My friends all know I have a huge collection of Blondie and Debbie Harry music and videos. Robert Stone, director of Guerrilla: The Taking of Patty Hearst, told me I have the biggest collection of Patty Hearst memorabilia he’d ever seen. And everyone knows I have a massive Linda Lovelace archive: multiple binders of newspaper and magazine articles; promotional photographs from her films; original posters from same; dozens of books; vintage vinyl records; obscure video and audio interviews; and lots more.
How do I do it?
Being a German Taurean journalist helps, as did my tenure at Screw magazine, whose archives were an incredible resource. I’m also a motherfucker when it comes to research, so I spent hours and hours at libraries, bookstores, thrift shops and online hunting down every scrap of information, every fact, every opinion, every rumor, every innuendo, every mistaken supposition and every flat-out lie I could get my hands on.
But some of my most interesting pieces came from Linda herself.
When Linda first agreed to give me an interview for The Complete Linda Lovelace, she asked how much I would pay. This didn’t surprise me; like another famous Linda—Evangelista—Linda Boreman didn’t get out of bed for less than $5,000 (for an interview). Being the honest, upstanding journo I am, I told her I don’t pay for interviews—I also couldn’t afford to; I do put the “poor” in “pornographer,” after all—but I said I’d gladly buy something from her, like an article of clothing from back then. She went to her closet and pulled out a funky, ’70s-era fringed jacket and pants. I recognized them immediately. She wore them in promo photos shot for her 1974 appearance in “My Daughter’s Rated X” at the Aladdin Hotel and Casino in Vegas. I made an offer, she took it, and the deal was sealed.
While I was writing the book, she gave me amazing access to photographs, correspondence, and a pile of newspaper clippings she’d gathered from the mid ’70s to the late ’80s; she did chronicle her own career throughout her life, saving articles, magazines and even movie ads for Linda Lovelace for President and, yes, Deep Throat. I received copies of important legal papers, including all four of her book contracts. (At one point we were trying to figure out exactly who owned the rights to Ordeal and Out of Bondage; Lyle Stuart's Barricade Books had to auction off its properties after Stuart lost a defamation lawsuit brought by Las Vegas entrepreneur Steve Wynn, and Linda wanted to see if she could buy them.) She also sent me copies of ledger sheets with accountings of her book royalties—or lack thereof, in some cases—and letters to various lawyers concerning unpaid bills and potential cash settlements. Even though most of those documents didn’t make it into my book, the revision will include some of them, one way or another.
While wrapping up the book in 2000, I’d reserved Linda and myself a table at the Chiller Theatre convention in New Jersey so we could do some promotion. I didn’t finish the book in time for the convention though, and when I told her, she offered to wait until the book was done. I'd already bought her plane ticket and booked the hotel room, so I said, “No, come out anyway and see what the convention scene is like. You can make some money. We'll do it together next time.”
I had 8 x 10s printed up for her, and our friend Dian Hanson arranged for advance copies of her Leg Show issue to be sent in from New York. Linda brought some mementos too: her ticket to the 1974 Academy Awards; a few foreign editions of Ordeal and Out of Bondage (which I bought); and some more ’70s-vintage clothing. A few autograph dealers came in while I was setting up her table and wanted to buy the whole lot, minus the clothes. I negotiated the deal and got Linda a nice chunk of change. She wound up meeting lots of really nice people, porn fans and post-porn fans both, and had a five-figure weekend money-wise, all of which made her very happy.
When we were getting ready to leave the hotel, I did a final count of the money for her and handed it over. Then she asked me if 10 percent would be good.
“Good for what?” I asked.
“For you, for setting this up,” she said.
Ten percent of her take would have been a nice little chunk of change for me, too, but I told her no, I didn’t want her money. I wasn’t her manager—despite what some people thought at the time, I definitely wasn’t her manager—I was just teaching her how to market herself. She insisted on giving me something, so I told her to just pay me back for the plane ticket and hotel room and we’d call it even. That way I didn’t lose anything, and she still made out really well.
After she gave me the money, she went over to a box in the corner, opened it up and walked back to me. “Here. I want you to have this.” It was the hat she wore to the Ascot Racetrack in 1974, a big felt topper with long black and white feathers. I recognized that immediately, too. And yeah, I took it gladly!
Once the book was done, she sent me a package with a note discussing some problems she was having with her family; she often confided in me when things weren’t going well with them. The package also had some other items: a few more articles; a few more photographs including some baby photos, one of which showed up in Inside Linda Lovelace; and an envelope with a very interesting surprise—a lock of hair from her first haircut, in 1949. (I didn’t put that in the book either. There wasn’t enough to include in each copy.)
The lock of hair confused me most of all. I know Linda didn’t think I was a freak, even though my interest in her story perplexed her sometimes, but for her to give me something so personal really touched me. More than anything else, it made me realize that yeah, she must really trust me. That trust was the best thing she ever gave me.
(Some of the items mentioned above—and plenty more—will be on exhibit at “Whole Lotta Lovelace,” the gallery show celebrating the re-release of The Complete Linda Lovelace, to be held in New York City later this year. Stay tuned for details.)
