Workingman’s Gunn

Today is Tommy Gunn’s birthday. You might say, “Grams, I only visit your site for the trannies, MILFs, and Satan – why confuse things by writing about dudes?”

Well, Gunn is one of only a few dozen steadily-working guys in porn, and as such has probably serviced 40 to 50 of your favorite female stars since 2004, and at least 200 more women you’re not attracted to. That he has carried on his career by being a genuinely nice and accessible guy is an admirable accomplishment.

Also, Gunn is able to articulate the work ethic involved in being a successful male performer.

“You should be hard before she’s in the room,” he said. “It’s a job.”

In the 600-plus scenes he has performed since getting into porn at age 36, Gunn has certain things figured out.

“I can tell you how the pop is going to go from the beginning,” he said. “I know if I’m tired, or if the chemistry is a certain way, or the way she smells, how far the load will fly.”

That is exactly like my job. I know that I will end this story with “I want people to look at porn performers and not think they’re somebody who had nowhere else to go” and it will be just as satisfying as shooting a ropy volley across the machine-crafted nubs of Jesse Jane.

Writing about porn is difficult sometimes. For me, I had no interest in being a porn performer after the first scene I watched being filmed. Not that it didn’t look like fun, but the work involved was considerable: standing in awkward positions under hot lights, the lack of spontaneity, delaying what wanted to come naturally (and then worrrying about aim); the fact that it was such a job became apparent the first day.

But even if I knew I didn’t want it to be me on camera, my suspicion is that porn dudes in general think that the writers really want to be them.

“The media are jealous,” says Jack Lawrence in his (otherwise) excellent training video Breaking Into Porn. Not true. At least not for me.

Blowjobs are like handshakes in this business, and I’ll take mine without the C-light, thank you.

Which is why Gunn, who approaches the business with an older man’s perspective, is such a good interview; he talks about his job like it’s a job.

On Respect

“When I work with another guy’s girlfriend,” he said, “I want to deliver her back to her boyfriend unharmed.”

On Role Models and Cutlery

“I admire Peter North, Randy West, Buck Adams, Lee Stone, and Ron Jeremy,” he said. “Without those guys chopping their way through the forest, I wouldn’t have this path. Now I want the machete.”

On Competition

“I think Evan Stone and I are going to trade that AVN Best Male Performer award back and forth for the next few years.” (Evan Stone says this too.)

On Scene Partners

“The girls have to have sex with someone, but what does it hurt you to be nice to them?”

On Career Choices

“If I’m lucky the director will ask me if I want to have sex on the couch or on the bed.”

Gunn was born in New Jersey 41 years ago today, worked in Philadelphia in construction and interior design, and moved to Florida where he became a dancer.

Gunn was married to World Poker Tour hostess Shana Hiatt (with whom he appeared in a Playboy Girls of Hawaiian Tropics video prior to his porn career) and, later, to porn star Rita Faltoyano. Currently living with New Sensations contract performer Ashlynn Brooke, Gunn has turned the Woodland Hills home they share into a workshop for his other projects.

“When I was a Chippendale’s dancer,” he said, “I got very good at sewing. I made costumes. I replaced the velcro when the other guys needed to patch their outfits.”

While working at a Miami bikini shop in 1997, he made swimwear for Janine Lindemulder and Julia Ann that they still remembered when he entered the porn business.

Gunn has a room in which weight equipment shares space with two sewing stations.

He has also built most of a deck that features a tiki bar and a trucked-in sand beach.

But the most impressive achievement for DIY enthusiasts is his shopping cart/battering ram for around-the-garage projects onto which he has built a platform for a circular saw.

“I like to keep busy,” he said.

It was in 2004 that Gunn, visiting L.A. with then-girlfriend, met Wicked director Brad Armstrong at the Saddle Ranch.

“How do I get into this business?” Gunn asked Armstrong, who just cocked his thumb at.

“She’s your ticket,” Armstrong said.

“But it didn’t work out,” Gunn said. “I was back on the plane to Florida. But Brad and I stayed in touch.”

Gunn’s first scene was with Cherokee in Wicked’s Fluff And Fold and he has been working ever since.

I asked him what he wanted to do next.

“I want to win an Oscar,” he said. “I’m serious.”

Gunn has a protective attitude about the porn business that its employees tend to generate after a year or so on the job, when they realize the rest of the world looks at them differently but not always kindly.

“I want people to look at porn performers and not think they’re somebody who had nowhere else to go.”

Previously: Backstage at the XBiz Awards:A Night of Heroes; Tommy Gunn casts the first bone; Ashlynn Goes to College 2; Barbara Summer, Rita Faltoyano, and Trina Michaels look frank, surprised, and wary, respectively; Untitled Briana Banks project; O: The Power of Submission
See also: Tommy Gunn