Linda Lovelace | |
|---|---|
 Lovelace in 1986 | |
| Born | Linda Susan Boreman (1949-01-10)January 10, 1949 New York City, U.S. |
| Died | April 22, 2002(2002-04-22) (aged 53) Denver, Colorado, U.S. |
| Occupations | Pornographic actress, memoirist |
| Spouses | |
| Children | 3 |
| Signature | |
 | |
Linda Lovelace (bornLinda Susan Boreman; January 10, 1949 – April 22, 2002) was an Americanpornographic actress who became famous for her performance in the 1972hardcore filmDeep Throat, which was an enormous success. She later alleged that her abusive husband,Chuck Traynor, had threatened and coerced her into participation. In her autobiographyOrdeal, she described what took place behind the scenes. She later became aborn-again Christian and a spokeswoman for theanti-pornography movement.[1]
Boreman was born on January 10, 1949,[2] inThe Bronx,New York, into a working-class family.[3] She described her upbringing in an unhappy family, as the daughter of John Boreman, a police officer who was seldom home, and Dorothy Boreman (née Tragney), a waitress who was harsh, unloving, and domineering.[4] She attended privateCatholic schools, including Saint John the Baptist (Yonkers, New York) andMaria Regina High School. Linda was nicknamed "Miss Holy Holy" in high school because she kept her dates at a safe distance to avoid sexual activity.[5] When Boreman was 16, her family moved toDavie, Florida, after her father retired from the New York City Police Department.[6]
At the age of 20, she gave birth to her first child born out of wedlock, whom her mother tricked her into putting up for adoption.[4] Shortly afterwards, she returned to New York City to live and go to computer school. There, she was in acar crash, sustaining injuries that were serious enough to require her to undergo ablood transfusion. The transfused blood had not been properly screened forhepatitis contamination, which caused her to need a liver transplant 18 years later.[5]
While recovering at the home of her parents, Boreman became involved withChuck Traynor. According to Boreman, Traynor was charming and attentive at first, then became violent and abusive. She said he forced her to move to New York, where he became her manager,pimp, and husband.[5]
Allegedly coerced by Traynor,[7] Boreman was soon performing as Linda Lovelace inhardcore "loops", short 8 mm silent films made forpeep shows.[8]
Boreman starred in a 1969bestiality film titledDogarama (also known asDog 1,Dog Fucker andDog-a-Rama).[9][10] She later denied having appeared in the film until several of the original loops proved otherwise.[5][11] In 2013, Larry Revene, the cameraman who actually shot the film, spoke about it for the first time, during which he asserted that Boreman was a willing participant and that no coercion took place.[8] Porn starEric Edwards, who was present for the shoot, has similarly claimed there was no obvious coercion going on and that Boreman appeared to be a cooperative performer.[12]
In 1971, Boreman also starred in thegolden shower film titledPiss Orgy.[13]
In 1972, Boreman starred inDeep Throat, in which she performeddeep-throating. The film achieved surprising and unprecedented popularity among mainstream audiences and even a review in theNew York Times.[14][15] It played several times daily for over ten years at theaters in thePussycat Theater chain, where Boreman did promotions, including leaving her hand and footprints in the concrete sidewalk outside the Hollywood Pussycat. The movie later became one of the first, and highest-grossing, X-rated videotape releases. WhileDeep Throat grossed over $600 million, Boreman was paid only $1,250, which was later confiscated by her husband Traynor.[16][17]
On December 20, 1973, she was inducted into the Golden Age of Porn Walk of Fame.[18][19]
In December 1973, Boreman made her theater debut inPajama Tops at the Locust Theatre inPhiladelphia,Pennsylvania. The production suffered disappointing box office performance, which led it to close early, and Boreman's performance was panned.[20][21]
In 1974, Boreman starred in theR-rated sequel,Deep Throat II, which was not as well received as the original had been; one critic, writing inVariety, described it as "the shoddiest ofexploitation film traditions, a depressing fast buck attempt to milk a naïve public."[4]
In 1975, Boreman left Traynor forDavid Winters, the producer of her 1975 filmLinda Lovelace for President, which co-starredMicky Dolenz. The film showed her on the campaign trail following a cross-country bus route mapped out in the shape of a penis. However, her career as an actress failed to flourish, and her film appearances add up to five hours of screen time.[4] In her 1980 autobiographyOrdeal, Lovelace maintained that those films used leftover footage fromDeep Throat; however, she frequently contradicted this statement. She also posed forPlayboy,Bachelor, andEsquire between 1973 and 1974.[22]
During the mid-1970s, she took to smoking large quantities ofmarijuana combined with painkillers, and after her second marriage and the birth of her two children, she left the pornographic film business.[4]
In 1974, she published two "pro-porn" autobiographies,Inside Linda Lovelace andThe Intimate Diary of Linda Lovelace.
In 1976, she was chosen to play the title role in the erotic movieForever Emmanuelle (also known asLaure). However, according to the producerOvidio G. Assonitis, Lovelace was "very much on drugs" at the time. She had already signed for the part when she avowed that "God had changed [her] life", refused to do any nudity, and even objected to a statue of theVenus de Milo on the set because of its exposed breasts. She was replaced by French actressAnnie Belle.[23]
In January 1977, she briefly returned to theater acting in aLas Vegas production ofMy Daughter's Rated X, but the show closed early and her acting performance was criticized.[24]
In her suit to divorce Traynor, she alleged that he forced her into pornography at gunpoint and that inDeep Throat bruises from his beatings can be seen on her legs. She alleged that her husband "would force her to do these things by pointing a rifle at her head." Boreman said in her autobiography that her marriage had been plagued by violence, rape, forced prostitution and private pornography. She wrote inOrdeal:
When in response to his suggestions I let him know I would not become involved in prostitution in any way and told him I intended to leave, [Traynor] beat me and the constant mental abuse began. I literally became a prisoner, I was not allowed out of his sight, not even to use the bathroom, where he watched me through a hole in the door. He slept on top of me at night, he listened to my telephone calls with a .45 automatic eight shot pointed at me. I suffered mental abuse each and every day thereafter. He undermined my ties with other people and forced me to marry him on advice from his lawyer.My initiation into prostitution was agang rape by five men, arranged by Mr. Traynor. It was the turning point in my life. He threatened to shoot me with the pistol if I didn't go through with it. I had never experiencedanal sex before and it ripped me apart. They treated me like an inflatable plastic doll, picking me up and moving me here and there. They spread my legs this way and that, shoving their things at me and into me, they were playing musical chairs with parts of my body. I have never been so frightened and disgraced and humiliated in my life. I felt like garbage. I engaged in sex acts in pornography against my will to avoid being killed ... The lives of my family were threatened.[25]
Boreman's accusations provoked mixed responses. Traynor admitted to striking Lovelace but said it was part of a voluntary sex game.[5] InLegs McNeil's and Jennifer Osborne's 2005 bookThe Other Hollywood, several witnesses, includingDeep Throat directorGerard Damiano, state that Traynor beat Boreman behind closed doors, but they also question her credibility. Eric Edwards, Boreman's co-star in thebestiality films and other loops that featured her urinating on her sex partners, similarly discounts her credibility. According to Edwards, Boreman was a sexual "super freak" who had no boundaries and was apathological liar. Adult film actressGloria Leonard was quoted as saying, "This was a woman who never took responsibility for her own ... choices made; but instead blamed everything that happened to her in her life on porn." Corroboration for Lovelace's claims came fromAndrea True, Lovelace's co-star inDeep Throat 2, who, on a commentary DVD track of the documentaryInside Deep Throat, stated that Traynor was asadist and was disliked by theDeep Throat 2 cast.Andrea Dworkin stated that the results ofpolygraph tests administered to Boreman support her assertions.[26] Moreover, psychiatristJudith Lewis Herman notes that many details in Lovelace's memoirOrdeal are consistent with a diagnosis ofcomplex PTSD, such as Lovelace's description of a fragmented personality in the aftermath of alleged abuse.[27]
Eric Danville, a journalist who covered the porn industry for nearly 20 years and wroteThe Complete Linda Lovelace in 2001, said Boreman never changed her version of events that had occurred 30 years earlier with Traynor. When Danville told Boreman of his book proposal, he said she was overcome with emotion and saddened he had uncovered the bestiality film, which she had initially denied making and later maintained she had been forced to star in at gunpoint.[28]
Boreman maintained that she received no money forDeep Throat and that the $1,250 payment for her appearance was taken by Traynor.[29]
In 1976, Boreman married Larry Marchiano, a cable installer who later owned adrywall business. They had two children, Dominic (born 1977) and Lindsay (born 1980). They lived inCenter Moriches, a small town onLong Island. Boreman was then going through theliver transplant that her injuries from the automobile accident had necessitated, owing to the poorly screened blood she received in the transfusions. For a while, marriage and particularly motherhood brought her some stability and happiness.[4] However, Marchiano's business went bankrupt in 1990, and the family moved toColorado.[6]
InThe Other Hollywood, Boreman painted a largely unflattering picture of Marchiano, claiming he drank to excess, verbally abused their children, and was occasionally violent with her. They divorced in 1996 but remained on good terms and were in contact until the end of her life.
With the publication ofOrdeal in 1980, Boreman joined theanti-pornography movement. At a press conference announcingOrdeal, she leveled many of the above-noted accusations against Traynor in public for the first time. She was joined by supportersAndrea Dworkin,Catharine MacKinnon,Gloria Steinem, and members ofWomen Against Pornography. Boreman spoke out against pornography, stating that she had been abused and coerced. She spoke before feminist groups, at colleges, and at government hearings on pornography.
In 1986, Boreman publishedOut of Bondage, a memoir focusing on her life after 1974. She testified before the 1986Attorney General's Commission on Pornography, also called the "Meese Commission", in New York City, stating, "When you see the movieDeep Throat, you are watching me being raped.[30] It is a crime that movie is still showing; there was a gun to my head the entire time." Following Boreman's testimony for the Meese Commission, she gave lectures on college campuses, decrying what she described as callous and exploitative practices in the pornography industry.[29]
Boreman had contractedhepatitis from the blood transfusion she received after her 1970 car accident[31] and underwent a liver transplant in 1987.[32] In 2001, she was featured onE! True Hollywood Story and did a lingerie pictorial as Linda Lovelace for the magazineLeg Show.[33]
On April 3, 2002, Boreman was involved in another automobile accident, suffering massivetrauma and internal injuries. On April 22, she was taken offlife support and died at the age of 53. Marchiano and their two children were present when she died.[34] Boreman was interred atParker Cemetery inParker, Colorado.[35][36]
The computer processing coordination systemLinda was named after Linda Lovelace. This name choice was inspired by the programming languageAda, which was named after computer pioneerAda Lovelace.[37]
Boreman's participation inDeep Throat was among the topics explored in the 2005 documentaryInside Deep Throat.
Indie pop singer and songwriterMarc with a C released a 2008 album titledLinda Lovelace for President, which contained a song of the same name.[38]
The country songwriter and singerDavid Allan Coe wrote a song called "Linda Lovelace"[39] which is featured on his 1978 albumNothing Sacred. The same song appears on his 1990 album18 X-Rated Hits under the title "I Made Linda Lovelace Gag".[40]
In 2008,Lovelace: A Rock Musical, based on two of Boreman's four autobiographies, debuted at theHayworth Theatre in Los Angeles. The score and libretto were written byAnna Waronker of the 1990s rock groupThat Dog, andCharlotte Caffey of the 1980s groupthe Go-Go's.[41]
Lovelace is one of the main characters of the 2010 stage playThe Deep Throat Sex Scandal by David Bertolino. The play follows the life and early career ofHarry Reems as he enters thepornography industry, eventually filmingDeep Throat and its resultantinfamy and obscenity trial inMemphis,Tennessee, and Lovelace is a central figure. In July 2013, anIndiegogocrowdfunding campaign to make a film version of the play raised over $25,000.[42]
As of 2011, twobiographical films on Boreman were scheduled to begin production.[43][44] One, titledLovelace, went into general release on August 9, 2013, withRob Epstein andJeffrey Friedman directing,Amanda Seyfried as Lovelace, andPeter Sarsgaard as Chuck Traynor.Lovelace received a limited release in 2013, but ultimately, despite drawing many positive reviews, it was a box-office failure. The other, titledInferno: A Linda Lovelace Story,[43][44][45] starringMalin Åkerman, was to be directed byMatthew Wilder and produced by Chris Hanley and was scheduled to begin filming in early 2011.[46][47] Due to a lack of financing it never went into production.
Tina Yothers, who was a child actress onFamily Ties, was cast as Lovelace inLovelace: The Musical.
Other books:
By 1980 she had become a mother of two, a born-again Christian, and a feminist -- and was living on welfare as her husband tried to make ends meet as a cable installer on Long Island. She had already become the feminist poster child for the demeaning effects of pornography, turning up in Andrea Dworkin's 1979 book "Pornography: Men Possessing Women."
… X-rated film actor Linda Lovelace in 1949
By Linda Lovelace With Mike McGrady (Lyle Stuart, $14.95.) In her 1980 bookOrdeal, Linda Lovelace, star of the pornographic movie ...
