Sinner Takes All: A Memoir of Love & Porn Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  Dedication

  Foreword

  CHAPTER I - Idol Worship

  CHAPTER 2 - The Switch

  CHAPTER 3 - The Party's Over

  CHAPTER 4 - Homecoming Scream

  CHAPTER 5 - Serial Heartbreaker

  CHAPTER 6 - From Bedpans to Bedrooms

  CHAPTER 7 - My Arousal

  CHAPTER 8 - Get It Up. Get It In. Get It Off. Get It Out.

  CHAPTER 9 - The Secret's Out

  CHAPTER 10 - A Star Is Porn

  CHAPTER 11 - Life Is a Porn Movie

  CHAPTER 12 - Four Reasons

  CHAPTER 13 - When Tera Met Evan

  CHAPTER 14 - The First Date

  CHAPTER 15 - Trust

  CHAPTER 16 - The Happiest Girl in the World

  CHAPTER 17 - The Storm Before the Calm

  CHAPTER 18 - What Have I Done?

  CHAPTER 19 - Dancing Queen

  CHAPTER 20 - The Birth Of Teravision

  CHAPTER 21 - Hells Angels, Hookers, and Wedding Bells

  CHAPTER 22 - Mr. Kookaburra and Mrs. Barramundi

  CHAPTER 23 - Bye-Bye, Vanilla Girl Of Porn

  CHAPTER 24 - Back to My Roots

  CHAPTER 25 - Three Awful Weeks

  CHAPTER 26 - The Power of Tera

  CHAPTER 27 - SO, You Want to Be a REAL Porn Star?

  CHAPTER 28 - Mission Accomplished

  AFTERWARD . . .

  My Essential Movies

  Awards

  Acknowledgements

  PHOTO CREDITS

  GOTHAM BOOKS

  Published by Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, U.S.A.

  Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario M4P 2Y3, Canada (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.); Penguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England; Penguin Ireland, 25 St Stephen's Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd); Penguin Group (Australia), 250 Camberwell Road, Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty Ltd); Penguin Books India Pvt Ltd, 11 Community Centre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi--110 017, India; Penguin Group (NZ), 67 Apollo Drive, Rosedale, North Shore 0632, New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd); Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty) Ltd, 24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa

  Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  Published by Gotham Books, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  First printing, January 2010

  Copyright (c) 2010 by Tera Patrick

  All rights reserved

  Gotham Books and the skyscraper logo are trademarks of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  Photo credits appear on page 287.

  LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA

  Patric, Tera, 1976-

  Sinner takes all: a memoir of love and porn / Tera Patrick ; with Carrie Borzillo.

  p. cm.

  eISBN : 978-1-101-17142-4

  1. Patrick, Tera, 1976-2. Motion picture actors and actresses--United States--Biography.

  I. Borzillo, Carrie. II. Title.

  PN2287.P27A3 2010

  791.4302'8092--dc22

  [B] 2009040837

  Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form, or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.

  The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Your support of the author's rights is appreciated.

  While the author has made every effort to provide accurate telephone numbers and Internet addresses at the time of publication, neither the publisher nor the author assumes any responsibility for errors, or for changes that occur after publication. Further, the publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party Web sites or their content.

  Penguin is committed to publishing works of quality and integrity.

  In that spirit, we are proud to offer this book to our readers;

  however, the story, the experiences, and the words

  are the author's alone.

  http://us.penguingroup.com

  I DEDICATE THIS BOOK TO MY SISTER , DEBRA, WHO'S ALWAYS BEEN

  MY ROCK, AND MY MOTHER . PREEYA, WHO CAME BACK INTO MY

  LIFE OVER THE COURSE OF WRITING THIS BOOK .

  Foreword

  BY MARGARET CHO

  I think that porn stars and stand-up comedians have a lot in common. We're both looking for a physical reaction from our audience--bodies flooding with endorphins and people feeling good in the dark. And laughter, like orgasms, can be faked, but it's always better if it isn't. Laughter can feel like short, abbreviated climaxes--orgasms in miniature--and porn, like a good laugh, can make you wet your pants. At least, that is the hope.

  Tera Patrick and I have even more in common than the porn/ comedy thing. We are both women who decided to go forward and forge our own path, leaving behind a culture that urged women to be silent and subservient. Tera's story and mine are different in the details, but I love hearing about her journey because essentially we both came from the same place--invisibility.

  I remember when I was six years old and I came to the bitter understanding that I was not white. Even though I was too young to have seen The Brady Bunch in its heyday, I never missed the reruns that played on a seemingly continuous loop on TV after school. I was obsessed with Cindy Brady's blond hair, which glistened like gold ropes on either side of her head. I begged my mother to braid my hair in the same style, but no matter what she did, it never looked the same. I asked my mother why my straight black hair didn't look like spun gold on the shoulders of an angel. She said simply, "Because you don't have blond hair. Because we are not white." This realization was shattering. To know that I didn't look like the people on TV made me think that I would never be on TV. Never seeing anyone like myself out there made me feel like I didn't exist.

  In this book you'll learn that when Tera was a little Asian girl, she looked up to a blond goddess of her own: Marilyn Monroe. But what Tera realized even then was that it wasn't Marilyn's blond hair that mattered. It was her power, and the fact that the whole world couldn't stop looking.

  When I got older and started doing stand-up comedy, comics and other people in the business warned me about being too sexual: "Don't be sexy. Be cute." I never understood that. People always thought I was sexy, and I talked a lot about sex onstage, so why was it wrong to have people want to have sex with me? I am glad for it every time it happens. I came to understand that people viewed women's sexuality, especially an empowered woman's sexuality, as a threat. I believe this is what makes Tera Patrick's contribution to society tremendously important. Tera Patrick--as an Asian-American porn star--has shattered what people expected and demanded from Asian-American women. Because of her, we are seen in our entirety. We are seen as whole. Not only our beautiful faces and bodies but the forbidden things that we were not allowed to show, our sexuality and our desire.

  Tera, as a businesswoman, also defies the stereotype of the porn star as victim. She owns and runs a global empire that goes
way beyond her work as a porn star. She manages so many careers, it's hard to keep up. Porn performer, actress, lingerie designer, talk-show host, producer, director, CEO, etc. She's proof that yes--you can have it all, and then some. Tera Patrick is a true icon of our time, a fantastic example of the power of femininity, sexuality, and intelligence.

  I love that she has decided to tell her story in this book, and so honored to be a small part of it. It's a story that needs to be told because I think that the world would be a better place if we could all grow up to be like Tera Patrick.

  Prologue

  I woke up in the psych ward at St. Vincent's Hospital in Manhattan strapped to my bed, confused, disoriented, scared, and thinking, "How did I get here? What have I done?" What went down in the previous hours started coming back to me piecemeal, but to this day the night remains one big, blurred, fucked-up nightmare. My brain filled in the missing parts of the night with hallucinations; I have visions of being bundled into a straightjacket and taken away in an ambulance. But according to people who were there, it didn't happen that way. That was all in my warped mind. What actually happened might be even worse. The man who loved me and who I loved the most had to duct tape my hands behind my back to stop me from further hurting myself and him. He had to have me committed to a mental ward of a hospital to save my life.

  As I scratched and clawed my way through Evan's Brooklyn loft just hours earlier, the only thought in my mind was to end this. I wanted to end my misery and I wanted to end my life. I couldn't handle any of it anymore. But Evan stayed strong because he knew I was worth saving. Evan took my punches, dodged the heavy objects I hurled at him, suffered through my relentless scratching, and he did the one thing he knew to do: stop the madness and get me help.

  I don't remember the ride in his Suburban over to the hospital. I don't remember Dr. Lugo talking Evan through what to do. I don't remember entering the hospital or being checked into the psychiatric ward. I don't remember being strapped to a gurney and the cops questioning Evan about the night's events. I just remember waking up the next morning in lockdown in the place where they keep the most dangerous mental patients. Was I mental? I didn't believe it. My emotions had taken over my thought process, and I was reduced to questioning everything around me and not being able to make sense of any of it.

  The psych ward frightened me. I was just a porn chick going through a rough time trying to get out of my contract. Why was I in a room behind locked doors that doctors had to be buzzed in and out of? Why was I in a room with four beds with a variety of women whom I did not relate to, who were not like me? The girl in the bed next to me was a black girl younger than me who had tried to kill herself. She was obsessed with shrimp parmesan and her sister would bring it to her daily, and every day she'd offer me some and each time I'd say no. To this day, the sight of shrimp parmesan sends chills up my spine. I wasn't there to make friends. At first, I wanted nothing to do with the place or anyone in it.

  In the bed next to her was a Middle Eastern girl with black curly hair and a flashlight she'd shine around the room after the lights went out. She didn't talk much, but she did mumble her prayers a lot. I would pretend not to hear her. She scared me. I overheard the nurses say that she had delusions about becoming a suicide bomber and that's why she was in the ward. The bed at the end was host to a revolving array of patients whom I don't really remember.

  The reality of the night before started coming back to me, and bits and pieces were told to me. I realized that I'd had a major meltdown. A psychotic break. A suicide attempt. I was inconsolable. I was out of my mind. There was no talking me off the ledge this time, as Evan had done before.

  I was in St. Vincent's psych ward for fourteen long days, and it was not what you could call time well spent. I just lay there in my hospital bed like a statue. I wanted nothing but out. But I did everything you shouldn't do if you want to be released from the psych ward. In full denial for the first few days, I acted out in every way imaginable. I figured if they think I'm crazy, I might as well play the part. I talked to myself out loud. I refused medication. I wouldn't eat anything. I picked fights with other patients. I took it all out on Evan, calling him daily and cursing him out for the entire ward to hear.

  I pulled the diva act and tried to own that pay phone. My cell phone had been confiscated, so the pay phone was my only connection to the outside world. So, when anyone else tried to use the phone, I unleashed a shit-storm of anger, screaming, "I'm on the fucking phone! You wait your fucking turn! I'm on the phone! I'll be done when I'm done! I'll fucking kill you!"

  Making death threats in the psych ward is not exactly the way to prove that you're not crazy and get released. One day, I even tried to escape. When those buzz-in, locked doors opened, I made a run for it, forcing the orderly to wrestle me to the ground.

  When I realized there was no way out unless I played by the rules, I threw the rules in their face. They had been asking me to shower for days and I refused. I was defiant and angry and antiauthority. After days of nagging me to shower, I finally said, "Fuck it. You want me to shower? OK, I'll shower." So I stripped off all of my clothes, walked out of my room into the hallway completely naked, and looked at the first nurse who came my way and said, "OK. You want me to shower? Here I am. Where's the fucking shower?"

  As much as this experience was the lowest point of my life, I'm grateful for it. Sometimes you need to go off the rails of the crazy train to get on the right track of your life. And that's exactly what I did.

  CHAPTER I

  Idol Worship

  How bad do you want what you want? I wanted to be famous and adored so bad it nearly killed me. Well, in all honestly, I nearly killed me. But before we get to that, let me start at the beginning. . . .

  In 1986 I was ten years old and my mother had already left us. It was just me, Linda Ann Hopkins, and my dad, David Hopkins, a carefree hippie of English, Dutch, and Irish descent. I was born in Great Falls, Montana, but was living with my dad in Fresno. On a rare father-daughter day out, he took me to a thrift store in town to do some shopping. We were on a budget. As we made our way though the tiny, cramped shop, I saw her hanging on the dusty wall behind some cracked vases and rusty candelabras. It was a beautiful black-and-white photograph of Marilyn Monroe from the Korean USO tour she did in 1954. She was beaming as she posed for hundreds of handsome men in uniform, who in turn were ogling her in all her blond-haired, blue-eyed glory.

  Something lit up inside me when I saw that photograph. I thought, "Someday, men are going to look at me that way."

  I couldn't stop staring at this photo, thinking how much I wanted to be that girl. The girl everyone adores. The girl whom fame made so happy (little did I know what a sad wreck she really was). All I knew about Marilyn at the time was how much I wanted to exude the power that she did. I wanted to be famous like that. I just didn't know what for yet. I never thought it would be for porn.

  The photo that started it all for me

  Around the same time the Marilyn Monroe photo was burned into my brain, I stumbled across another piece of inspiration. I was home alone one day after school. Dad was still at work. I was usually a good girl; I learned manners and respect for others very early on from both of my parents. Although I had never looked through my father's things, on this one day my curiosity got the best of me. I had seen my dad hide a stack of Playboy magazines once and was anxious to take a peek inside. I wanted to know what a woman's body looked like. I was just a young girl--an awkward one at that--and I wanted to compare myself to a full-grown woman. It was a natural fascination. The curiosity to see a naked woman left me searching through my dad's teak, tapestry-covered dresser, one of his finds from Thailand when he was there during the Vietnam War. I opened the drawer and there was a Playboy with supermodel Paulina Porizkova on the cover. The supermodel and actress was holding back her long, beachy, golden brown hair with a lean, elegant arm and gazing at the camera with her ice blue eyes emanating a fierce self-confidence.

&
nbsp; I thought Paulina was the most beautiful woman in the world, and I couldn't stop staring at her photos in Playboy. I was even more impressed when I learned she'd married Ric Ocasek, the lead singer of the rock band the Cars. She was a rock wife and a beautiful supermodel, and I just idolized her for that. I wanted what she had. It was that Paulina cover that made me want to be in Playboy. From the moment I saw this cover in the summer of 1987, I had a simple quest: be a Playboy model, be married to a rock star, and be rich, famous, and adored.

  LOOKING UP TO STARS like Marilyn and Paulina was my escape. My parents separated when I was ten. I didn't have my mom or dad to talk to, because they fought a lot and were so wrapped up in themselves. So instead I escaped into a fantasy world of supermodels, celebrity, pin-up girls, Playboy Playmates, and rock stars as I flipped through the pages of my dad's issues of Playboy, Rolling Stone, LIFE, and whatever music or teen magazine I could get my hands on. I thought about what these gorgeous celebrities would be like in person, what it would be like to live their lives and to be as cool and happy as they seemed to be in the pictures. I would daydream about these models, rock stars, and actresses instead of doing my school-work. My grades suffered and I got a lot of notes from the teacher that read "Linda doesn't apply herself enough." Fair enough.

  I would also rummage through my father's cassette tapes--he was a rocker--and lust after Jim Morrison. To this day, if I could go back in time and fuck a famous rock star it, would be Jim Morrison. I idolized the Doors, Led Zeppelin, and Pink Floyd--the older bands that my dad was into.

  I wouldn't know until years later, after some therapy, that what I was doing was filling the void left by parents who weren't there for me. Some kids in tough situations cope with absent parents by overeating, others with being sexually inappropriate (more on this later), others with drugs and alcohol or getting into trouble at school. For me, at age ten, I disappeared into daydreaming about what it would be like to live the lives of those models, rock stars, and celebrities I read about in magazines or saw on television.