FOREST HILLS, N.Y.—Bill Caits, one of AVN's most prolific early reviewers and an amateur photographer very popular with adult actresses, died early this morning from complications of diabetes. He was 68.
Caits first began reviewing adult movies for AVN in 1988; over the course of his eight-year career with the magazine, he assessed more than a thousand XXX-rated videos, sometimes caustically but always with good humor.
"Bill was my mentor and he basically was the go-between between me and Gene [Ross], and later Mark Kulkis, the magazine's editors," recalled fellow reviewer Sheldon Ranz. "He was a dear friend. He had a wicked sense of humor that sometimes slanted toward conservatism. One of his favorite jokes was, he used to look every morning in the obituary section first thing to see if Jane Fonda had been swallowed by a whale. But his humor was so over the top, you were never quite sure if he meant it. Bill was not a political person in terms of the ideological, in-your-face type of style, but he could joke about it, like everything else."
"In general, Bill was beloved by the performers because at the trade shows and the award shows, he was a relentless photographer of the performers, and he would always give them copies of their pictures and they looked forward to that."
Caits' friend and fellow reviewer Bob "Dirty Bob" Krotts echoed that sentiment.
"Bill, in addition to being what one could consider an ultimate fan/reviewer/adult collector who was firmly entrenched in the adult business, was always at every convention on both coasts," Krotts noted. "His collection of adult videos was legendary as was his knowledge of those on the screen. All of the performers back then knew him by sight and the fact that Bill would always make numerous copies of photos he had taken at previous adult conventions, and then take the time to hunt down those attending whatever current show he was at and give them photos of themselves, endeared him to all. Not a convention went by where Bill didn't give me photos of myself from the last event.
"Bill never asked for anything but acceptance," he continued. "One time, after hearing that I had just returned from an "Anna Malle party" at the ECVS, where things got pretty wild, Bill quietly and rather sadly confided that he had never been invited to anything similar. I think this may be his only real regret about the business. During his time he was one of our fellow AVN reviewers, a total fixture and familiar face that should be missed by everyone who knew him."
Caits had a day job, as an attorney at a real estate title insurance company, but in his spare time he amassed a massive collection of adult videotapes, from which he decided to divest himself after his son was born.
"He decided for family reasons to part ways with it, so he gave away and sold a large part of it to various acquaintances," Ranz said. "This including most of his AVN issues as well, so we all got a little piece of that, because Bill wanted to have a more standard family life to help his son, Richard, and it seems to have worked. Richard is now a fine young adult.
"His reviews were hilarious, which was a genuine reflection of his goofy sense of humor," Ranz continued. "He loved all movies in general. In a sense, I would say he was the Joe Franklin of adult video; he used to like everybody, at least in public."
For example, in reviewing 1995's Body and Soul (Infinity Film & Video), Caits opened with the observation, "With the exception of last year's Pinnacle release, each time the title of this video is re-used, things go downhill. It started with John Garfield in 1947, then took a nose-dive with Leon Isaac Kennedy in 1981. As if anything could get worse than Leon Isaac Kennedy, in 1995 we have a quickie video wherein the microphone (for the most part) sounds like it's stuck up somebody's ass."
Though Caits rarely (if ever) reviewed gay films, he had no problem with transgender fare, as the beginning of his review of Stasha's Diary makes evident:
"I've seen quite a few she-males over the years ranging from the somewhat feminine to the Russian weightlifter type, so it's nice to report on what is evidently the most attractive of the breed that I've seen in many a day. Stasha is reminiscent of Debi Diamond. In fact, give her one slice of the scalpel and you can send her over to my house."
"When I met Bill during the 1980s, he was working on an encyclopedia of adult movies and performers," noted fellow adult film aficionado John A. Mozzer. "He used to watch all of the movies in order to identify performers, not trusting the credits to be accurate. VideoSan started computerizing Bill's encyclopedia database probably around Spring 1986, before the public web. This continued until Bill stopped adding to his encyclopedia in July 2001. Bill Caits and VideoSan had a close working relationship with Peter van Aarle, and they shared data that made its way into the Internet Adult Film Database (iafd.com)."
For a time, Caits had an adult video review show—Ranz described it as a sort of "Siskel & Ebert for porn"—on the Manhattan Cable channel with fellow reviewer Penelope Jordan, sponsored by Manhattan Video's Dick Kunis, who had also contributed reviews to the magazine.
"Kunis' store, Manhattan Video, was a real fixture in midtown for porn lovers, but unfortunately was targeted by the Giuliani administration as part of their 'clean-up of Times Square' campaign, and he was forced to sell it," Ranz recalled.
But over the past few years, Caits' fight with Type II diabetes had taken its toll.
"Bill had a lot of complications of his diabetes," Ranz explained. "A number of organs were failing. At one point, for a time, he couldn't feel his legs, and that came back later. He also had some issues with his hospital treatment, going back at least a year, and he always considered himself an active person, liked to walk around and hated being helpless, but he fought it the best he could. He was an army veteran; he always had the crewcut from his enlistment days; he maintained that as a source of pride."
On May 25—Memorial Day—Richard Caits sent Ranz an email, saying, "Bill is in a coma after having suffered a heart attack and a stroke, his brain function has been wiped out, it looks like this is it." Caits died shortly after midnight today. Besides his son Richard, Caits is survived by his wife, Rochelle.
UPDATE: Bill Caits was buried Tuesday, June 16 in Mt. Richmond Cemetery in Staten Island. The burial was handled by the Hebrew Free Burial Association. A U.S. Army honor guard was at the burial to note his military service. His surviving family members will not be preparing a formal obit for the mainstream press or a memorial service.
Pictured: Some of Caits' favorite movies.
