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Traci Lords: I Was A Teenage Pornstar

AUTHOR'S NOTE: This interview with the ex-hardcore pornstar, Traci Lords, was first published in the Scottish music paper TRIGGER (5th October, 1995) then in dumb/SULK trigg-er fanzine (December, 1996).

***

Nora Kuzma has done more in her 25-odd years than most women do in a lifetime. As an actress she's appeared in two of weirdo director John Waters's main features ('Cry Baby' and 'Serial Mom'), played a scary cult member in the US teen-soap, 'Melrose Place', hammed it up as a bimbo waitress on 'Roseanne', been possessed by aliens in 'The Tommy Knockers' and grown wings in the SF movie 'Virtuosity'.

As a singer she has appeared on the 'Pet Cemetery II' soundtrack, collaborated with Manic Street Preachers on their 1992 single, 'Little Baby Nothing', and released her own critically aclaimed techno album, '1,000 Fires' (recorded in London with ex-members of Jesus Jones, The KLF and The Thompson Twins). Her first single, 'Control', was a white-label dance-floor smash and reached the top position on the US Billboard Charts!

But none of this matters.

The real reason the World's media wants to talk to her (and that includes us, it has to be said) is because, for a few mad years of her life - when she should still have been worrying about who would take her to the Prom - she got in a bit over her head with 'the wrong crowd' down on Redondo Beach and somehow ended up as one of the most famous hardcore porn stars in the World.

The tale has been told so often now it's become a part of porno folk-lore.

At the age of 14, Nora Kuzma, a pretty Jewish girl of Ukrainian descent had become so fucked-up by life that she convinced herself she wasn't going to make it past her 20th birthday anyway and so set off on a notorious self-destructive journey - running away from her Hollywood home and becoming TRACI LORDS.

Over the next 4 years Traci Lords developed a serious coke habit, appeared nude in various men's magazines, made what has been estimated at over 100 hard-core porn videos (many whilst still technically underage) and got busted by the FBI for her involvement in these. At 19 she shot up a dose of cocaine and almost died. It was this near-death experience that finally shocked her into taking stock of her life.

On '1,000 Fires', Traci sings 'Father's Field' - a disturbing song which describes the experience that first set her off on this troubled path. When she was only 10 years old and living in rural Ohio she was abused by an older boy in a field behind her parents' house. At first the song seems to be a fairly innocent introduction to sexual awakening but, as it progresses, things get frightening.

Although the lyrics to 'Father's Field' are harrowing, the music seems to work in a different way. The hypnotic ambient groove gives the feel of a woman remembering the facts of her childhood abuse but unable to properly feel all the pain. This could almost be Traci at 19 - all her senses dulled by the cocaine she's injected - staring death in the face as images from her past float past like she's in a dream.

Despite the difficult subject matter, Traci Lords seems fairly relaxed as she sits here smoking cigarettes and drinking cups of coffee in the living room of her Hollywood home. Leaning forward on the over-stuffed, pale-green, silky sofa, she stubs the remains of a Marlboro Light out in her overflowing ashtray. The cat, Mr Steve, watches as she almost immediately places a new one between her lips and lights it. Traci is dressed casually in a pair of trashed, holey Levi 501 jeans and a white, V-neck, cotton T-Shirt with her bare feet resting on the stripped hardwood floor. The only concession she's made towards making-up her face (surprisingly pale for a native of Los Angeles) is the thick, trashy, black eyeliner that surrounds each eye.

Did you have any qualms about including 'Father's Field' on your album? I don't think many people would feel comfortable about opening themselves up to the public in that way.

Traci frowns, just a little, and brushes a few strands of peroxide-blonde hair from in front of her eye. 'That was probably the most significant thing that happened to me when I was growing up. The album deals with my life - so it would've been totally bizarre to have left out what was probably the most powerful thing I ever experienced.'

You've said in the past that at junior high-school here in California you felt that you were a bit of an outsider - that you didn't really fit in with anyone else. Do you think that was because of what had happened to you when you were 10?

'Yeah, it had to do with that and it had to do with the fact that I always looked different to everybody else. I was physically a lot more mature - more of a woman than a girl, really. Even when I was very young I was overdeveloped. It seemed like I was in some sort of a weird time-warp.' Miss Lords looks out the huge French windows, blinking into the sun as she remembers. 'I never really belonged to any clique. I just went from group to group and picked up different things along the way. I think that's why I listened to so many different kinds of music - why I did so many different things. I've always said that rock music - AC/DC, Black Sabbath, Ozzy Osbourne and stuff like that - was really important in my life when I was growing up but I was also into dance music, soul, jazz, Elvis, The Cure, Blondie, The Cramps.'

Were the pornography and drug taking something you stumbled into, or do you think you kind of chose to go in that direction - maybe so you could work through your feelings about the abuse?

'It was definitely something which I got involved in accidentally but in a way, when you think about it, I was in such a state - so angry and destructive, with all these twisted ideas about what sex actually was - that it makes perfect sense. I never planned to go and do drugs and make a bunch of porn films. It's not something that I'd want to rewind and do again but it happened and... uhm... in a sense it allowed me to go completely crazy and come out the other side.'

So, would you say that whole episode of your life was positive - that it helped you to grow?

'I don't think that it was particularly positive. It was just a thing that happened to me that was so bizarre that - when I stopped and took a look at it - it scared me into getting my life together.' Traci reaches her hand out and gently strokes Mr Steve's soft fur. He narrows his eyes and peers adoringly up at her.

Your music career really took off when you collaborated with Manic Street Preachers. I think that's when most people in Britain found out that you were getting involved in music.

'I didn't really collaborate with them - I worked with them. I sang on 'Little Baby Nothing' but I didn't write that song. They wrote it and asked me if I'd get involved so I met them and we talked. I thought they were a bunch of really cool guys so we just recorded it there in London. That was the first time I'd ever been in a recording studio. I'd been singing all my life but never in a professional sense so it was a way for me to gain experience as far as what it's like working in a studio. It's completely different to just singing in the shower, you know.' Traci laughs and taps ash from her cigarette into the ashtray.

'Later on after they released that single, Richie made a statement to the press saying that basically he saw me as being that girl - 'Little Baby Nothing' - which I thought was pretty funny 'cause I didn't see myself as being her at all. It just goes back to perception. That was their interpretation of me.' She looks sad for a moment. 'I know that Richie's still missing and that distresses me.' Shrugging her shoulders she sips at her sweet, milky coffee - the third in the space of an hour.

The Honeymoon Stich Radio Mix of your latest single, 'Fallen Angel', has quite an Indie-Rock sound. Could you ever see yourself making the sort of loud, angry 'vagina music' that Courtney Love makes?

'I don't know. It's funny that you mention Courtney 'cause I know I've been compared to her lately. I take that as a real compliment because I think she's an extremely talented artist. I love how trashy she looks - especially when she goes up on the stage and she's playing the guitar and she sort of props her leg up on one of the monitors. She usually has stockings and garter belts on underneath and you can see right up her dress. She's got her own little baby doll vibe about her. I love Polly Harvey too. PJ Harvey and Courtney Love - those are my favourites.' Traci Lords smiles, her soft, green eyes sparkling.

'But when I was trying to get a deal and looking for people to work with I knew that I wanted to do a dance record. Not like a poppy, top-40 type thing. I wanted something that was real edgy and alternative.

'I got into techno in 1992 when I was working as a model in London. I didn't have much money and I was living with three other girls in this shitty flat above a coffee shop - which was totally depressing - so we used to go to the clubs to escape from it all and that's where I fell in love with the music. I really wanted that influence to come across on my album so when I eventually signed with Radioactive that's what we did.'

With a lot of techno the lyrics are fairly minimal but with your stuff the words seem to be just as important as the music.

'That was deliberate on my part. The one thing that I love about this music is that there are just so many highs and lows. They take you to a peak... then drop you... then take you back up again. It's all about building. But the one thing that's always bothered me about techno was that there weren't any vocalists and there weren't any lyricists. Sometimes you'd hear one phrase repeated over and over in a song and it was obviously just sampled - it didn't mean anything. I always wondered, 'Why can't techno have more of a soul? Why can't it be more human?'. That's what I tried to do. I didn't want to change it in any great way. I just wanted to add my own thing.'

Your songs all seem fairly autobiographical.

'Yeah, my album's all about obsession, addiction and control or being out of control. I think it is very personal. Some of the lyrics are taken from journals which I've kept since I was nine. As a writer how could you not write about the things you know - the things that you've experienced? If you're not going to tell the truth why even bother? That was why I felt this need to act and sing. It's a way for me to vent all my feelings - a way to express myself.'

As far as 'serious' acting goes, you worked a lot with John Waters early on but I think the first time I ever saw you was when you were on 'Roseanne'. What was it like working on that show?

'There's been a lot of stuff said about Roseanne but I've always thought she was amazing. She's a very strong woman and I think she's just absolutely hysterically funny. I was doing her show at the same time as 'Melrose Place' - where I played this girl called Ricki who seems sort of sweet early on but turns out to be totally volatile, a real weird, manipulative psycho - so that was a pretty wild time for me.'

And you recently worked with Denzel Washington in the film 'Virtuosity'.

'Yeah, that's a kind of futuristic film where I play a karaoke singer. It's wonderful. You see me in this cyberspace club singing 'Fallen Angel' - a song about suicide that I wrote round about the time Kurt Cobain killed himself. When I lift my arms up above my head they grow into giant angel's wings. That's the most expensive movie I've ever done.'

Do you think you'll every publish your personal journals or your poetry or write an autobiography?

Traci Lords smiles and stubs out her Marlboro. 'Maybe someday when I'm really old and all my teeth have fallen out - if I've nothing better to do. Right now I'm still so young and God-knows what's going to happen in the next twenty years. I'm nowhere near ready to tell the story of my life at this point, I haven't even lived it yet.'

Having made sexually explicit videos yourself how do you feel about the idea of pornography as art? Annie Sprinkle, for instance, uses elements of her earlier careers in prostitution and porn in her one-woman stage show.

'If someone feels happy about using their body in that way and they really are an artist then they should go ahead and do it. It's their gig. We then have a choice to either like it or discard it. Censorship is totally wrong. It's frightening. I would never stand for it in any way, shape or form.'

What do you think about organisations like C.O.Y.O.T.E. who want prostitution decriminalised.

'Well, in some ways I think that it would be safer if it was legal because then it would be more controlled. But I can also see the other side of the argument - by validating prostitution, and saying that it's OK, there's a great fear that it could become totally rampant. It's hard to make a judgement and say, 'Yes, it's right,' or 'No, it's wrong'. It goes back to the point that if someone is doing something in their life that they really want to do - and they're not hurting anyone by doing it - who really has the right to stand up and say, 'No, you can't because I don't like that'?'

Do you think that prostitution and pornography are damaging in themselves or do you think that it's more to do with Society's attitudes towards sex?

Traci chews her lip and ponders this. 'I think both. There's definitely a stigma attached to sex work. People get weighed down morally and spend their time judging others, which is wrong. But, at the same time, I think that there isn't a tremendous amount of responsibility as far as the people involved in making films or in prostitution goes. They don't seem to know what's right and what's wrong. I think that kiddie porn is wrong. When you're talking about children or vulnerable people being victimised then I think it's terrible. The biggest problem is in the producers of these films. They just don't have a conscience. They're not bothered about the lives of the people involved - about the ways they're being affected. They just care about their bank accounts.'

What do you think about the other side of the coin - all those American teenagers who are now pledging vows of celibacy?

Miss Lords shrugs her shoulders. 'I think it's great. If you've got a kid that's maybe 14 or 15 years old who's really taking a look at things and saying, 'OK, I'm going to have sex,' or 'No, I don't want to have sex yet,' and they decide against it because they want to grow in other ways - they don't want to be frivolous with their bodies - then I think that's a beautiful thing. It's not negative at all.'

I've seen a few of them on chat shows and I think it's good that they've made some kind of decision about how they're going to live their lives but, at the same time, a lot of them seem pretty puritanical. I got the impression they were judging anyone who didn't share their beliefs.

'Yeah, I hate judgement. Unfortunately, everybody does it to some degree. When you meet somebody you form a first impression. That's all it is - a vibe about who you think they are. Once you really know that person it's hard to put such a label on them. The press are constantly placing people in little categories, which is annoying. You can't really put a whole person - who's comprised of all these different aspects - into one category and say, 'Oh, this one's a bad girl,' or 'That one's a good girl'. It's limiting. They're trying to make people one dimensional and, of course, people aren't one dimensional.'

How different are you now as a person than when you were in your teens - abusing drugs and making pornos?

'I'm not a saint now,' Traci says, crossing her legs. 'I still have my wild side. Like everybody else temptation is always there. But I think that the biggest difference between myself now and then is that in those days I was just a destructive little kid. That experience helped me mature. I'm a little older now. My head's clearer. I've been through all that stuff and I've seen it for what it is so it's not as tempting anymore.'

So, just how much of a rock 'n' roll animal are you now? What did you get up to last night, for instance?

'Last night I was so exhausted that I just wanted to curl up and crash - so I took a bath, a big bubble bath, and fell asleep in my bed at about 11. When I woke up this morning there were messages on my machine from all of my friends who were out partying last night. They were a bit pissed at me 'cause I'd stood them up.'

'Traci Lords - too tired to party.' Maybe that should be the headline above the interview.

Traci smiles, picks up the box of Marlboro Lights from the table, taps out the last cigarette and places it between her lips as if to say, 'I still have some vices, you know.' As she lights the end and inhales, the tip burns fiercely orange and a thick wisp of bluey-grey smoke curls above her head.

My heart is beating hard in my chest. I can feel my stomach tightening up as I reach out my trembling hand to touch the ex-porn star's pale leg. She looks at me and grins, wickedly, brushing a hand up towards her chest.

Probably.

Because, of course, this is a bunch of Gonzo.

I DID talk to Traci Lords but I've never been in her house. I've never been in LA. I've never even made it across the Atlantic. In reality, I was sitting the whole time in a sterile radio station somewhere in Scotland, with clumpy old fashioned earphones fixed to my head, sheepishly mumbling my questions into a big fluffy mic.

Can't blame me for fantasising, though.

***

AUTHOR'S NOTE: You can read my erotic fiction here on Lit, posted under the names "Alexander Tzara" and "Roger Simian". Remember to vote or email me your feedback.

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