Drowning in Odium

Mandy Morbid is awesome. Intelligent, articulate, hip and hot as fuck, Ms. Morbid is the embodiment of the new wave of independent alternative pornstars who have come to shine over the past decade or so. Only, Mandy shines way brighter than the majority.

(All photos by Bob Coulter)

Mandy Morbid Interview:

Okay, for starters, tell us a bit about yourself and what you’ve been up to lately.

About myself: I do porn. I was born in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. I grew up bilingual–English speaking parents, mostly French primary education. I’ve been dating the artist/porn star Zak Smith/Sabbath for a few years. Lately: I just got back from Berlin, Hungary, and
New york, where I alternated between having a lot of fun and seeing
amazing things and being really sick, mostly because of how I have
asthma and they still smoke an awful lot over there.

Your site is totally free, and for awhile you had a slogan on it that
read something along the lines of “All the pussy, none of the
Capitalism”. What are your thoughts on Capitalism? What social and
economic schools of thought do you dig? What is the ideal economic and
political system to you?

I think wealth and power should be redistributed, and from there we should
try to progress toward total anarchy–(the “theory that regards the absence of all direct or coercive government as a political ideal and that proposes the cooperative and voluntary association of individuals and groups as the principal mode of organized society”). But more immediately I think people should think much more creatively than they usually do about these things.

For example: rich people buy retarded expensive shit all the time. Why not
use the fact that they do to pay for cheap, essential stuff for poor people?
Whenever you go to Vegas you see tons of idiots just throwing their money
away gambling–let them! But find a way to channel all the money to buy
bread and milk for poor orphans.

Were you happy with the Presidential Election results? Also, as you’re
in California, did the whole Proposition 8 thing piss you off? I know
that I’m still baffled as to how it even got passed…

Y’know only 60-some percent voted and only a little more than half voted for
Obama, so that’s still not a majority. But it’s nice to know that 33.5% of
Americans aren’t complete morons. It’s not like I trust him totally–but this is less
about his policy issues than proving America is maybe a little less stupid than
it used to be. I was so relieved. I was going to move to Europe or back to Canada if the election had turned out differently.

Proposition 8? What can you say? It’s ok to be black, I guess, but I guess
people still don’t approve of hot girl-on-girl action.

You mentioned in your blog that before you started doing porn you
worked with special needs children. That’s really cool. Did you have
many other jobs before you did porn and modeling? Have you been able
to totally sustain yourself financially via porn during the last few
years? I know that a lot of alt porn folks in L.A. sometimes have a
hard time doing so, as odd as that is to me…

I had a few other jobs. Working with special needs kids was probably the most interesting and rewarding, and one of the things I actually do very well. It’s hard to support yourself in porn unless you’re willing to take almost every
job that comes along, and I don’t. But I strip, I model, I do ok.

You have a starring role in Hospital, an alt porn movie by Benny
Profane. What was it like working on that? Was it a particularly
different experience from other shoots you’ve done? I’m just kind of
assuming that it was a more professional deal than some of the more
DIY stuff, what with it being backed by Vidid Alt and all… Am I
totally wrong?

Well “Hospital” and “Young Hollywood” and “Shades of Romona” were all more
“professional” than shooting stuff at home in my bedroom
with other porn girls I know, but in porn “professional” really just means
more people and more equipment on the set. It’s still sort of catch-as-catch can.
Porn is less like theatre–like a planned show, and more like a sport. You throw
people in a room and see what happens. I mean, sometimes the “professional”
shoots are the most disastrous.

Do you consider yourself a Feminist? If so, what do you think is the
relationship between Feminism and Porn? I know a lot of Feminists see
the concept of a Feminist Pornstar as an oxymoron… Also, what do
you think has to be done to change some of the more negative attitudes
towards women in the sex industry?

I am a feminist. I think, in general, women should be treated more fairly.
I also think, in general, people should have sex more often and with more
people. These two ideals don’t contradict each other. I feel probably the
most important things that could be done to change attitudes toward women
in the sex industry is if women OUTSIDE the industry who like porn would
start admitting it, and men who watch porn would start realizing that hot
chicks who like to fuck are actually a good thing. I have written a fair bit about this in my blog. And I’m sure I will again.

You’ve done some stuff with Suicide Girls under the name Adria. Is
there a reason you don’t go by Mandy Morbid on there? Mandy Morbid
sounds far cooler to me, it has that cool punk rock appeal….
Also, what has it been like for you working with the SG folks? I’ve
heard lots of stories about them as a company, both good and bad…

I was on SG modeling as Adria before I came across any of the “right” kind of opportunities that I was interested in regarding hardcore porn. (And all the variations of the name “Mandy” were already taken on SG, Adria was part of my Night Elf’s name on World of Warcraft back when I used to play). Also, SG doesn’t want to be seen as a front for hardcore porn. And it isn’t.

SuicideGirls, as an idea, is clearly a good idea–it gets lots of people
laid, so that means it’s a good idea. I’ve made lots of good friends on
SuicideGirls, and honestly I really do enjoy the community aspect of it.
Now SuicideGirls, as a business, is an individual business run in a certain way by a guy and a girl who live in LA who have their own particular issues and problems and weirdness and drama, and like any very large business, it’s “good” to some people and “bad” to other
people. It’s kind of like a college–some people are going to graduate and
wish they’d gone somewhere else, and some people are going to get a
lot out of it. Whether or not the Dean of Admissions is a jerk only matters
to some people, and I’m not one of them.

You’ve mentioned an interest in comics. What kind of comics do you
like? Who are you favorite comic writers/ artists/ characters?

I like superhero comics. I liked New Avengers when Leinil Francis Yu
was drawing it, and Iron Fist. I love the Inhumans. I read a lot of JLA when I was in middle school. My favorite characters are usually girls–like Womder Woman and Supergirl or female villians and I have a soft spot for some of the X-Men. I really really liked the old George Perez Wonder Woman comics. And anything with space sluts.

Are there any plans to do more freaky octopus type shoots for your
site? That was totally awesome.

I want to. It’s just a lot of work and I need the energy and to not be
asthmatic. Almost every other porn girl I know wants to shoot a tentacle scene
for me. It’s just hard to get everything together so the tentacles look
right and stuff. And the cum is cold and gross.

Now for some more generic, mildly random questions:

What kind of music and movies do you dig? Could you list some of your
favorite movies and bands?

I like industrial–the more rock kind, not the dance kind. And doom and
death. I adore Isis and Neurosis, I like Pigface, Nine Inch Nails and Ministry. I also like almost anything where there’s women screaming–like The Distillers, Death or Queen Adreena and The Cranes . I like some punk, Against Me, Social Distortion, Leftover Crack, some typical girly type stuff too like Tori Amos, Fiona Apple, Blondie, Dresden Dolls and I also like a lot of the old music my dad listens to, Alice Cooper, Billy Idol, Tom Petty and Queen.

I like David Lynch movies. And kung Fu movies and sci fi especially Star Wars (the original 3). I like that Kurosawa movie “Ran” an awful lot–and “Sword of Doom” and Wong Kar Wai’s “Fallen Angels”. And Star Trek of course.
I met Spock once on my 23rd birthday.

What is the last book you read? What are you currently reading?

Ummm..I read “Heavy Water” by Martin Amis. I am currently and very slowly reading “Infinite Jest” by David Foster Wallace. I tend to re-read “Wicked” a lot—but I will not see the musical, I’ve heard it’s a travesty.

If you could have one superpower, what would it be?

I’d like to have Wolverine’s healing powers. I’ve had asthma and arthritis and
migraines and things the doctors can’t even figure out since I was very young and it’s incredibly frustrating.

Five years from now, what do you hope to have accomplished?

I don’t know. My life is pretty great, aside from migraines and stuff. I’m not the kind of girl who plans ahead all that much.

What do you hate most about yourself? What do you hate most in others?

I hate that other people are unbelievably stupid and I hate that I can’t
do anything about it.

If you could choose how you died, what would you choose?

I don’t care. I’m like Sartre: I’m worried about living, not symbolism.

Do you play any musical instruments/ If so, what do you play?

Nope.

Zombies or Vampires, and why?

I would like to have a vampire army. I guess a few zombies would be ok,
but the officer corps would have to be vampires–zombies have no joie
de vivre. Or joie de mort, I guess.

Squids or sharks, and why?

Squids. Duh.

If you could fuck any person, living or dead, who would you choose?

Zak Sabbath, Zak Sabbath over and over again. Other than him? Well–when you’re in the industry, you can’t really answer that question without making one of your friends who you fuck mad. It’s a good problem to have, though. I have had a crush on Yul Brynner since I was about 7 years old, and Billy Idol was pretty attractive, back in the day….Oh and Spock of course.

Well, that’s all I have. hopefully it wasn’t too disappointing. Is
there anything else you’d like to say?

Dear fans: write more articulate letters and, if you are a cute girl, send
pictures.

Thanks a ton for doing this Interview, Mandy!

Thank you!

Be sure to checkout Mandy Morbid.com