On Saturday night Showtime ran an interview with Marilyn Chambers in conjunction with the world television premiere of Rated X, the story about the Mitchell Brothers, directed by Emilio Estevez and starring both him and his brother Charley Sheen.
Chambers in the Showtime interview described herself as a little hippie chick living in San Francisco. Sandy Zane, from the San Francisco Chronicle, describes her as "an upper class rebel from Fairfield County, Connecticut." Zane said Chambers' father was an ad man in New York and that Chambers had a "privileged background". Chambers who had a small part in the Barbra Streisand film, The Owl and the Pussycat, said she came out to L.A. for a promotional tour because Streisand didn't want to. "I absolutely hated L.A. thinking how could anybody live here?" Chambers recalled. "The next stop was San Francisco. It was drugs, sex and rock n' roll - my kind of place." Chambers took a variety of odd jobs from restaurant hostess to topless/bottomless dancer ["sorry mom"].
Then she saw an ad in the San Francisco Chronicle describing a casting for a "major motion picture". Chambers said she no idea what it was about but found her way to Stage A on Tennessee Street. She recalls filling out a form, a green one. "How appropriate," she smiles. A question on the form tweaked her curiosity. It asked about "balling". She thought it was a typo and the Mitchells meant "bowling" which she was pretty good at. Nevertheless, the Mitchells got a look at her, sat her down and proceeded to give her the poop about Behind The Green Door. "I thought I can do that," Chambers said, not imagining that she could. "I gave them a price and a certain percentage of the gross." Chambers says she was bluffing the jargon, but the Mitchells called her bluff and she decided to do the film. "If I could make this the sexiest film ever, maybe it could help my career," Chambers thought.
Chambers said she didn't have lines in the script. "It was scary and on the other hand I was excited. They made me feel totally at ease. They treated me like their little sister." Chambers observed that Art Mitchell who started directing the film, didn't appear to know what he was doing. Chambers recalled an instance where they shot footage at the Alta Mira Hotel and none of it was usable. "All of a sudden Jim was directing, and it went a lot quicker and a lot smoother." And, as an oh, by the way, Chambers said she neglected to tell the Mitchells about the Ivory Soap box which she shot at the age of 17 - a story which had its obvious repercussions more for Ivory Soap. "The whole story was a P.R. man's dream," Chambers said. "It was a marketing bonanza for the boys," Emilio Estevez added. Chambers said she went to Cannes Film Festival and was treated like a movie star.
Sandy Zane calls Behind The Green Door, "The high water mark of porno - it was something that was creative, sexy and fun. It had a plot. The brothers made about $50 million out of that movie."
It was Chambers' recollection that the budget was $50,000, which for that time was a lot of money. She also recalled doing autograph signings at movie theaters and getting busted. Chambers notes that the Mitchell Brothers' battles with then-mayor Dianne Feinstein were legendary, prompting on one occasion, the Mitchells putting her home phone number up on a theatre marquee. "She [Feinstein] took it all in stride," Chambers says.
Former assistant D.A. Bernard Walter was also interviewed. He conceded that, though the Mitchells had their good side and bad side, they were a lot of fun to be with. "They were jesters. They had a lot of fun, but I'm glad I was not a woman in their world," said Walter. Walter said he was shocked when he heard the news that Jim Mitchell killed his brother. "I thought it had to be the other way around - murder's an ugly thing, and though I was their adversary, I regret the loss."
Describing Art Mitchell has having a loose cannon personality, Zane describes it as a "cold, calculated execution," and that Jim Mitchell "was lucky he got away with six years in San Quentin."
Chambers said the situation got out of hand when the Mitchells stopped making movies in favor of attending to the sex club business. [The O'Farrell Theatre] "That's when the heavy drugs and alcohol came into action," she says. "I never saw any violence but when Art got loaded, he got nasty. When somebody gets to that point, it's only a matter of time when they're going to kill themselves or somebody else." Nevertheless, in her wildest dreams, Chambers couldn't imagine that kind of tragedy occurring. Chamber says the porn industry has changed a lot since then. "It was an exciting time in history," she says. "It was an era that will never be again."
"They [the Mitchells] made pornography acceptable," Estevez says.
