and it might have been funnier if Lauer had actually called Griffin, and Griffin told him “I sold the Beverly Hilton hotel three years ago”… Lauer then walks over to interview Jenna Jameson and, wouldn’t ya know it, he picks the wrong busty blonde at the table. “Do your research,” Jenna says to him…

The Award presentation, unfortunately, is the same as any Award presentation, long and dull… Although the pace picks up a little when the list of nominees on the video screens is replaced by the winner’s name halfway through the reading of the nominees…. There are 60 categories, we’re gonna be here all night… Heth accepts an Award for Wicked, Tommy Gunn gets another Award, some guy adresses Lauer as “Matt,” a reference to the host of the Today show which nobody notices. I’m bored out of my skull. At 10:40, the band plays “Fool If You Think It’s Over,” and I decide to see what’s going on in the lobby…

My mainstream-writer friend is out there – it was a bit loud for him – and we catch up for a while… Jeff Mullen and I catch up, and I get a picture of Hillary Scott… Jeremy comes out, with some of his performers, one of whom bristles when he hears my name. Turns out his real name is Todd and he thought Jeremy was using his real name… Holly Randall, happy-drunk, waves around her mother’s Hall of Fame Award. I ask her to pose with it and she opens her mouth wide, still smiling, and tongues it… Can’t beat that, I’m out of here…

> Jimmy D posts on www.simplyjimmyd.com: Gene Ross’s AdultFYI.com accounting of George Witty’s appearance on KSEXradio this past Friday night sort-of cleared up the mystery surrounding the Temptation Awards getting an unceremonious boot from Pasadena’s Ritz-Carlton Hotel.

George Witty is the producer or organizer or someone who has something to do with the Tempation Awards. He’s also Canadian (eh?) and I’m really not sure what his actual connection to the jizz biz is… which might also have something to do with the show’s recent problems. But what do I know? Shit happens, right? I don’t know if shit happens in Canada but shit definitely happens here.

Anyway, according to George, it seems the problems with the Ritz-Carlton came to a head when some R-C employee opened a box of Temptation Awards trophies and which one do you think this employee pulled out? Yep. The trophy for the Anal Award. I guess that pretty much sunk the Temptation Awards at the R-C. When the lady at the Ritz proclaimed, according to Mr. Witty, “This is an awards ceremony that celebrates the porno industry, and the Ritz-Carlton does not.” What I really think she meant was, and I’ll paraphrase, “This is an awards ceremony that celebrates ASS-FUCKING and the Ritz-Carlton does not.”

You know what? If that’s what the lady from the Ritz really meant, I can’t say I completely disagree with her.

Giving awards and trophies for stuff like ass-fucking, in my opinion, pretty much destroys the credibility of the rest of the awards organizations give out. It’s absurd to give awards for shit like that. (Pun intended.) I can understand and endorse awards for “Best” movies, performers, new starlets, scenes, packaging, camerawork, whatever. But “Best” at getting fucked in the ass? People wonder why practically the entire universe does not take us, the adult biz, seriously? Well, that kind of stuff is a big part of it.

Okay. I had my say. Congratulations to whomever won any of the Temptation Awards. If you’re the big sodomy winner, I’ll bet your family and friends are proud! Something to someday tell the kids and grand-kids about, right?

> Posted on Lukeisback:I Hear The Temptation Awards Lost $100,000. Worse than a car crash.

The powerpoint presentation on the big screen kept putting up winner photos while the nominees were being read.I hear that to fill the room they were scrambling to hand out free tickets to people drinking at the hotel bar.

About 100 people total went to the show. Aside from Gram Ponante’s blog, the official media sponsor of the show, XBiz, does not even bother to cover it. I can find no list of winners anywhere.

3:10 p.m. A list of winners is emailed and a story subsequently appears on XBiz.com.

> Tricia Devereaux posts on ADT: It may have been the least organized award show I’ve ever been to. And that goes way back to Girl Scouts in grade school.

I understand there were problems with venue changes. But did the person running the PowerPoint application change too? They would be partway through reading a list of the nominees, then all of a sudden, the winners name would pop up on the video screen. And THAT was if it was the right category.

Pirates won a few, Vivid won a bunch. Randy Spears, Barrett Blade.

Sophia Rossi for Best New Starlet. Kirsten Price for Best Female.

Jules Jordan for Best Gonzo and Best Gonzo Director.