That’s Colonel Robert Schaffner.
Sunday at 5 p.m., I joined AVN’s Mark Kernes with about 20 others for this historic event at 4328 Melrose Blvd.
Jim Beck, one of the Colonel’s most devoted followers, insists on calling Kernes "Mike Albo."
The press conference begins with a song and then is thrown up for questions.
Luke: "Why are you closing?"
Rob: "Because the economy sucks. I lost $60,000 last year on this store. It’s become a club house. It’s always been about hanging out and getting drunk and doing what you want… The DNA you are looking at on the ground, if they came in and did those luminol testings, this place would light up, it would look like a hippie’s apartment."
"You might very well have been invited here today to watch the Colonel blow his head off."
Ivan Lerner from New York asks: "Do you have an enemies list?"
Rob: "Number one. These local community business groups. These fat old housewives that have nothing better to do than to pry into your business."
Ivan in a falsetto voice: "Because they want to protect the children."
Rob: "Exactly. We’ll protect the children. We’ll eat ’em.
"Number two. The federal government has been a pain in my ass since I was 15 and working with the old school guys [such as Russ Meyer].
"Number three. Local police. We got raided a year ago. They took a bunch of porn. Guess what I never got back? My porn.
"Number four. My mother. I haven’t seen her or talked to her… I was up on an obscenity charge in 1988, one of my first obscenity charges, and my mother testified for the federal government that I was a scumbag since I was a little kid, and that I masturbated since the age of eight and all I wanted to do was torture women."
"Number five enemy of Mondo Video is the press."
The Colonel’s father is "Captain Art. A colorful character," says his son.
Art is 77. He’s recovering from brain surgery.
Rob says his brother is a drug addict. Rob had him working in porn, "which is no place for a drug addict."
"My brother was so hopped up and high that customers would rat on him to me."
Rob lists his favorite people.
"Phil Spector is the pariah of LA. He loves foreplay with women. He’s legendary for bringing home certain young ladies who work in the Adult industry. $1500. And they’d orally do the gun. I’ve heard this from at least 20 different women. For $500 extra, Spector would like to do the Russian Roulette game (after using a disabled bullet)."
"Next on the list is Pizza Paul next door. He’s like a father figure."
"Jim Jones was a hero. He talked people into moving to a jungel in nowhere and commit suicide. The cowards ran."
"Number two is Titus Moody."
In his teens, Rob worked for Harry Novak, who shot such as classics as The Pigkeeper’s Daughter.
One day Rob met Titus Moody on a set and brought him into hardcore.
"Number one is Russ Meyer. My father was a television repairman to the stars. He fixed Judy Garland’s TV, Jack Benny… He did night calls. These were stars. They wanted service now.
"I’d go along with him.
"I was 15. We went to this house under the Hollywood sign. His house is a museum. My dad’s working on Russ’s TV. I start going through his crap and looking at his pictures.
"Russ noted I had an eye for photography. He said, ‘I’ve never noticed anyone react to my photography like you have.’"
Russ insisted that Rob graduate from high school. He then gave him a blue 1972 Cadillac that Rob still drives.
Rob would take a bus from school to work for Russ. "Russ adopted me. I’m an adoptable little puppy."
"I was with Russ until the end."
"We’d go to titty bars. He was in the first stages of Alzheimers but he knew what a tit was."
Luke: "What happened to your marriage?"
Rob: "Too much drugs and the Colonel’s gone. And the drugs weren’t on the Colonel’s end.
"I was addicted to heroin when I was about 24. I call it my $100,00 tattoo."
He unrolls his sleeve.
James Beck: "It’s a gateway drug."
Rob: "It led me down the road to marijuana."
"Russ saw that I was addicted to heroin. So Russ locked me up in the desert house. I dried out there. I can’t tell you about the pain. That was the end of my drugs. I smoked pot and cigarettes."
"Always in porn you put your hand in the cookie jar.
"I’ve always dated girls outside of the business.
"I was working late… Jim Powers and I were adrenaline-based directors. We’d get high from shooting a f— flick.
"A lot of directors had drug habits. We all agree that when you’re shooting porn and you’re on your game, your job is to push that envelope. After a while, shooting people f—ing it becomes everyday and you want to go further…and the only way you can get high is to go further…and you get that shot of the cum dribbling off her face and maybe even some blood coming out the side of her mouth… As a cameraman, you’re shaking. It’s like getting a fix. It is better than a fix."
"I’m out working long hours and she’s down here at Mondo Video A Go Go meeting the dregs of society.
"Jim and I would start driving that edge and the adrenaline starts kicking in and we’re there until 4:30 a.m. as we’re getting our porn fix. She’s here mixing with the scumbags and eventually the first thing I notice is that her teeth are getting black. It got to the point where I didn’t want to go home. I had two homes. I only have one now.
"It’s getting worse. Maggots in the garbage. Trash strewn all over. One night I came home and found a syrine in the trash can. We call them a spent round. I hadn’t f—ed that woman for a year before the divorce.
"She got more pale. Dark rings under eyes. I’m not going to f— that and get AIDS. It’s el divorco time."
"She was a speedballer. Heroin and cocaine."
"I took advantage of the heroin. I got a good divorce settlement. We’re going through this divorce and she’s as high as a kite. Basically, I bought her out."
"I haven’t seen her in three years."
"The evidence came out that there was saliva on Phil Spector’s cock. Guess who’s? Lana Clarkson. There was saliva on her left tit. It’s sad that someone with a great set of tits had to die but you know what? It’s entertainment.
"They also found another person’s saliva on his cock."
"They rape-kitted it."
"I love this trial and I hope there’s a season two."
Rob says his older brother is a member of the Klu Klux Klan.
On the ride to California from Missouri, Rob’s younger brother David died (at about eight months of age) in Arkansas. Rob says his dad suspects that his mother strangled David to get back at him.
They kept the body in the car for several days until they got to California. The smell was terrible. It was the middle of summer. And there’s a dead baby in the car for five days.
Why’d you fkn walk out in video #2 for Luke? The Colonel was about to talk about my ol pal Stevie Strange. You missed some good stories.