History of porn business in the UK?

[Sabine77]

Good evening folks,

for a university project I'm currently looking for a brief history of the adult entertainment business in the UK. When were the first explicit films shot? Were there any stars back in the 70s, 80s, 90s? Was there something like a golden age of UK porn, resembling the Boogie Nights era in the US? Has porn ever faced major legal trouble and political debate?

I'm VERY grateful about ANY kind of information, so if you have something - please help me out!

Cheers, Sabi

[Sabine77]

Been there, done that. Currently there are exactly 376 books from all over the world solely covering the topic of the US adult business, more than 1850 books briefly referring to its history, 5000+ articles and degree dissertations about everything from Deep Throat to the Bang Bros - and zero, 0, null, not a single one about the specific subject matter of porn in the UK.

Glad I'm entertaining you, but that's the reason I came here and asked. The UK business has not yet been covered by international historical science. Anything valuable to contribute?

[beutelwolf]

Regarding Reggie Perrin's comment/advice, there are some relevant books that would be of help, in particular by Simon Sheridan, and Doing Rude Things by David McGillivray. These are mostly focussing on softporn, but tell you a little bit about hardcore too.

I would say that there was not a golden age of porn as such in the UK, because of a lack of distribution channels. Private members clubs were one such channel but that would not suffice to sustain an industry.

Thus, in the 70s, porn would be either making hard export versions of softcore flicks (Come Play with me, The Sex Thief) or porn loops, and even those would be largely targeted for export, especially to Germany.

Stars? Not really. There were a few faces occurring repeatedly, but most remained anonymous. Tim Blackstone is a rare exception.

Censorship debate? Yes, but that was mostly about where the BBFC should draw the line. For example, there is an interview with John Trevelyan (then the head of the BBFC) in the Kronhausen movie Freiheit f?r die Liebe.

[andy at handiwork]

You must have a good public library where you are Reggie. Mine has nothing on the history of porn in it.

[BGAFD Admin]

[Sabine77]

Folks, that was EXTREMELY helpful - thanks for the books list and the names to look up, that'll get things going. With all the stuff I know about the US adult business, the British porn world is still a mystery to me.

Thanks again!

[Dave Wells]

I'm interviewed in Babylon Blue and although a bit deep (the book), it is acurate.

[number 6]

The golden age of brit porn was without doubt late 80s early 90s for me.

[lickalot]

You may wish to Google Lindsay Honey, Mike Freeman, Paula Meadows etc.

http://bgafd.co.uk/films/details.php/id/t0163 - ignore the review on this site, is a seminal work and you may find it worthwhile to look at the subsequent careers of the above three