Taken from the Toronto Sun - February 26, 2004
Sex that didn't sell
By MIKE STROBEL -- Toronto Sun
"No more porno biz for me," says Peter A. Black.
He says this though he has just won his case against MQIS Inc., aka lovenow.com, in a sort of split decision. MQIS aka aka is a porn-production outfit operating from a Sheppard Ave. W. bungalow. I first wrote about it in January 2002.
You may recall I was up for a role in Phys-Ed 101. Leila, a leggy casting director, said old bald guys were all the rage in porn.
The price of fame? Five bills for a must-have photo portfolio and $2,500 to invest in my own first flick.
Payment? A hundred DVDs of Phys-Ed 101, which I could sell, for a tidy profit, to family and friends. What a deal, eh? Well, lots of fellas bit.
Black, 36, is the first to sue. He took MQIS aka aka to small claims court, seeking $10,000 for breach of contract. He got screwed, he said, and he didn't just mean for his debut in the DVD Body Shop. It was shot mid-2001.
You can imagine the courtroom yesterday. I keep waiting for Jerry Springer to bound in. Regular Joes Who Wanna Be Porn Stars! Or for Madame Justice Pamela Thomson to bust out laughing.
"So there's a script?" she asks dryly, as Sam MacMurchy tells how he directs/shoots MQIS films for a mysterious Costa Rican company called Rainforest Dreams.
Thomson is a sharp knife. She could be a Judge Judy.
"Does the script have a plot? Does it have dialogue?" Her eyes are grinning.
"Absolutely," says MacMurchy, though Black remembers the dialogue as mostly grunts.
MQIS, or NMST or whatever it's called now, is represented by the magically named Romeo Finder. He is your classic tailored lawyer.
Black, says Finder, "was never promised he was going to be a star.
"He knew exactly what he was getting into." A contract is a contract.
He says his client promotes DVDs, including Body Shop, on assorted Web sites. Lo and behold, he brings Black's first royalty cheque to court, $153.47.
Black has hired lanky Lincoln Allen, a Scarborough paralegal. Black testifies he has struggled to sell his 100 DVDs. Finally, he unloaded three dozen on a downtown adult magazine store. For a buck each.
I do not know how other Body Shop stars are faring. It features "35 Fresh New Faces in Sizzling Action." The MQIS spiel suggests you can get up to $80 a pop. Black's only big sale, $50, was to a newspaper columnist researching the case. Me.
I cannot bring myself to watch it. Nor have I figured out how to expense it. MQIS still operates, as NMST, a stone's throw from the courthouse.
Thomson lays into 'em.
Of the portfolio pitch, she says: "This is a famous ploy of some modelling agencies, most of which have thankfully been put out of business."
But it's the method of payment that wins Black the case. The MQIS contract says the 100 DVDs cover your investment and a juicy sounding $1,000-a-day acting fee. Black is out of luck on the former, rules Thomson. An investment means risk.
"It is not the job of the court or of the law," she says, "to protect people from themselves." From "the human qualities, which we all have, of vanity and greed."
The $1,000 wage offer is another matter, the judge says. The DVDs, especially when they sell for a buck or two, are no substitute. She awards Black $1,000, plus costs.
So, where is our friend Peter? He didn't get his 10 grand. But he keeps the, oh, $150 he made peddling Body Shop. He has another one to sell, now that Exhibit 8 has been returned to him.
He has that first royalty cheque, with hopes of more. And now he gets $1,000 for having had sex with a redhead in a North York condo.
Not too shabby. What's your next career move, Peter?
"Maybe something in construction," he says.
Sex that didn't sell
By MIKE STROBEL -- Toronto Sun
"No more porno biz for me," says Peter A. Black.
He says this though he has just won his case against MQIS Inc., aka lovenow.com, in a sort of split decision. MQIS aka aka is a porn-production outfit operating from a Sheppard Ave. W. bungalow. I first wrote about it in January 2002.
You may recall I was up for a role in Phys-Ed 101. Leila, a leggy casting director, said old bald guys were all the rage in porn.
The price of fame? Five bills for a must-have photo portfolio and $2,500 to invest in my own first flick.
Payment? A hundred DVDs of Phys-Ed 101, which I could sell, for a tidy profit, to family and friends. What a deal, eh? Well, lots of fellas bit.
Black, 36, is the first to sue. He took MQIS aka aka to small claims court, seeking $10,000 for breach of contract. He got screwed, he said, and he didn't just mean for his debut in the DVD Body Shop. It was shot mid-2001.
You can imagine the courtroom yesterday. I keep waiting for Jerry Springer to bound in. Regular Joes Who Wanna Be Porn Stars! Or for Madame Justice Pamela Thomson to bust out laughing.
"So there's a script?" she asks dryly, as Sam MacMurchy tells how he directs/shoots MQIS films for a mysterious Costa Rican company called Rainforest Dreams.
Thomson is a sharp knife. She could be a Judge Judy.
"Does the script have a plot? Does it have dialogue?" Her eyes are grinning.
"Absolutely," says MacMurchy, though Black remembers the dialogue as mostly grunts.
MQIS, or NMST or whatever it's called now, is represented by the magically named Romeo Finder. He is your classic tailored lawyer.
Black, says Finder, "was never promised he was going to be a star.
"He knew exactly what he was getting into." A contract is a contract.
He says his client promotes DVDs, including Body Shop, on assorted Web sites. Lo and behold, he brings Black's first royalty cheque to court, $153.47.
Black has hired lanky Lincoln Allen, a Scarborough paralegal. Black testifies he has struggled to sell his 100 DVDs. Finally, he unloaded three dozen on a downtown adult magazine store. For a buck each.
I do not know how other Body Shop stars are faring. It features "35 Fresh New Faces in Sizzling Action." The MQIS spiel suggests you can get up to $80 a pop. Black's only big sale, $50, was to a newspaper columnist researching the case. Me.
I cannot bring myself to watch it. Nor have I figured out how to expense it. MQIS still operates, as NMST, a stone's throw from the courthouse.
Thomson lays into 'em.
Of the portfolio pitch, she says: "This is a famous ploy of some modelling agencies, most of which have thankfully been put out of business."
But it's the method of payment that wins Black the case. The MQIS contract says the 100 DVDs cover your investment and a juicy sounding $1,000-a-day acting fee. Black is out of luck on the former, rules Thomson. An investment means risk.
"It is not the job of the court or of the law," she says, "to protect people from themselves." From "the human qualities, which we all have, of vanity and greed."
The $1,000 wage offer is another matter, the judge says. The DVDs, especially when they sell for a buck or two, are no substitute. She awards Black $1,000, plus costs.
So, where is our friend Peter? He didn't get his 10 grand. But he keeps the, oh, $150 he made peddling Body Shop. He has another one to sell, now that Exhibit 8 has been returned to him.
He has that first royalty cheque, with hopes of more. And now he gets $1,000 for having had sex with a redhead in a North York condo.
Not too shabby. What's your next career move, Peter?
"Maybe something in construction," he says.
