LOS ANGELES—The studio where Angela White is preparing for the final day of her top-secret showcase lies hidden near the base of the Verdugo Mountains.
Today’s order of business calls for a pair of tease sequences with the Australian star as she completes a project that has been almost eight months in the making by the time I arrive.
White performed all four sex scenes for the movie in April under the direction of master gonzo stylist Jonni Darkko, the Chicago native who has joined forces with the 2018 AVN Female Performer of the Year on a producer level for the first time in their decorated careers.
The working title for the project is simple, yet profound: Angela By Darkko says it all.
“I like it,” Angela tells me. “I think it works. I think it says what it needs to say. Fans of porn know what that’s going to mean—us collaborating together.
“We just wanted to be creative and be artistic without restrictions. I think that’s when you create the best stuff.”
The two started to entertain the idea for a co-production between AGW Entertainment and Darkko Productions in October 2017, beginning pre-production in February. By the end of this first day of June, they’ll declare it a wrap.
“We know how to make a commercially viable product and we do that every day,” Angela explains. “This is really a chance for us to be us and to grow and to have fun.”
Their vision for Angela By Darkko is to deliver something different from their trademark fare that has propelled them both into the AVN Hall of Fame—Darkko was inducted in 2016 and White was enshrined in January.
Gonzo porn pioneer John Stagliano’s Evil Angel has distributed more than 200 Darkko Productions since 2004; Angela By Darkko will be distributed by Stagliano’s one-year-old premium imprint—Evil Angel Films.
“I’ve always found that my most successful scenes are the scenes where you just let yourself go and you’re really doing it for you,” Angela says from her makeup chair. “You’re not doing it for a paycheck. You’re not doing it for a company. You’re not doing it for anyone else’s expectations, or something that you feel you have to do. It’s just that you’re doing it for you. And I think that resonates with the audience.”
White says she and Darkko drew inspiration from the iconic work of directors such as Greg Dark—circa New Wave Hookers—and the studio-heavy productions of the late ’90s and early 2000s for the stylized wardrobe and art direction. The occasion also called for another original soundtrack from the seasoned music producer Darkko, who is laying down a series of new moody, electronic tracks for the title—a signature of his body of work for the past 15 years.
Even a sore throat and a quick trip to Urgent Care this morning could not prevent Darkko from being on set. Wearing a surgical mask, he says he didn’t bring any of the music he’s working on, but that Angela’s whip-smart production manager and photographer, Shawn, likes one of the tracks.
“Like a minimal techno thing,” Darkko says. “And I worked in a little more of an industrial vibe to some of it—just like a juxtaposition.
“I didn’t want to use older stuff. I keep changing and evolving in different ways. I haven’t really done anything industrial in a long time—like real march-y, kind of heavier. So I went a little heavier, a little faster. Usually I tend to go a little slower, a little more vibe-y.
“Before I got into porn that’s all I really thought about.”
As White receives the final touches on her makeup from industry go-to artist Rosalinda, the energetic native of Sydney, Australia, tells me three of the four scenes she did involved multiple performers. To no one’s surprise, she and Darkko spared no expense for this.
She did an anal threesome with three-time AVN Male Performer of the Year Mick Blue and five-time AVN winner Kristina Rose. Then she did a blowbang with eight guys—Robby Echo, Anthony Gaultier, Steve Holmes, Eddie Jaye, Eric John, Jason Moody, Filthy Rich and Michael Vegas—breaking her previous record of seven in Angela 2.
“I wanted 10 guys but unfortunately we had two cancellations that day,” Angela confesses. ”I’m still pretty happy.”
She also performed in a five-man gangbang with Mr. Pete, John Strong, 2018 AVN Male Performer of the Year Markus Dupree, Blue and Holmes.
“It had the longest amount and best caught double anal and double vag—and triple penetration footage—that I’ve ever done,” Angela assures me.
“I mean I’ve done doubles before but this was for an extended period and the shots we got… I’m really happy that Darkko was able to capture it—these extended shots—where I’m in doggie and the camera’s behind me. I’m trying to remember if there were two cocks in my ass or two cocks in my pussy. I think we did both. I’ll have to bring up some of the footage.
“But there’s these shots where you’ve got three dicks inside me and you’ve got the curve of my back coming down and I’m turning around and smiling and I’m just loving it with all these dicks. That was really cool—the best angles that I’ve been able to get for that kind of scene. Those positions are difficult for everyone.”
Indeed, there is nothing easy about anything White & Co. do when the cameras are rolling, but the pros tend to make it look that way. It’s part of the reason why White made porn history in January, when she and her studio combined to bring home a record-setting 14 AVN Awards at the 35th annual ceremony at Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas.
Doing gangbangs, according to White, is like “climbing Mount Everest.”
“That’s what I compare it to because it’s not the same kind of pleasure you get from a one-on-one scene or even a DP—that’s really pleasurable,” she says.
“But when it gets to the doubles it’s a challenge and the pleasure kind of comes not so much from the physical but from the mental—the accomplishment of being able to do a feat that’s really about sexual athleticism at that point.
“For me it’s physically a toll and it’s quite a lot at that point. To get everybody doing the physical part of it and to get it captured so beautifully is really… that’s exciting.”
White tells me the fourth scene entails her going toe-to-toe with porn’s Russian Rocket—Markus Dupree. To characterize what happened when White met Dupree as an anal scene may not be doing it justice.
“I was covered in glitter and we used a gallon of Spunk [Lube],” Angela recalls. “So it’s this kind of Spunk/anal/squirt scene where Markus used this big black enema ball and filled my butthole up with Spunk. And then when he makes me squirt I’m like squirting all over myself—like a shower on my face; and while he’s making me squirt the Spunk is shooting out of my ass.
“So you’ve got these two geysers. And we did it in this studio and made such a mess.”
The scene became so intense that after the final cut, Dupree had to take a knee from exhaustion.
“We shot all the scenes in April and in porn years that was forever ago,” she says, joking that the gangbang erupted on John Strong’s birthday.
“We had birthday cupcakes,” she says. “His birthday treat was sharing me with four other guys.”
For the second part of today’s teases, White will be recreating her glitter look.
“We’re putting more glitter all over my body, so the glitter’s going to extend down my boobs and all over my legs,” Angela says. “I mean it still ended up in my butthole and in my pussy.”
Her makeup artist Rosalinda tells me the glitter day challenged everyone, including her.
“I was really concerned because typically when we’ve done glitter, I don’t use the traditional glue. I actually use prosthetic glue,” Rosalinda says. “Being that she was going to be doing a sex scene I said, ‘OK, listen…’ I kind of warned her and said this is going to be intense to take off. And it was, but it looked amazing.”
Angela adds, “You have to use a special remover, which I brought today. But there’s no shower. That’s the other thing. We shot everything here—we shot this squirt/Spunk scene with glitter. But I had to drive home like this.
“And squirt obviously comes out warm but it cools down. So Markus and I were cold because we were covered in liquid.”
White says she cherishes group sex scenes—and not for the reasons one might suspect.
“They get a bad rap from criticizers of the industry—from conservatives and feminists—like as if they are proof that women are being mistreated in porn,” she explains. “But for me group sex scenes are all about the girl. Those are the scenes where I’m like all these guys are here just for me and I’m the center of attention and they’re here to give me what I want.
“They’re here to pleasure me. So there’s always this moment right before it begins, where I’m on set and all the guys start to come towards me and I’m like, ‘Oh my god it’s happening. This is so cool!’”
As White excuses herself to brush her teeth, I ask her production manager Shawn about the crew’s use of a rain machine for yesterday’s tease.
“The water never sprays out like a shower, it just drips,” Shawn explains. “And we were projecting moving fern footage in the background. She was all oiled up.”
It turns out the crew overcame a technical hiccup.
“They built a trough for us,” Shawn tells me. “They brought out a specialist who built it for us. They said, ‘Look, we’ve never done this before.’ What they did is they only brought out one piece of 4 x 2 to build the trough, which means it’s only 4 inches high.
“The pump that they sent us to suck the water out requires that the trough be about 8 inches deep for it to work, so we had to use a suck pump—a Vacu-Suck—instead to get the water out and obviously that’s a much slower process. So we were really jammed. We were only able to shoot video for about 15 minutes because the water was filling up so much.”
Today they’ll project cloud footage behind White while running a snow machine, creating a dreamy atmosphere for her seductive dance.
“We’ve never worked with this before,” Shawn says. “We’re going to be blowing fake snow out of here, like a soap substance. We’re going to have a fan lifting it up so it falls. And we have a haze machine…”
Darkko adds, “I haven’t used a hazer, which is kind of cool technology. All the kids are doing it for music videos and shit.”
The two recount how the set for the glitter scene featured a row of tall, narrow LED light bulbs that required Shawn to build a custom electrical grid to house them.
“To have 10 different bulbs in an arc he had to literally hardwire all of them together on a rig,” Darkko says.
“He’s plugging it in, ‘Is this gonna work? Is this gonna fry right now?’ And it worked perfectly because he’s so fucking smart. He’s so mathematical.”
Darkko continues, “But even just the motion backgrounds. I wanted something—because of all my DJ experience and party experience—I wanted something that was moving. So every one of these backgrounds is physically moving.”
During a break, White shows me some of yesterday’s rain machine footage, noting it was nice to have warm water for it.
“Especially because I’m working so much,” she says. “I can’t afford to get sick. I have bookings until October so if anything gets cancelled this month I have to move it October.
“I was really in a tropical rain shower scenario. I’m happy that we’ve almost got our teases to the seasons. When Jonni and I first started talking about it for a little while we were going to start playing with the elements and the wind and fire and water.
“But then we were like it’s Fall so maybe we should do Spring into Autumn…So we’ve kind of done that. We’ve taken a little bit of liberty and we’ve made the seasons our own. But the glitter, I’m not exactly sure what season that is…Glitter, that’s kind of like the wind element. But tropical rain I feel like that’s summer.
“I feel like we’ve kind of merged the elements and the seasons and taken liberty and embellished. It was interesting trying to get the glitter out of everything, because it was in my dryer for months.”
Darkko adds, “It was in my house, too.”
When White emerges from her dressing room in a luxurious fur coat, she points out she also wore it for the gangbang.
“Listen, I don’t want to ruin even one person’s erection,” she cracks.
“That’s highly unlikely,” Darkko replies. “I don’t think that’s possible.”
No argument here.
Darkko, who has more than 260 credits as a director since 2003 and hundreds more as a videographer, exudes confidence and focus. He’s as relaxed as can be while in charge of a high-stakes set.
In between takes, he recommends discovering the natural majesty of Jackson Hole, Wyoming.
“Do yourself a favor. Just to get lost,” he tells me. “It’s a wonderful, magical place.”
He turns to White. “Are we ready to rock another run? We’re getting so much…”
Three takes into the snowy tease, everyone is coughing because of the soap-like after taste of the flakes.
“I think everyone should get some fresh air,” Angela says, as we step outside.
I ask her what the fruity-looking drink is that she’s been sipping.
“These are branched chain amino acids, so I drink them every time I’m on set but especially when I’m doing solo or posing,” Angela says.
She says holding certain positions for an extended period becomes a strain on her muscles and the drink helps her recovery.
“So if I don’t have these branched chain amino acids sometimes the next day I can barely walk.”
White reveals she sustained an injury during her tussle with Dupree.
“After the scene I couldn’t feel my left thigh for a couple of weeks. I pinched a nerve,” she says. “I was fine and then after the scene I was like, ‘I can’t feel my leg.’ Like I could feel it from here down, but here, completely numb. And I thought, oh, by the time I wake up tomorrow it’ll be there. No.”
But make no mistake, White isn’t complaining. “I’m proud of my porno injuries because I know that I worked really hard if I get off set and I’m like, ouch, I don’t know exactly what I did but…”
She says Dupree pushed himself to another level.
“These wet, oil scenes—he makes it look easy but he’s working his butt off,” Angela says, adding Dupree puts enormous strain on his hand when he is fingering her to squirt. “I massaged his hand after.”
As I watch footage of Dupree feeding White lube from the enema ball, I ask her if it has a taste.
“You know, honestly it doesn’t taste that great,” she says, laughing. “But you forget about everything; you forget about the taste. You forget that you can’t feel your leg. You don’t even notice that. You’re just in it. I mean how can you not be when this is happening to your body? You’re nowhere else but right there.”
As the crew breaks for lunch, the production manager Shawn tells me about the “juxtaposition” that Angela strives to present in her movies. “She’s all about catching people off guard," he says.
“Not necessarily visual contrast, but her philosophy behind her website, her website design and her whole branding was always if you want to serve a really dirty dish you have to serve it on a really clean plate if you want to get someone to eat it; and she really wanted to shoot pretty aggressive, hardcore sex but make it still pretty digestible,” Shawn explains.
Darkko’s amped-up visuals complement White’s look—they employed slow-motion for the teases and then crank the shutter speed to make the sex “electric,” Shawn adds.
During White’s historic 2017 campaign she shot 183 scenes—including 40 anal, seven DP’s and five gangbangs. Angela By Darkko marks her third high-profile collab of 2018, on the heels of writing and starring in vignette scenes for producers Bree Mills and Greg Lansky. Whether she’s making conceptual porn or throwing down for a no-holes-barred, gonzo tryst, her approach remains the same. She wants that spark.
“That’s what makes me tick,” Angela says. “That’s what makes me excited to shoot. That’s why I got into this in the first place—to connect with people and to have those crazy, intense authentic moments on set that you just couldn’t plan. And that’s when I feel like I’m doing my best work.”
