For consumers viewing one of Marty Zion's Nectar Entertainment features for the first time, the reaction is likely to resemble something out of a ’60s episode of "Batman": "ZANG! POP!! WOW!!!" The images hit below the belt — in the best way — and that's exactly how Nectar CEO Sean Logan wants it, because that's exactly how he and his associates have done it for the past several years.
"My background and Nectar's background are mostly in music videos and high-budget commercials," Logan explained. "I've done a couple hundred commercials and videos in my time, and I've also done several feature films. My whole team, these guys were in production, post-production and directing with me, and I brought the three of them with me."
The "team" he's talking about are director Zion, editor Eric Avalon and composer Jeffrey Bryan, who work together as a well-oiled artistic machine to produce some of the most impressively shot, edited and scored couples-friendly productions to come out of XXX since Ninn Worx.
"The funny thing was, when we launched in June of ’03, I didn't know a single soul in the business," Logan recalled. "I didn't even know what AVN was. Basically, our objective was to give a classier product to the end consumer, so we took our talent, our expertise, our production experience, and I capitalized on our ability to put together a commercial spot for 15 seconds or 30 seconds and really tell a story within that time frame."
The first result was Marty Zion's Shades of Red, a tightly edited visual and auditory cornucopia of sexual imagery that uses rapid-fire editing to produce and erotic sensuality rarely seen in adult video.
"I'm happy to say we've sold over 14,000 pieces," Logan said of his premiere production. "We're getting orders left and right, even off of the mail order catalogs, and it's doing well for us. What I'm finding is that Shades of Red has some sort of cult following; it's becoming some sort of cult hit, which is cool, it's exciting."
Nectar productions, which have received multiple AVN and Venus Faire nominations, are among the best sellers in the Adam & Eve catalog, and the line is also very popular with PABO, Europe's biggest mail-order company and a partner of the continent's largest retail chain, Beate Uhse.
Zion continues to be the company's hottest director, speaking with a visual voice so unique that the company's gone so far as to trademark his style under the brand "Eroticore."
"We actually just got all the paperwork back," Logan noted in late March. "So that's now ours. Eroticore, and we're calling the Marty Zion features the Eroticore line. We're hoping to get 'eroticore' listed among all the Web retailers, so when people are looking for it, it's going to be its own subdivision."
But Nectar's "couples-friendly" identification is starting to chafe a little.
"I think there's a misperception among some of the video distributors and consumers that we're pretty soft," Logan lamented. "But 'eroticore' has plenty of hardcore sex; it's just that our production values are so high, that's what people tend to talk about."
That perception's going to change once the public discovers Nectar's newest imprint, 1st Strike.
"1st Strike is our entry into the gonzo market," Logan announced. "We'll be competing with the Third Degrees, the Zero Tolerances, and the first two titles are going to be helmed by Skeeter Kerkove."
"We'll be coming out with one or two 1st Strikes a month," he added. "The first one is Fresh Asses, basically featuring young girls who probably have never shot before, and then we'll be doing something with a more urban feel, starring Mandingo and Brian Pumper, because the retail stores and distributors have been asking us to get into the interracial market."
The production team spent much of January in Brazil, where Zion had been grooming Avalon to move from the editing bay behind the camera.
"Eric was Marty's assistant on all the Zion movies," Logan explained. "Eric also is my VP of production and my chief editor, so there isn't a Zion movie that's gone out the door without him being involved in it. Eric's first movie, in the 'Marty Zion presents' series, is Exxxtasy Island, followed by Rio DeJaniero Top To Bottom and Sao Paolo Black & Brown Samba."
The company is also inking a deal that should bring the company's titles into a much larger number of mainstream venues.
"Pretty soon, wherever you're seeing Peach DVDs, you're going to be seeing Nectar," Logan said.
Peach — Nectar — somehow, that seems fitting — and juicy.
