CHATSWORTH, Calif. – Starlet Dana DeArmond is at the center of Vivid Alt’s newest production, Dana DeArmond Does the Internet. The title, which ships on Friday, is the brain child of DeArmond, who told AVN.com that she’s been trying to put the movie together for about a year.
“I was talking about it at AEE last year,” recalled DeArmond, who recently finished a signing for the production company in Hartford, Connecticut. The starlet gained huge popularity even before she jumped in front of a camera as an internet personality, netting over 300,000 friends on the popular website, www.myspace.com. DeArmond has since done a handful of hardcore titles for companies such as Hustler and VividAlt, the alt. arm of Vivid Entertainment, fronted by director/producer Eon McKai.
“This movie really took on a life of its own,” said McKai, “and Dana gave more of herself than I think a lot of other porn stars would.” The VividAlt frontman said he wants to do more events like DeArmond’s recent signing in the future, starting with Dana DeArmond Does the Internet.
“I wanted to do something that would look at the fact that I’ve established a big following on the internet,” continued DeArmond, “and that I’m not this huge porn star…I’m not even like a real person to most people, I’m everyone’s friend on the internet. And I needed to make a movie for all of those friends.”
DeArmond explained that, as it was being developed, Dana DeArmond Does the Internet (or D3TI, as it is affectionately called) vacillated between a documentary-style porno and a fully scripted feature. “At some point, I decided to take the movie back [and keep it unscripted],” said the raven haired performer. “And I’m really glad I did that, because I wouldn’t have gotten to see the whole process of making a movie…how the directing process goes and how the editing process goes, or marketing or selling the movie. I’m now involved in all of that stuff.”
DeArmond, who effectively turned the title into her own porno biopic, said that she isn’t credited as the title’s director — nobody is, in fact — but she had a hand in almost every aspect of it. “This movie became my baby…it was the opposite of saying, ‘oh, I’m just a porn star, so put my name on the box, and other people will sell it.’ And so I wanted to make it absolutely perfect.”
The movie appropriately features bands that DeArmond connected with on www.myspace.com like the Nintendudes and Driver of the Year. She even met what would be one of her co-stars, newcomer Reagan Maddux, on the internet site.
“I’m also a make-up artist, and so I was invited to do make-up on some [porn] sets,” explained Maddux, “but had also mentioned that I might be interested in actually being in a movie.”
Maddux does her very first scenes in the D3TI; a threeway with DeArmond and Julius Ceazher and a blow job scene in the kitchen of a restaurant.
“I had a great time,” added Maddux. “I made a lot of friends on the set.” Maddux said she also just finished McKai’s next directorial venture, The Doll Underground, which will release next year.
“I actually fell in love with [Reagan],” added DeArmond. “We’ve become really good friends. We actually hang out in real life now. We’re buddies.
“This movie has a lot of my other friends in it as well. Lorelei Lee, who is a friend of mine from San Francisco and Princess Donna, who is a webmaster from Wired Pussy. Neither of those girls had ever been in a regular porno…they had done a lot of BDSM stuff. I consider hardcore lesbian sex and BDSM to be ‘alt’ in its own way…so it was good to bring those ladies to VividAlt. I’m all about bringing my friends up with me, and bringing everybody together.
“I don’t think that the title would be the same as it, if Eon hadn’t wanted to make it at VividAlt,” added DeArmond. “All the movies [at VividAlt] are so different, and I love them all.”
“I knew that this movie had to do two things,” said McKai. “For Dana’s hardcore fans, it had to let them see into her life, and be really honest, and to other people, who weren’t familiar with her, it had to hook them in…and, in the end, I think it accomplishes both of those things.”
DeArmond said her roots have still remained with the internet. “When I meet my fans that know me from the internet…it’s different for them to see me as someone other than this pixilated image. It’s like they’re meeting the President or something,” she laughed. “But not the President of the United States, because nobody likes him…it’s like meeting the President of the Internet. Can I proclaim myself the President of the Internet?”
Dana DeArmond Does the Internet will ship on Friday. For more on VividAlt and DeArmond, go to www.vividalt.com .
