Porn stars embody the sexual ideals of gay men. It is the porn star’s sexual performance that is the portal through which viewers engage with a pornographic movie. Director Fred Halsted considered hardcore porn a performer’s medium—as well as the cameraman’s. Halsted was in all senses a pornographer, but more an experimentalist who went on to make ambitious and experimental films that included some of the first visual examples of fisting and would garner critical acclaim for his work during his lifetime.
L.A. Plays itself, his initial film is his grand opus. Although the film is not considered a masterpiece in any conventional way, it is beloved but Halsted fans and art critics and broke new ground while it the groundwork was being laid down in gay erotic cinema.
Whenever you think of Fred Halsted from this moment on, you will come to associate him with Joey Yale. Yale’s iconic appearance in L.A. Plays Itself as a fisting bottom would begin a friendship, partnership and tumultuous relationship with Halsted that would tie them together forever in history. On this episode we celebrate Fred Halsted, His film L.A. Plays Itself and Joey Yale.
