10 Questions with Linda Roberts – Performer, Director and Producer
Exclusive by Lady B
Linda Roberts started her adult career at the age of 40 and hasn’t looked back since. So how did someone that grew up in New York State, dancing in stage shows professionally in her teens, end up being in porn? What’s she doing in 2011? Well, here are 10 questions that Linda answered to shed a little light on those questions and more.
1) When did you start dancing and performing professionally? I started dancing when I was 8, studying ballet and some jazz dance styles. Obviously, I was doing mainstream performances. By the time I was a teen I was regularly performing on stage, both dancing and acting in community theatre productions. Throughout my teens to my early twenties, I could be found working in one of several local New York theatre repertory companies, usually working as the assistant choreographer or dance captain, many times both.
In adult, oddly enough, I do not dance in clubs and have never done so, only because I suck at it. I can’t dance like the girls in the strip clubs. However, I admire and respect the pole dancers that are so incredibly athletic and talented. I started my adult video career in 1995. Before that, I had modeled for nude layouts and softcore publications for a couple of years.
2) Why did you decide to get into the adult industry?
I actually got into the video end of the adult industry on a dare. I had done a few photo shoots and some magazine layouts but it had not dawned on me to try adult films. Then my husband, Frank Castle, dared me to do a sex scene in a movie that he was producing. Since I was convinced that he was wrong and I wouldn’t have any success as an adult performer, I decided to take him up on the dare. I was wrong. He was right. The rest is history!
3) What was your favorite adult movie that you performed in?
Without question my favorite adult movie role was Laura Brody, in The New Neighbors. I was nominated for the AVN Best Actress – Feature award for that role. I got to work with some of my favorite adult performers. It was an incredibly detailed plot with a lot of great people in it. We all worked very well together, the chemistry in the sex scene pairings was real, and I think it shows in the final product.
4) What was your favorite role in a mainstream movie?
I think my favorite mainstream role would have to be in Cannibal Taboo because the character was just such a weirdo. The whole film is bizarre as it’s about a family whose matriarch is a cannibal. There are scenes of movie style occult rituals, gore, sex. . . We had a great time making that film and I loved working with Ashlie Rhey on it. She and I get into a lot of trouble as characters in the film and we had a blast both on camera and off.
Another favorite mainstream project I have done is less of a role, but more as a participant in the Better Sex video series, distributed by Adam and Eve. My husband and I are featured on 10 or so of the titles in the new series, produced between 2006 and 2009, and we really enjoyed working with the Sinclair Institute on those productions.
5) You are also a producer and director, do you have your own production house?
I have directed and produced for the Marquis Productions line of videos. Marquis is the adult production house my husband and I own and operate. Much of that content was picked up by Homegrown Video, and we became the "go to" production house for them, when they were looking for niche content in both amateur and swinger genres. For years, our content was a large part of their MILF lines.
I have also acted as producer for about two dozen or so independent mainstream production studios. Most of those movies were video direct horror movies and "sexploitation" titles. Currently I am producing and directing videos for the State of California.
Even though I retired from doing hardcore sex scenes in 2010, I am still doing some non-sex roles in my husband’s productions, both mainstream and adult. Since I have always done behind the camera work as well, I have just switched to directing and producing, instead of having sex on camera. I still consider myself very much a part of the industry, and am in contact with everyone I’ve ever worked with, that’s worth being in contact with.
I have always crossed back and forth between mainstream and adult entertainment. Both ends of the entertainment industry require some of the same skills of a producer and director. However, good adult scenes are much harder to capture on film than most mainstream scripts. Between keeping costs down and working with people that are completely exposed on camera, there is a different mind set the director has to follow. That’s why many mainstream directors don’t do well in adult. As a performer and a director in both, I am able to produce either type of movie comfortably.
6) What are your hobbies?
Honestly, I’ve been working so much that sometimes I don’t take the down time I need. I take dance and yoga classes whenever I have hours for myself, and I spend time with my dogs and my husband. I love to read and always have several books I’m reading at the same time. Some of my favorite authors are Kaye Hooper, Patricia Cornwell and James Baldacci. Gardening and working on projects around the house take up a lot of my time, but that’s work I can enjoy and consider a hobby. I just bought a new Craftsman drill and now I’m building shelves in our utility room!
7) When you aren’t doing movie production, do you have another business?
I have a graphics and lay out design business that I have run since my early twenties. You could say that I inherited it from my Mom, as she was a publisher since before I was born. I do graphics for print collaterals, publications and also websites. Right now I have four websites going for the State of California, along with video production work and handling all of their brochures, training packets and other print projects. I have also started a new business with my friend and adult business associate, Sherry Ziegelmeyer (of http://blackandbluemedia.com & http://thepresswire.com) called Start My Porn Company.
8) So what’s this Start My Porn Company project? Start My Porn Company – I usually use the acronym SMPC – is a concept Sherry and I came up with after we realized how many requests we were getting from people wanting help starting an adult business through our regular adult industry positions, me as a performer and her as a publicist. We had both assumed that there was someone teaching that kind of thing, so it hadn’t occurred to us that there was a need for actual consultants or business managers for adult.
Well, we started researching and found that while there are people offering courses that supposedly teach you how to start an adult business, they either aren’t taught by people actually in the industry or they don’t teach production, or they are lacking in other basic information. So we put together a group of people we know and trust and we offer advice and information from real adult industry professionals to those that want to start their own production companies.
Everyone involved with Start My Porn Company are people who are actually out there making adult movies, or who have done so. And every one in our network has a minimum of five years experience in the industry, not a year or two, or have just been on a porn set once and think they know everything!
When you are doing mainstream movies, you can take a course at any accredited college or university, but you can’t do that for adult production. The adult industry is interesting in that you almost have to know someone in order to find out “insider” information that will help you make the right decisions for your particular company. We offer that “insider” information along with company management, production services and pretty much anything else someone might need to be successful.
9) What makes SMPC different than other “get into adult” courses?
We are more of a business consultation and management service than a course. You really can’t learn what you need to know to be successful in adult by having people talk at you for hours or days, and you certainly can’t learn how to shoot a good porn scene from a book or a DVD. What we provide, is a way for people to start building an adult production house, focusing on learning how to shoot quality content, by working with the professionals that we have put together in our Start My Porn Company ProNet.
Above all, we’re not here to rip people off or to lie to them. Our goal is to actually help people be successful. There has been a recent incident of someone that claims to do what we offer through Start My Porn Company, but that person has no real industry contacts and their investors that think they are starting their own companies are getting ripped off, because the people he’s choosing to work with aren’t able to do what they are claiming. And technically, it isn’t even that person’s fault, as he just doesn’t know enough about this industry, or the people in it, to know who to work with.
Another thing that I know sets us apart is total honesty. If someone approaches us with a concept that we truly believe won’t allow them to be successful, we tell them so and suggest ways to make it successful for them. We also do our part to keep people that work with us from doing anything that could get them arrested or sued. I don’t know of any other service or course that’s willing to do "tough-love" the way we do. We aren’t all about the money and letting people think they have a great idea, when they don’t. We’re about making sure that everyone that works with us starts a profitable and legal adult business. http://startmyporncompany.com/
10) What are you looking forward to doing in the next two years? My husband and I, along with Sherry, are going to continue to build Start My Porn Company, and we will start offering introductory "primers" that cover the basic information people need to know before they choose to start an adult production company. We are also forming a plan to begin doing weekend long on-set workshops, so we can help more people learn how to put together a quality adult production first hand.
Of course, I will continue my graphics and design work ,along with producing and directing for both mainstream and adult. Frank and I are also getting new adult content ready to distribute. We’ve both been so busy the past two years with mainstream work that our adult video content has sat waiting for us to get it edited and out there. We have at least five movies in the can, which have never been released. Our intent is to get moving on that before January of 2012. I’ve also been working on updating my own site, http://linda-roberts.com, and I will be doing some personal appearances coming up.