Fakin’ It: Gay Porn Copulation — A Simulation!

This only confirms something that I've long suspected:

A certain helping of gay porn -- maybe not a heapin' helpin', but a fair share all the same -- is simulated.

Simulated Skinemax-style.

Eagle-eyed viewers called Fake-Out! on a recent Corbin Fisher scene in which a furious pounding was clearly being performed high and dry, causing the studio to enact a rather hasty trimming of the finished product.  Visible boom mics and klieg lights are one thing, but obvious fuck-feigning leaves many a viewer feeling fleeced.  Talk about phoning it in.  More like bonin' and moanin' it in!

The simple truth is, this is nothing new or even that out-of-the-ordinary.  Gay porn loves to present itself as a visual fantasy rife with teeth-shattering spurts of jizz and balls-to-the-walls improvisation between its players, but once that camera actually starts rolling, the medium is often anything but offhand.  Models not only struggle with even the most rudimentary dialogue -- "He died very rapidly" is one my all-time faves -- but sometimes have all the physical chemistry of a pair of male lions lazily vying for physical dominance over the pride, the top doing it for a paycheck and the bottom figuring being King of The Jungle ain't all he thought it was cracked up to be as he presents with a lackadaisical yawn of antipathy.

I'll go so far as to contend that I've encountered certain scenes that generously contain anywhere from only thirty seconds to a single minute of actual penetration.  We're talking in-'n'-out.  Sets abound with nightmarish tales of directors, casts, and crews dealing with some serious spanners in the works when it's time for that money shot.

Many is the gay model who will allege that their straight counterparts will often only be able to stay erect for half-minute intervals at a time.  Upwards of fifty condoms can be used for the lensing of a single scene.  Bad pairings can turn sex into the equivalent of beating a dead horse.  The reality is that some men just aren't built for all anal action.  Uncomfortableness and pain are real mood killers.

One director related the anxiety-producing anecdote of his DVD sleeve-gracing leading man showing up for work with a serious case of hemorrhoids, unable to bottom.  The scene had to be simulated from afar, with pick-up hardcore inserts shot at extra cost weeks later once he'd healed.   Still another related being saddled with a bottom whose legs were so massive from steroid use that the top had difficulty even entering him, resulting with the director having to flag down a nearby pair of workers to spread and hold his legs out of frame.

You can imagine a director's quandary. Combine a difficult top with a ill-accommodating or inexperienced bottom, a pricey rented set, and a schedule daunted by a ticking clock, and you can understand why he might have to get creative. Promotional stills featuring actual hard-ons and penetration one thing, but CGI is cost prohibitive and Claymation is too time-consuming.  What to do? Get that entry shot, repeat a handful of explicit thrusts on a loop, and film plenty of long shots with copious amounts of counterfeit thrusting.  And scene, bitch!

This is actually just the tip of the iceberg.   The money shot can be notoriously difficult to capture and achieve.   Viewers like their performers evermore jacked-up to superhuman levels, but the ubiquitous presence of anabolics and other muscle-building chemicals and hormones in the industry leave models on the very brink of dehydration, making voluminous cum-shots a bridge too far.

The famed porn actor Jon Vincent -- one of the few performers to hold any right to the mantle of "star" or "legend" -- admitted that he'd never once been able to climax on camera due to his rampant steroid addiction, resulting in all of his ejaculations being faked.  Breck shampoo or dish soap have been the go-to stand-ins for decades now, with bottles hidden between models' legs and squeezed hard for the desired effect.  The returns can, at times, be hilarious.

Just as mainstream Hollywood employs body doubles for nude scenes and second unit shoots, so too has its downmarket evil twin The Fuck Flick relied on bench warmers to stand in for first-stringers who've struck out at bat.  Stand-ins for both tops and tails have been used for close-ups -- gay porn's version of stunt men -- and keen-eyed audiences will often be able to detect flesh tones, dicks, or pubic hair that don't quite match from scene to scene.

His face might not immediately spring to mind, but David Ashfield  was the medium's answer to Hal Needham, filling in for top-tier marquee names like Jeff Stryker, Ryan Idol, and Lex Baldwin, many of whom relied on injections to keep it up.  Whether it be inhibition or the effects of recreational drug use, workhorses like Ashfield kept and likely continue to keep productions running smoothly, and in their absence, prostheses will do the trick.

Trees may grow in Brooklyn, but wood doesn't always necessarily sprout in The Valley.