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Mickey Blank entered porn in 1983 while living in Philadelphia. "My brother-in-law bought a distributorship and I was getting a divorce and in a business that ran itself. My brother-in-law said, ‘if you just hang around the house and do nothing, you’re going to go nuts and end up in trouble.’ So started working in PVE – Philadelphia Video Exchange.

"A year later, my brother-in-law made an agreement with Jeff Steinman (son of Joe) to run Essex East. Joe had just had his first heart attack and had relinquished the company to Jeff. I came to California to learn the business to run Essex East. I ran Target which was changed to Essex West. We sold videos to video stores… It was a reverse market then. If I didn’t like you, I didn’t sell you. We sold videos for $50 each to the distributors. Prior to that, Essex made its big money in theatrical."

In 1987, Essex was busted for ITOM – Interstate Transportation of Obscenity, and within two years the company was broke. "People that Essex owed money to took over the company and I was the only person left. I ran the new Essex for Jim Haskins and then he got sued by the people who sold him the company. I was paid strong money for a year to do nothing. Then I quit. I met with Reuben [Sturman]. He put me in touch with the people at Parliament Video and I ran Parliament for a couple of years [1990-91]."

Owned by Mike Cohen (Paul Wisner’s son-in-law), Parliament was the sister company of Gourmet Video which was owned by Paul Wisner and Howie Wasserman. Cohen started Elite Pictures and gave Blank a percentage of it. The company first release was by John Bowen – Easy Way Out which featured a hot wax scene that ended up on the first 500 or so tapes shipped until it was discovered and excised. The tape eventually helped Gourmet (the distributor) get busted in North Carolina for ITOM.

"They [the feds] basically wanted to get Gourmet," says Blank. "They didn’t want Parliament Video. They just wanted to go through our books. By the time they were ready to go to court, they dropped that movie [from the charges] after a one-hour phone call we had with attorney John Weston (which cost $10,000). It was worth every penny. They eventually just went after a couple of Gourmet pieces which ultimately cost Gourmet hundreds of thousands of dollars [in legal expenses and fines].

"If you’re willing to make the commitment [to fight], you’ll win because we have every right in the world to sell this stuff because of the First Amendment. Right now the business has a bunch of restrictions because people rolled over. The law is set by precedents. If you put three fingers in a girls pussy, that’s legal. But if you put a fourth finger in, it becomes fisting and is illegal. Why? Because someone rolled over. Instead of fighting, they took the loss and left the business. Thus the government got one up on us. To overturn a precedent is expensive and nobody wants to fight them."

Mike Cohen eventually divorced Paul Wisner’s daughter, sold Parliament Video to the distributor IVD, and left porn.

In 1992 Blank started Glitz Video. Then in 1995, for a year, Blank ran Sin City for his friend David Sturman (after Hank Weinstein left). "It wasn’t a money making proposition for me," says Blank. "It wasn’t meant to be. It was done as a favor."

After Ed Powers took over SCV, Blank left SCV and sold Glitz. "The people I sold it to, an Egyptian and an Israeli, then sold it to a Korean. They f---ed the s--- out of the Korean (Dong Kim), charging him triple (about $500,000) what the company was worth. They didn’t give him all the masters and all the boxes… He started putting the stuff out sideways. Glitz was a good company but a company is only as good as the people creating for it. Look at Caballero, they were fabulous. Now it’s cheap city. After a few months, Dong went under with Glitz.

"I started Shooting Star after I sold Glitz. I shoot older women, women without teeth giving head… Pregnant and lactating and some she-male. My latest one is called Three Pigs starring three gigantic women… I’m not in competition with Vivid… But there’s a market for it. My mom says there’s a lid for every pot.

"My wife runs SB Sales which puts out the Dennie-O series. Dennie-O is a middle-aged housewife who does dildos the size of New Jersey. The series is up to 14 now and is the hottest thing we’ve touched in years. She does gangbangs with black guys, an anal tape…"

Luke: "How attractive is she?"

Mickey: "She’s not bad. She’s not my cup of tea but she’s got giant tits.

"We shoot some of Dennie-O’s friends. Gina Talia is a 30-year old heavy set internet slut, a down and dirty chick who does everything. It’s pretty much bookstore stuff. It’s funky. But not everybody wants story or pretty girls.

"We were releasing Anna Malle’s Wild Life, but effective this week that will go over to Kevin Beech who’s signing a contract with Anna to do one a month.

"I just put out Mondo Extreme P-Verts which is just a rainbow assortment of girls taking a piss. I can’t tell you how successful it’s been.

"My third company is Typhoon which we started in March. I came in this business in 1982 with Essex Video and this is the most successful thing I’ve had since Essex. I have a partner in Japan who does about 40% of all adult video made in Japan. We call him K.C. of Hokuto Company. I can’t even pronounce the town where he lives.

"He supplies me with the raw footage. In Japan they can’t show penetration while they can do many things we can’t do, such as bondage, torture, rape, pissing [with hardcore sex]. I cut out all the stuff that is not legal here. Japanese girls look so young. We do this series Dragon Ladies which features Japanese women in their 40s. And they all look like they are in their 20s. Girls in their 20s look in their teens. Now if the scene look like they are playing up the youngness of it, I can’t use that.

"This guy [KC] puts out a 100 tapes a month in Japan. Each scene, which runs about 40 minutes, is a tape. I get all his masters and I will put six or seven scenes in a tape, whatever it takes to make it action-packed. We do different series – she-male, gay…

"What’s scary today is the internet. In our [video] industry, we guard ourselves. If I put out something that is questionable, my distributors won’t buy it. If I put something questionable in a tape and don’t tell them, they won’t trust me. And we’re in a business of trust. I deal with the same 45-50 distributors all the time.

"GVA was even stronger a few years ago. They take about 50% of my product. Even though they own their own stores, GVA does not dabble in anything questionable."

5/21/01

When Jimmy Caci Shook Down David Sturman

XXX says: You know who sent Jimmy Caci (West Coast mobster whose contacts go up to Sonny Franzese of the Colombo crime family) to Sin City to shake down David Sturman in 1995? It was Ken Gallo, aka Kenji, that Japanese guy who thinks he's a mobster.

You can see Jimmy Caci and Ken Gallo and Tabitha Stevens in this picture.

Gallo claimed that Sin City owed him money. I think they screwed David over which is why David was being a hardass. They got into a screaming match. There were a lot of people in the building when it happened.

Kenny called these people (Jimmy Caci and company) in from Palm Springs. David got into an argument with them. David told they to go f--- themselves. And they said they were going to make a phone call. David said, 'You're going to make a f---ing phone call? I'll make a f---ing phone call. I'll make your f---ing phone call s--- in your pants.' In other words, David can make a bigger phone call. And those guys left.

Luke: They left with thousands of David's dollars.

XXX: They left with way less money than was owed Kenny. I know they settled for less, for like $9,000 out of $15,000. David was ballistic. He was pissed beyond belief. He was screaming. 'You bring these f---ing wiseguys into my f---ing place?' And then David tried to blackball Kenny Gallo. He said that GVA would not buy anything that had Kenny Gallo's name on it. I'm sure he still won't talk to Kenny Gallo.

YYY says: This Israeli guy Ben, through Jerry Zimmerman, sold a movie to Mickey Blank at Sin City. And Sin City never bothered to pay. So Jimmy Caci went down there and collected the money from David Sturman. Later, Sin City owed money to Kenny Gallo for the Buck Adams movie Blade. The video rights were sold to Kevin Beechum and David Sturman bought the foreign and cable rights. David claimed that Buck owned the money and that he didn't owe Kenji any money. So Kenji showed him the copyright on the movie.

So Kenji and Jimmy Caci and a couple of other guys went into Sin City to pay David Sturman a call. And Buck Adams and Mickey Blank and a bunch of guys were there. Buck got thrown out. And David said, 'I don't know what you guys are making such a big deal about. It's only $13,000.'

An argument erupted. David tried to weasel his way out and that he knew people, muscle, too. So Jimmy says, 'Get on the phone bubblegum chewing motherf---er. Call who you've got to call.' And of course, David didn't call anyone because he can't. He has no muscle. Just because you have money doesn't mean anything. Then Mickey Blank interjected until he got told to shut up. And Gallo got his check.

In the year 2000, Mickey Blank tried to get Gallo arrested for selling his product. First Blank told the police that it was counterfeit. The Orange County intelligence squad drove all the way into the San Fernando Valley to look into this. Mickey claimed that the only person who could distribute his product was him. And that it was worth $14 a tape. But everyone in the business knows it is worth $2 a tape.

It turned out that Mickey Blank's son sold the 400 pieces to Kenji Gallo. And Mickey and the police looked like idiots.