Lenny Kirtman’s Freaky Gang: The Untold Story of Ralph Ell, Ras Kean, Bo Koup and the rest – From the Seminary to Warhol, Drug Busts, & XXX Films: Part 2

Previously on…. Lenny Kirtman‘s Freaky Gang:

Leonard Kirtman was one of the most prolific – and notorious – of the first wave of adult filmmakers in New York. But for a short time in the mid 1970s, he handed over the reins of his studio to a small group of filmmakers who formed around his Chelsea studio, including Ralph Ell, Bill Bukowski, Chuck Smith, Ras Kean, Tzipi, and Annie Sprinkle.

They called themselves ‘The Freaky Gang’ – and over the last 25 years, The Rialto Report has spoken to the various members of the group. This is the story of their wild exploits, and films such as My Master My Love, The American Adventures of Surelick Holmes, Big Abner, The Amazing Dr. Jeckyll, Airport Girls, The Vixens of Kung Fu (A Tale of Yin Yang), Teenage Deviate, The Affairs of Janice, Sex Wish, The Devil Inside Her, and Unwilling Lovers.

You can read the first part of the story here.

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4.     The Further Adventures of Billy Hawk and Ras Kean

Bill Bukowski and Ras Kean were the two young bucks of the Freaky Gang – often responsible for finding women to appear in the loops and films, as well as being part of the crews. But their activities extended beyond just making films.

Bill Bukowski:

Bobby/Ras and I probably weren’t great for each other. By which I mean… we were great for each other (laughs).

We liked to party and we used drugs, which just got me deeper into my vices. We got into plenty of scrapes. To this day, I don’t know how I survived.

Ras Kean:

I hung out with the Freaky Gang a lot. I acted in a few more sex films and sometimes helped them out behind the scenes.

Billy was a fun, friendly guy. He was also good-looking and hip… unlike the rest of the guys who worked for Lenny! So we became tight. We were a similar age and we did similar things.

Ras Kean

Ralph Ell:

Billy, Ras, and I often went to swinger’s bars looking for talent. They were good-looking guys and always had lots of girlfriends. They’d go to clubs and bars and pick up girls and bring them back and we’d shoot loops with them. Sometimes they’d go to the peep shows and find girls there too.

I was a different generation: I had a family…

Ralph Ell and family

Bill Bukowski:

Lenny would hire the big-name women, like Andrea True or Darby Lloyd Rains, but we filled the other roles with women who you’d never seen before. Women who only ever made that one film, or maybe a second, and then went back to whatever normal life they had before.

Ralph Ell:

There was a great bar on 6th Avenue. It was unbelievable watching Bill and Ras in action. The girls that went to these places were gorgeous and outrageous. They’d come over to you and say “We’re having a party later” and Bill and Ras would come away with all their phone numbers. These women would work for a lot less money than the bigger stars. At that time, $100 was a lot of money. Established actresses like Andrea True wanted ridiculous amounts to perform. I had a lot of fights with people who thought they were God and wanted more: I had a budget and I wasn’t gonna pay them more than that. That’s what Lenny liked about me: I was a cheap bastard and I wasn’t willing to spend more than I had to.

Tzipi:

The funniest times we had were when we auditioned men for performing roles. The guys would come in, and Ralph and I would sit behind a desk and ask them to get an erection – and maintain it. Some of the men looked truly terrified, making eye contact with us as they tried to make something happen. Sometimes I’d have to hide under the table to conceal my giggling…

Bill Bukowski:

There were times when I wondered if the girls we were using were underage. I mean, we’d ask, but there was no way of checking. Some of them were runaways who’d just hit town from the Midwest. Sometimes, if we suspected that they were 16 or 17, we didn’t use them… because it wasn’t worth it for the guys buying the films.

Ralph Ell:

C.J. Laing was always the first girl we thought of when we wanted to do a freaky scene. C.J. was Billy’s girl, but he didn’t seem to mind her doing things like double insertions. C.J. was gorgeous but she was difficult to work with. She’d do anything but it was always, “Give me more money.”

I think it was Billy and I who made up that name for her. Her real name was Wendy.

Bill Bukowski:

I met C.J. on the set of The Vixens of Kung Fu (A Tale of Yin Yang) (1975), I think. That was one of Bill Milling’s first films as a director. I don’t know where he found her, but I was mesmerized by her. She hit me like a bolt of lightning and turned my life upside down. She was something else.

C.J. Laing, in ‘The Vixens of Kung Fu (A Tale of Yin Yang)’ (1975)

Ras Kean:

So this is where my story gets a little… crazy (laughs). Like I said, I liked to party and I rarely had enough money. Eventually something had to give…

Well… I knew people who knew some people who knew some other people, and to cut a long story short, I made some extra money by selling some product. What product? Pills, powder, grass, anything that would get you high. Hey, it was the era. Everybody was doing some drug or other. I was just part of the food chain (laughs). A small cog in the scheme of things.

I dealt with different groups. One was called the Council, which was headed by a guy named Nicky Barnes in Harlem. They mainly dealt in heroin. I was just small-time and tried to stay out of heavy stuff like that, but I’d run all sorts of product around town. It made me a good living for a time.

Bill Bukowski:

Ras would call me up and ask for some help – usually to move a consignment of dope. He had an apartment on Bethune Street in the Village where he worked out of. Then his operation grew, and he needed a bigger place to store it, so I suggested Lenny’s studio.

Bill Bukowski

Ras Kean:

Lenny’s place was perfect: a safe place to stash anything. Lenny never knew anything about it. Ralph kinda knew what we were doing and kinda didn’t approve… but he kinda turned a blind eye to it (laughs).

As for Chuck… he was clueless. One day, we found him digging into some of Ras’ packages containing white powder… but Chuck thought they were chemicals to develop film stock…

Bill Bukowski:

One day, Ras sent me up to Harlem with a package. He gave me a watch which told a different time – that was supposedly the way a contact would identify me. It was an old idea: I’d be asked the time and tell them the time on this fake watch.

When the day came, I was nervous. I had no idea if I was being set up or if I was going to be in danger. So I rolled a joint as big as a baby’s leg and smoked it before leaving the house. Somehow, I got up to Harlem and sat on a park bench clutching this package close to my body. A guy came up to me and asked me for the time. I was so high I’d forgotten about the watch I’d been given. I told him the actual time, and he walked off. Then he came back and asked again. I repeated the time. Except this time, I might have said something like, “It’s ten minutes later than when you asked me the first time, you moron.” He looked pissed and disappeared.

So I went back to the Village with the package before I realized what I’d done. Ras wasn’t happy.

Ras Kean:

The drug business was more profitable than acting or modeling, and I didn’t really want my face on movie posters or theater screens, so I stopped doing the sex films.

That is, until ‘The Affairs of Janice.’

Ras Kean

*

5.     The Freaky Gang Expands

With the core Freaky Gang established, others started coming into the group to perform a variety of different roles.

Ralph Ell:

Over time, Lenny brought in new people like Victor Milt, Zebedy Colt, and a few others. Victor was ok, he just wanted to make commercials and documentaries, so he was more independent. But Zebedy was the worst freak you ever saw. Lenny was amused by him, maybe because they were of a similar age and Zebedy had had a long career on stage and in music.

Anyway, Lenny started asking us to add Zebedy as an actor in our movies. I made up excuses to avoid doing that but he still ended up in a few of mine.

Bill Bukowski:

Zeb was a crank, but a fascinating guy. It wasn’t that I didn’t like him but he sucked the energy out of a room with his neuroses and nervousness, so at first, I stayed away from him.

But after a while, I got to know him pretty well and found him more interesting. He told me stories about being a former child actor from silent Laurel and Hardy movies who’d reinvented himself as a theater actor and a singer of gay torch songs.

Chuck Smith:

Zebedy told me once that he was acting in an off-Broadway production with Sandy Dennis. Apparently, she took her mother to see their first porno film in a Times Square theater – and it was a Zebedy Colt production. Sandy Dennis recognized Zeb on-screen, and told him he was great!

He wasn’t a great looking guy, so on the face of it, it was strange having him as the lead actor – especially because he was gay too. But he had a ball acting these deviant characters.

Annie Sprinkle:

Some of the guys really loved acting and they really fancied themselves as actors. I fancied myself more of a sex performer – and I was very political too because of the ‘Deep Throat’ trial. I wanted people to feel better about themselves and about sexuality. I was raised to be an activist, to be political, and I still am to this day.

Ralph Ell:

One actor we hired was Sonny Landham. What a trip he was! And what a fucking weirdo, excuse my language. He was in Big Abner (1975). But he had a little charisma and some acting talent.

Sonny Landham

Bill Bukowski:

If only his dick had been as big as his ego, Sonny would’ve been a bigger star. It wasn’t a surprise when I saw him star in ‘Predator’ (1987) with Arnold Schwarzenpecker, or whatever he’s called. I’ve seen Sonny’s name in a lot of credits in a lot of real movies. He was a big strapping guy, he wasn’t bad looking, and that all helps.

Chuck Smith:

Sonny spent the whole time on ‘Big Abner’ wandering around the set, bellowing at people, “Hell, I’m not Lil’ Abner, I’m Big Abner!”

I couldn’t believe it when I saw him running for political office in Kentucky a few years later!

Sonny Landham and friend, in ‘Big Abner’ (1975)

Annie Sprinkle:

Another actor we worked with was Bobby Astyr. I loved Bobby. I was one of the few Jewish girls so I think I had a cultural connection with Bobby and Leonard Kirtman that maybe others didn’t have. I remember I did a scene, tied to a brass bed, and Bobby and I had really great sex. After the scene was done, Bobby wanted to give me an orgasm so he stayed when everyone else went off to shoot another scene. But I wasn’t very orgasmic so I faked it… and he knew it. He told me so – and I was horrified and humiliated. I learned that in personal relationships, it was important not to fake an orgasm. So I got myself a vibrator and I learned how to become orgasmic after that.

Bill Bukowski:

I never went to see any of our films in the theater. Never once. It didn’t interest me. I’d seen ‘em when I was doing the editing. Same thing for premieres. We didn’t have ‘em. I mean these weren’t great films! Sure, we did things that were different than what other people were doing… but it didn’t mean they were great. Great is great. Ours were… different. The only way you knew that people appreciated our films was that they were popular, and the theaters kept wanting to exhibit them. They wouldn’t have bought them otherwise.

Annie Sprinkle:

Jamie Gillis was another we worked with. So handsome; very sexy. There’s a movie I did with him called Kathy’s Graduation Present (1975) and we’re sitting on the bed and you can tell I am so turned on to him. Just in the talking, the flirting. We did a double penetration. It might have been my first one.

Ralph Ell:

We got busted a bunch of times. And more often than not, the cause was Lenny himself! He couldn’t help himself. He liked to think he was a big shot movie producer. Louis B. Liar, or something.

We’d be shooting somewhere on location, and he’d go to a restaurant and say, “Hey we’re shooting porn” and half the town would show up – including cops. A few times, I had to bury canisters of film, and then go back a few days later and dig them up.

I remember one particular bust: I’d built a large cock out of papier-mâché and we positioned it near a pool. One of the crew started smoking and the whole thing caught fire while we’re shooting. The alarms went off and soon we were surrounded by firemen. They wanted to know what permits and certificates we had. Of course, we didn’t have anything like that, so I was worried. I thought they were gonna lock us up. Then I looked around and saw some of the girls had enticed some of the firemen into the other rooms at the studio. We didn’t have a problem after that…

Bill Bukowski:

We got busted at the Chelsea Hotel once, but only after we’d finished the shoot. We’d taken a few hundred Hebrew National salamis and used them in a sex scene. When we wrapped and had finished putting the equipment away, there was a bang on the door – and it was the cops. They spent ages questioning us about the sausages trying to figure out what we’d been doing. We just shrugged and kept repeating that we loved sausage.

Ralph Ell:

‘Boogie Nights’ (1997) was reasonably close to what it was like in the 1970s but I didn’t like the way it showed everyone doing coke all the time. I saw more drugs on the Warhol sets. In my experience, the biggest drug that was used at that time was amyl nitrate; it was a yellow thing and it would often fall out of people’s pockets.

I wouldn’t allow drugs on the set. Or maybe I was just dopey and nobody told me what was going on.

Ras Kean:

I assume that you’ve heard about Lenny’s frequent ‘appearances’ in the films as a… stunt cock?

Ralph Ell:

Lenny was a major maniac when it came to sex, but he wasn’t a bad man. When you got to know him, you didn’t dislike him. The thing was… when there was a hot girl on set, Lenny was always around. And he insisted on being the one to deliver the… er… close-up cum shot. He’d come in and say, “I’m here, Ralph, set it up,” and we’d set up a scene so that his face wouldn’t be shown. Like, sometimes he’d have a ghost outfit on. He did this on so many films I directed without anyone knowing about it. But see… he had an unusual marking on his penis and so, if you knew that, you could always tell that it was him.

Once I met this girl at a bar and she was real pretty, and I invited her to be in the next movie. For the first – and only – time, I figured I was gonna do what Lenny always did, so I put the costume on that covered my face, and got everyone ready to shoot and guess what happened? Lenny showed up. He walked in and said, “Ralph, get the hell outta here.” He took my costume and he did it. So… I never did it, ever.

Tzipi:

Can you believe that?! Leonard Kirtman was the President of the company. The owner of the studio. The guy who paid all our salaries and provided the money to make the movie. And yet… he turned up every time to finish off the scene by dropping his trousers in front of us all and having sex for 60 seconds. I couldn’t stop laughing every time. It was such a ridiculous situation!

Ralph Ell:

For a time, these films made me seem an important person in other people’s eyes. My friends would flip out that I was doing porn, and they’d want to come on the sets. People would say, “Ralph, could I meet that girl I saw in your movie?” I wouldn’t let them get involved. It just wasn’t smart for me to do that.

My mother and father never knew what I did. My wife did, of course. She got suspicious of what was happening on the sets and she didn’t believe half the things I told her – she figured I was having sex every five minutes. So I took her to some of the shoots so she could watch me work. She was excited at first but she quickly got bored.

Bill Bukowski:

The trouble was that it got to be formulaic real quick. Hey, that’s capitalism: you figure what works and then you just keep repeating it until it’s dead. So, yeah, there was a formula. Anything you do successfully has got a formula.

Mine was: Opening set-up, you have people talking. Second set-up, girl meets boy. Third set-up; you do the sex. Fourth set-up, they have a fight. Then they make up. Then her friend comes in. (laughs). I had to plead with Lenny to be able to shoot ten minutes of dialogue in every film. All of us did if we wanted to have some type of story.

Ralph Ell:

I learned the business side of making films from Lenny. He was smart. How to find buyers, how to make deals, how to sell. If you were an independent in the adult business, you had to deal with some strange characters. You couldn’t just be a filmmaker: you had to become a businessman.

And the people that ran this business were not nice people. I’m not talking about the filmmakers or the theater operators. This was the Mafia. They ran this business. That’s how you sold these movies. Most of the people had a connection with a Mafia guy: you had to in order to sell your product.

Lenny knew these people and he introduced me to a few. I knew they were mob. I mean, they didn’t come over to me and say, “I’m Mafia” but, you knew it, and to be honest with you, I was scared as shit.

Ralph Ell

*

6.     Zebedy Colt Takes Over

Ralph Ell:

Zebedy had been in several of our films like Surelick Holmes and Dr Jekyll, and then he presented Lenny with a script for Sex Wish (1975). It was a rip-off of the Charles Bronson film, ‘Death Wish’ (1974), that had just come out. Lenny knew I didn’t like Zebedy, so Lenny said he’d direct it, and he and I would produce it so we could keep an eye on him.

Bill Bukowski:

Ras had been using the studio to store his product, and one day he rocked up with a batch of space cookies and left them out for people to help themselves to. Of course, Lenny had no idea what they were, he ate half a dozen and started hallucinating.

So Lenny was out of action for a few days after that, and Vick Milt had to direct ‘Sex Wish’ instead.

Ralph Ell:

I was angry. ‘Sex Wish’ turned out terrible, and Lenny blamed me. He said people weren’t interested in comedy, and our films needed to be weirder. Weird? I didn’t know what he meant, but I was about to find out.

Bill Bukowski:

With hindsight, ‘Sex Wish’ was a turning point for the Freaky Gang. The only good parts in it were when Zeb was on screen. Everyone could see that. So Lenny decided he wanted more of Zeb, and less of everyone else.

Bill Bukowski

Ralph Ell:

Lenny started giving Zebedy directing jobs. I got real mad because Zebedy didn’t know how to direct. He was horrible. It was a kick in the ass to the rest of us. Have you seen any of his films? What’d you think of them? Zebedy was ok at making gay films maybe, but not the type of films we were making. I wanted comedy; Zeb wanted degradation and abuse.

I complained about him, but Lenny just responded by offering me fewer director jobs, and I started feeling cut out. I still worked on the productions, but it was mainly in support roles after that.

Chuck Smith:

Zebedy was an auteur, in that he did everything – from directing, writing, starring, casting, location managing, and he even edited some of them too. Don’t believe what you see in the credits… Zeb did everything. I think he provided the costumes from his Broadway contacts too.

Bill Bukowski:

Zeb was damaged. I’ll just put that out there. One stagehand told me he’d heard Zeb had been abused by a concert pianist when he was a boy, and he hadn’t been right since. I don’t know what the deal was but you didn’t have to be a genius to know he had something wrong with him. And it came out in the plots of his films. They were a catalogue of damage.

Chuck Smith:

The funniest times were when Zebedy would present his next film to us all. He would stand in the center of the room, and describe the plot in great detail. Each time, it was stranger than the last. We just stared at each other in disbelief. Meanwhile, Lenny was laughing in the background (laughs), probably rubbing his hands in glee.

Ralph Ell:

(Zebedy) was wiry, dark, intense. And he was so serious as he described the themes of each film: “Incest. Masochism. Whipping!”

Bill Bukowski:

“Bloodshed. Revenge. Golden showers. Satanism. Violence.” My favorite was when he said, “Mental retardation,” with such an emphasis on each syllable (laughs). Or, “Genital torture!” (laughs).

Ralph Ell:

“Corpses. Cruelty. Rape!”

Chuck Smith:

Let’s see, I remember, “Necrophilia!”

Zebedy Colt

Annie Sprinkle:

At that time, we were emulating Hollywood and trying to make movies with plots and stories and characters… so rape was a hot fantasy as well as incest. We hadn’t yet had that feminist conversation about rape and incest and the harm of the reality of it. So it was a good conversation to have. I liked doing the rape scenes.

I liked rough sex at that time, and there’s a lot of energy in acting out a rape scene. There’s an element of danger because you might hit each other wrong or something. So energetically, it was pretty exciting.

Bill Bukowski:

Zebedy would get the actors that were part of our group to take part and engage in these weird fantasies of his. Annie and C.J. were in many of the films, as were Gloria (Leonard) and Terri (Hall).

I worried at times if he were asking too much: Terri had a mental breakdown once, and Annie was pretty shaken after one big orgy scene.

There were some strange people who he recruited too. One guy could twist his balls like a corkscrew. God knows why, but they hung down to his knees after that.

Annie Sprinkle:

I ended up doing it even though politically I realized maybe we have to (start to) shift gears – and be a little bit more conscious of what we’re putting out there. But that is the artist’s dilemma.

Ralph Ell:

And when Zebedy had another crazy script, we’d head out to shoot his strange movies. Lenny was getting us to shoot more films on location. I think he thought it would make the films look like they had bigger budgets. We shot many in Zebedy’s house in Lambertville, NJ and at Lenny’s place in upstate New York. We shot several films there – like, The Farmer’s Daughters (1976), Unwilling Lovers (1977), The Devil Inside Her (1977). The whole Freaky Gang would be there and it was like a company day out (laughs).

Chuck Smith:

I had more fun than usual on Zeb’s shoots. Believe it or not, he had more of an artistic sensibility than most people I worked with, and this often challenged me as I was the guy with the camera. It kept me on my toes.

That’s not to say his films weren’t weird sexually… they definitely were. His scripts were full of incestuous, abusive relationships. I don’t know much about his background, but there was something dark going on.

I recently re-watched ‘Unwilling Lovers’ (1977)… that’s creepy and nasty! It’s a ‘Psycho’-type plot, with Zebedy playing this strange man-child who lives in the woods with his mother, and kills women to experiment with their bodies. That’s not the product of normal mind!

Zebedy Colt

*

7.     Beyond X

Ras Kean:

One day, Ralph called and asked if I wanted to shoot a movie out in Jersey at Zebedy Colt’s house. I think it was The Affairs of Janice (1976). I was doing fewer sex films because I didn’t need the money as much anymore (laughs). But this time I said yes because I had a shipment that was due to arrive in a safe house near the shoot. I figured I could pick it up while in Jersey.

I explained the situation to Ralph, and he was cool. He offered to ship it all back to Manhattan in the trailer that he used for the film equipment.

Ralph Ell:

I was starting to care less about the actual films. I can’t even remember what my job was on that shoot.

Ras Kean:

Zebedy asked me to do a golden shower scene with Annie. I told him, nope. Been there, done that. I think Ralph told me later that they used some of the outtakes from when he filmed me and Annie for ‘Teenage Deviate’ (1976).

Tzipi:

I kept all the footage from the films we made in case we needed to use any of it a second time. And we did. Many times (laughs).

Ras Kean:

‘The Affairs of Janice’ was a strange experience. Here I was out in New Jersey in the middle of nowhere getting ready to pick up a consignment of drugs. I didn’t know the address of where the stuff was being dropped off, which meant that I had to keep calling my answering service back in Manhattan to pick up my messages. At the same time, I was the star of a sex film – which meant I was fucking C.J. Laing, who was Billy’s girlfriend… and he was the guy behind the camera filming us.

What can I say..? It didn’t seem to bother Billy.

Ras Kean and C.J. Laing, in ‘The Affairs of Janice’ (1976)

Ralph Ell:

Ras found a place in a big barn where we’d keep the drugs. Then Zeb, who knew nothing about what was going on, decided to shoot a scene right there…

Ras Kean:

We shot the film over a long weekend back-to-back with another – which may have been ‘Unwilling Lovers’, I’ve tried to find out ever since. Anyway, most of the actors were in both films. I was in almost every scene of ‘Janice’ so I pleaded with Zebedy to leave me out of the second film so I could get away to the safehouse and pick up the stuff.

Zebedy was taking so long over the shoot, I was freaking out. I had to get the stash up to Harlem or else I’d be in serious trouble. C.J. was acting crazy, Zebedy – always the narcissist – was acting as well as directing, and I was getting desperate.

Eventually the shoot finished and we set off home. I’d packed the drug hoard in Ralph’s trailer. We got halfway back to the city… when a cop pulled us over in North Plainfield. He looked in the trailer and found it all (laughs).

Ralph Ell:

I was driving the car with the trailer when we got pulled over and he discovered our cargo. We were all arrested… Ras, Tzipi, and another guy were with me.

Tzipi:

The arrest was especially scary for me. I still didn’t have any legal documentation or identification, so I was basically working illegally in the country. I could’ve been deported. The cops booked us into the county jail overnight, and released us after that clown, Lenny, bailed us out. But no one asked me for I.D. which was amazing.

Ras Kean:

We were lucky that this was just marijuana. The Council dealt mainly in heroin, and so it could’ve been much worse. But it was a pain in the ass being arrested. It wasn’t my first time, so it didn’t faze me. I felt bad for the others though. We all had to spend the night in jail before being released. It was Lenny who showed up and paid the bail. He wasn’t happy. The charges for the bust were eventually reduced, and we got away with paying a fine.

Ralph Ell:

The arrest was the last straw for me. With the mafia involvement, Lenny sidelining me in favor of Zebedy Colt, the ongoing risk of porn busts, and now the drug arrest, I felt it was getting too dangerous for my family. I could’ve stayed in films with Lenny for years because I was making a pretty good amount of money. In fact, at that time, I was making a lot of money. I must have made at least 100 films.

I told Lenny I was done, and he understood.

The only film I made after that was when I made a film with Chuck. Just me and him. I got somebody to back me financially, and I directed it and wrote it. I figured I was gonna sell it and make some money. We shot the film, and Chuck said he would edit it for me. Next thing I knew, he took off and disappeared to Florida and never gave me the film back. He robbed my film and cost me money. That got me into trouble with the finance guys.

Tzipi:

After the arrest, I decided that chapter was over for me. I wanted to do different things. I’d written a diary from the age of 13, and I wanted to start writing professionally. I went to Columbia University and NYU, and then became a translator.

I’ve had several books of my own published, and I still write to this day.

Ralph Ell:

A few weeks later, I got approached by a guy on the street who told me that he represented a group that had financed the movie I made with Chuck. They said I was in debt to them, and they wanted me to make some more X-rated films for them on my own.

I said “No”.

I didn’t want to be involved with those people. I had a lot of family and friends who were involved with that kind of person, and I didn’t want to be involved. I was surprised: they left me alone…

Bill Bukowski:

In between making porn and drug deliveries for Ras, I would fiddle around with the equipment in Lenny’s studio. There was no one else in town who had all this camera equipment, lighting, and editing decks that I could experiment with.

I was obsessed with creating a 3-D camera system. I researched the hell out of it and designed several prototypes. Chuck told me that he knew of a guy from the early sex film days who was doing the same thing, and that was Michael Findlay.

It was in 1975 that Michael and I started sharing our ideas. Michael was fascinating. He was a sweet-hearted, screwed-up nerd, damaged by the break-up of his marriage, so he poured his life into developing a 3-D camera prototype, which would later evolve into the Optimax III system. I loved that guy.

Through Mike I met with Stan Borden, the businessman who invested in Mike’s camera technology.

Ralph Ell:

After working for Lenny, I got a job at Miller Advertising.

It didn’t take long before everyone found out that I’d been making sex films but they didn’t care that much. They just said, “Ok, so what?”

Bill Bukowski:

In 1977, I picked up a newspaper and saw that Michael had been killed in a helicopter crash on top of the Pan Am building. It was tragic to see his life cut short – especially when he was so close to achieving his goal of a 3-D camera. After his funeral, Stan (Borden) contacted me and asked if I’d continue Mike’s work and prepare the camera for production.

I stopped my work with Lenny and completely dedicated myself to developing Michael’s ideas. His ideas were light years ahead of mine, so I had a lot to learn. I went back to school to learn everything I could about optics and pitched the concept to European film companies.

Bill Bukowski

Ras Kean:

The winter of 1977, I moved to D.C. and was taking some time off with my girlfriend spending most of our time on a boat. Coming from Gloucester, sailing was in my blood. Then I got a call from a Colombian who I’d known when I sold product in New York. He told me he was representing someone who had a large quantity of cocaine and marijuana that he wanted to bring into the U.S. They had a big boat for the operation – but they needed someone to take charge of the ship. Could I be the captain?

Bill Bukowski:

I got a call from Bobby/Ras. He wanted some help with his latest drug deal. There was some crazy story about a Colombian cartel. I was deep into the 3-D camera by that stage. I said no. I didn’t need any more crazy in my life. Those days were gone (laughs).

Ras Kean:

I took the cargo onboard, together with a crew of 22, and my girlfriend, and we set sail for Florida. When we came into American waters, it was obvious something wasn’t right. The Coast Guard had been tipped off and they were expecting us. The operation was aborted, and the boat was set on fire to destroy the evidence.

Well, that didn’t work – the cops took samples from the wreck to figure out what was going on.

I managed to escape with my girlfriend, and we were on the run for a few months. When they finally caught up with us, they’d already convicted my Colombian contact – and he was the person they really wanted. So we got off relatively lightly.

Ras Kean

Ralph Ell:

I started shooting commercials, making $150 a week, and everyone was surprised how good I was. They said, “Ralph, we didn’t think you were that smart!” But the reality was that I was just doing what I’d done in theater, or for Andy (Warhol), or for the sex films: it’s not being smart, it’s just knowing how to do it. Once you know how to do it, it’s easy. I was good at it.

Then three years later, I became the Broadcast Director and I was making $3,000 a week. I enjoyed it and made a good career for myself. I moved to Staten Island, raised a family, and never looked back – until you called me!

Ralph Ell and wife

Bill Bukowski:

In the fall of 1980, the 3-D system I developed, Optimax III, was used to shoot Comin’ At Ya! a 3-D spaghetti western. I’d worked with the director, Fernando Baldi, and he liked the idea so I went on location in Spain to oversee the use of the system.

Annie Sprinkle:

I never really felt like a big porn star until I did my one woman show ‘Post Porn Modernist’ (1983). The show really took off, I entered the art world and told people about my life in porn. By then, I had made a hundred something films and fifty loops so it seemed like a lot, but I never really felt like a big porn star until then.

Chuck Smith:

I worked for Lenny again in the 1980s – which was a disaster.

In true Kirtman style we were shooting a couple of films at the same time: The Erotic Adventures of Lolita (1982) and Coed Teasers (1983) with the same people on both movies. We were on location in the middle of the country in the Catskills in upstate New York. Ron Jeremy was there. Most of the cast and crew were staying in a big house, but one night some of the actors went into the nearby town, and they had too much to drink. They raised some hell, and told the locals about the porn film that we were making. Before you know it, the police turn up and arrest Leonard and some of the others, and throw them all in jail overnight.

There were articles about our bust in the newspapers – including Screw magazine. It was another sign that the industry was still an underground business.

Annie Sprinkle:

Leonard had a bad reputation because he often insisted on doing the stand-inserts, but I liked him a lot and I think overall his heart was in a good place.

I ran into him years later. He’d become a much more enlightened person and had joined the Human Awareness Potential, HAI. He’d done these male-female relationship workshops and had found himself and matured. He apologized to me. He said, “Gosh, I’m sorry if I ever didn’t treat you with the utmost respect. I didn’t respect myself then.”

I said, “Leonard, you didn’t do anything wrong.”

Ralph Ell:

Occasionally I missed not having pursued an acting career. That was my first love. I even signed up with an agent for a time. But then I taught acting to kids and I did a lot of kids plays. My daughter was in my plays – as was the whole neighborhood. I enjoyed it and I liked working with kids. Kids are so much easier than adults.

But you want to know something? The people in porn were like kids. I mean, they were all kids looking for somebody to hug them.

Ralph Ell, in filmed interview by The Rialto Report

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With thanks to the people who contributed to this article, including many who have since passed away:

Ernest ‘Turk’ Turpin died in 1988.

Zebedy Colt died in 2004.

Bill Bukowski died in 2006.

Ras Kean died in 2015.

Chuck Smith died in 2017.

Sonny Landham died in 2017.

Ralph Ell died in 2020.

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