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May 29
2005
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IML Report Day 2Posted by Lavender Lounge in Untagged |
Yesterday started out with a cab ride to Boys Town with Drew Warner and Troy Punk to an autograph signing at a local video store put together by Jett Blakk of Red Devil Entertainment. Troy and Brad Benton were expecting crowds like an Oprah book signing, but unfortunately, no one came.
Drew and Troy are now gay porn's current "power couple" and joke about being nicknamed "Drew Punk". Now dubbed the "Bennifer" of gay porn, the Grabby's awarded them a laundry basket full of lube for their trousseau.
After a few minutes, I bailed out of the autograph signing to take a stroll of Halsted Street. Naturally, my radar directed me right to the gay thrift store. Retardo The Wonderfuck called and I said, "Guess where I am? Thrift store shoppping!" It's where I'd be if I was home, so why not. The Brown Elephant thift store was having a used leather sale. How could I miss it!
After playing tourist for a few hours, I rested up for the Grabby Awards later that night. The Grabby's are held in a fully appointed theater setting which gave it much more of a quality feel than the last few years of the GayVN Awards. The opening video was a brilliant comedy skit featuring MC's Chi Chi LaRue and Honey West, with a cameo by none other than Bobby Trendy (someone we all love to hate). I don't remember much of it, but I remember I enjoyed it immensely. Jeff Rosenberg directed it, and I hope it's available for screening somewhere online!
As for the Grabby Awards themselves, I wasn't keeping track of who won what. In fact, my favorite line of the night was Michael Brandon picking up a trophy and asking, "What did I win?" (Turns out it was a big dick award of some kind.) A similar "surprize" award was given to Arpad Miklos for Best Money Shot or something. He paused as he was making his acceptance speech and it seemed like he was suddenly caught by the absurdity of the moment. Who exactly do you thank for the Best Cumshot award, your seminal vesicles?
I also remember COLT won Best Picture for Buckleroos, but the rest of the awards seemed to be pretty evenly spread out among the various studios, which is nice. Raging Stallion won the People's Choice Awards for Pokin' In The Boys Room. It's a new category created by the Grabby's new corporate sponsor, MaleFlixxx.tv.
The Grabby's were fun, but I had two closing thoughts. First, it's almost June and the 2004 movies nominated are already ancient, but what can you do? IML is Chicago's big gay (sex-oriented) event of the year, so this is the only time you could do it. Secondly, which relates to the first, it's hard to get porn stars to come out to Chicago. Most live on either the West or East coasts, and without two overlapping events in one weekend it would be even harder to get the stars to show up. They had just enough porn stars to be presenters, but it would be nice to see a few more milling around, as you often see in West Coast events.
And speaking of East Coast porn stars, as you recall, Michael Lucas made a big point of avoiding the Grabby's this year. I forget who said it, but there was "Jesus joke" made from the stage at one point, taking a little shot at Michael Lucas from his GayVN speech comparing himself to our Lord and Savior. ("I'm 33 and a lot of people would like to crucify me.") I happened to wear a D&G shirt with a rhinestone Jesus and someone else complimented me on my Michael Lucas shirt! Didn't plan for that!
For those of you keeping track, yes, I did finally get laid last night. Not a big leather fantasy scene, but it was just what I needed to renew my confidence. I just hooked up with a sweet local boy to get our rocks off, he did what I needed him to do and I sent him home. Perfect, and with no bruises or scars. (My nipples are little tingly, though...)
And to the people at Gay Chicago Magazine, do a Google search for the term "Grabby Awards". You'll see that Lavender Lounge Blog ranks number one right behind your own website! Keep that in mind when you want to advertise next year!





































AMG ANNOUNCES LAUNCH OF NEW WEBSITE - AthleticModelGuild.com
El Cerrito, California – May 10, 2005:
"If Bob could have only seen this...."
"Bob" is Bob Mizer, founder of Athletic Model Guild, one of the original male physique photography studios in America which thrived from 1945 until Mizer's death in 1992. The speaker is Dennis Bell, who bought the entire Mizer estate in 2004 and has carefully been cataloging the more than 1,000,000 black and white negatives, color slides, tapes, films, and magazines. “Bob Mizer passed away only a few years before the real Worldwide Web was born, and could have never imagined how adult erotica would have evolved with the new technology. For 60 years he used every new format that came out — 1940s 4x5 inch large format cameras, 1950s stereo slide cameras, 1960s movie film cameras, color film from the 70s and video from the 80s. But he never got to shoot anything with a digital camera, or even go online to the internet. This new digital age is the realm of the new AMG!”
Now Bell feels he is ready to debut the all new Athletic Model Guild website (www.AthleticModelGuild.com