L.J. WilliamsonThere may very well be porn stars (or even likelier, other flavors of sex worker) who went to the same college as you. But unless you go to go to a prestigious school, being in porn isn't that splashy.
Paint it as a salacious story, a feminist story, or a hell-in-a-handbasket story, but the “Duke University Porn Star” story isn't about college classes as much as socioeconomic ones. The real thing about Belle Knox that grabbed the headlines isn't that a girl turned to sex work to pay for college – it's that a nice girl turned to sex work to pay for a nice college. And by nice, we mean super expensive.
Long story short, the Duke University Porn Star is in good company. Here are ten more highly educated porn stars who graduated magna cum… oh, never mind. ]
Credit: Twitter.com/MissLoreleiLee
10. The NYU Porn Star: Lorelei Lee
The kinky, slightly buck-toothed yet uber-hot actress Lorelei Lee graduated from San Francisco State University in 2008, then went on to NYU's graduate program in creative writing.
In an interview with New York Daily News, Lee said that she tended to avoid casual conversation with fellow grad students, and that much of her writing deals with her experiences in porn. She also said that she had no plans to leave the porn industry after completing her degree.
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Credit: W. B. Fontenot
9. The UCLA Porn Star: Tasha Reign
In contrast to Belle Knox's reports of unbearable harassment, shaming and threats at Duke, UCLA students seem to be taking the presence of porn star in their midst in stride. Go Bruins!
At least that's the picture The Daily Bruin paints in their profile of Penthouse Pet and adult film actress Tasha Reign. Reign, who has spoken at her classes and is quite out about her extracurricular activities, told the Bruin that “she knew she wanted to be a nude model since as far back as elementary school, when she would run around naked and take photos, and that her mom was always aware and accepting of it, even if it wasn't her first choice for her daughter.”
Fiat lux indeed.
See also: Porn Star Tasha Reign's Secret Life as a UCLA Student
8. The CPA/Comptroller Porn Star: Shy Love
According to her website and interviews, Shy Love, Puerto Rican/Sicilian star of over 250 movies, graduated from high school at age 16, and has both a bachelor's and a master's degree in accounting. The accounting degrees may also account for her so called “late start” in porn – she didn't make her first on-screen appearance until the age of 25.
Once her porn career took off, however, Love moved out of accounting and into talent management, running a company that represented both female and gay male A-list adult actors.
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Credit: YouTube screen grab from GameHsnx
7. The Rutgers Porn Star: Asia Carrera
Not only did Asia Carrera perform piano at Carnegie Hall at age 13 and again at age 14 (Ernesto Lecuona's “Malaguena” and Bach's 13th Invention), but, according to the 90s porn superstar's website, Carrera was National Merit Scholarship Winner (for 1440 on SAT's), and attended Rutgers University on full academic scholarship, with a double-major in Business and Japanese.
Sadly, her fuller story is that at age 17, after a fight with her intensely demanding parents, the fed up overachiever ran away from home, and says that she only went to Rutgers for the room and board. Otherwise, she would have been living on the streets. For spending money, Carerra got a cocktail waitressing job that soon led her on a slippery slope into porn stardom. Take that, Tiger Mothers!
Carrera, a self-described computer nerd, was smart enough to retire from porn in 2003.
See also: 10 Porn Stars Who Could Be the Next Jenna Jameson
Credit: Twitter.com/ZakSmithSabbath
6. The Yale Porn Star: Zak Smith, a/k/a Zak Sabbath
Artist Zak Smith, also known by his porn name Zak Sabbath, received an MFA from Yale. The artist, whose books include Girls In The Naked Girl Business and We Did Porn, is best known for his series of page-by-page illustrations for Gravity's Rainbow, which were featured in the 2004 Whitney Biennial.
Smith also created a reality video series at gamer website the Escapist, called I Hit It With My Axe, “chronicling the adventures of a dungeon master and his stripper and porn star friends playing old school D&D.”
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Credit: YouTube screen grab from SlowDive626
4. The George Washington University Porn Star: Laurie Wallace
You may remember Laurie Wallace from such films as Casey the Co-Ed, Toe-Sucking Strangers and The Erotic Witch Project. Or not. But Wallace's IMDb bio also boasts some other impressive credits: the model and Scottish dance aficionada graduated summa cum laude with a double major in German and political science from Loyola College in Maryland.
The actress went on to attend law school at George Washington University for a year – the alma mater of Harry Reid, Colin Powell and Jacqueline Kennedy – but didn't graduate. Instead, she turned to modeling, and then moved on to porn, both hard- and soft-core, numerous appearances in Playboy, as well as gracing the covers of more than 300 romance novels.
See also: 10 Innovative Porn Stars Who Could Be the Next Sasha Grey
Credit: sambenjamin.tumblr.com
4. The Brown University Porn Star: Sam Benjamin
After his time at Brown University, Sam Benjamin went on to write a few tell-all books about his pornographic life, including Confessions of an Ivy League Pornographer and American Gangbang: A Love Story. He completed his degree in Critical Studies at California Institute of the Arts in 2005.
In an interview, Benjamin has said, “We live in this hypocritical atmosphere when people are willing to lie and cheat and engage in fucked-up behaviors in a private form. Pornography is interesting because it's all of that in a public way. In that way, it's always felt like a breath of fresh air to me – this honesty of how dark things can be.”
More recently, Benjamin interviewed Belle Knox for Nerve.[
Credit: YouTube screen grab from Sex: The Annabel Chong Story
3. The USC Porn Star: Annabel Chong
In attempt to make a world record, in 1995 Annabel Chong created a stunt in which she was to have sex with 251 men in 10 hours. The stunt gained Chong unparalleled notoriety at the time, but subsequent claims accuse her of fudging the numbers and sneaking in unfilmed lunch and rest breaks. She was also never paid the $10,000 she was promised.
Chong's stunt and its subsequent effects were made into a documentary, Sex: The Annabel Chong Story, which was nominated for a Grand Jury Prize at the1999 Sundance Film Festival. In the film, Chong is followed as she makes her movie, World's Biggest Gang Bang, has a subsequent HIV test, confesses to her Singaporean mother about her career in porn and revisits the alley where she was gang raped and robbed, during her time as a law student at King's College London.
Always an academic high achiever, Chong left law school and moved to Los Angeles, where she enrolled in grad school at USC, and received a Masters degree in Gender Studies. She has since retired from porn and now reportedly works as a web developer.
See also: Marilyn Monroe's Never-Before-Seen Mostly Nude Photos
2. The Harvard Porn Star: Dylan Ryan
A 2003 issue of the Harvard Crimson tells the saga of an Econ major in his junior year at Harvard who placed a sexy personal ad on a men's dating site. His ad was spotted by a British production company on the lookout for hot young American boys, and “Dylan Ryan” (his stage name, not his real name) was born. The shoot led to a real-life love affair between Ryan and his co-star, but Ryan, who was cast as (what else?) a horny Harvard student, just made the one film, then graduated and moved on, leaving the porn world behind. After all, a Harvard man has plenty of other opportunities.
And the smartest, sexiest porn star is…
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Credit: Twitter.com/JoannaAngel
1. The (Other) Rutgers Porn Star: Joanna Angel
Joanna Angel has a degree in English Literature with a minor in Film Studies from Rutgers University, and is the creator of the porn site Burning Angel, where she showcases her film studies chops in movies that she produces, directs, and writes as well as acts in. Angel also wrote an advice column for Spin Magazine, and because of her tattooed style, is considered a pioneer of “Alt porn.”
The self-described “Punk Rock Porn Princess” refers to herself as a “porntrepreneur” and hosts a weekly radio show on Sirius XM called “Lewd, Screwed, and Tattooed.” Her other enterprises include marketing her own branded sex toy, the Joanna Angel Fleshlight, and hosting live webcam chats on a regular basis. Angel also regularly sweeps the AVN Awards, with eight prizes to her name, for her acting and for her website.
Are you sure you weren't a Marketing major, Joanna?
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