Joel Someone was in London with his boyfriend, Marco Napoli. Marco had been booked to perform at the Hard On party that weekend. I took the opportunity to catch up with Joel for a coffee.
If they gave out porn awards for likeability, it’s hard to imagine anyone beating Joel Someone. Warm, engaging, generous, creative – Joel is a man with a big heart who likes a conversation.
He speaks in a rapid-fire style – expressing his thoughts quickly but thoughtfully. Getting easily distracted by the details of what we’re discussing, taking the conversation off on tangents.
“Big sex parties like Hard On aren’t really my thing…” explains Joel, as the waiter takes our order. “Obviously, it’s different if I’m performing, but sex for me is all about the connection. Marco loves it though – he loves putting on a show for people.”
On first impressions, Joel doesn’t fit the stereotypes of a gay porn star. He made the move into porn at the relatively late age of 30, although he’d already been escorting for a number of years before that. He describes the move into porn as something that he needed to do – wanting to break out of an increasingly hetero-normative path in life, he wanted to release the sexual energy that was building up inside him.
“When I tell people about what I do, I can feel them looking at me as if I’ve obviously made some bad choices…” laughs Joel. “But this is exactly what I want to be doing. I do this because I love it. I don’t have addiction issues. No one is taking advantage of me. This is the life I want.”
“Charged Media was the first studio to give me a chance – that’s who gave me my break…” explains Joel, when I ask him about the origin story of his Joel Someone character. Charged Media are the people behind the enormously successful MormonBoyz and Family Dick series. “I wanted to work with them. I pursued them because that’s what all of my escorting clients were watching – they weren’t just watching clips on PornHub or something, they were all fully paid-up subscribers. I was drawn to the storytelling aspect of their productions, the characters – as an actor, that really appealed to me.”
Intergenerational porn fantasies are obviously hugely popular. Even beyond the success of productions such as MormonBoyz and Family Dick, any analysis of gay porn search queries demonstrates that intergenerational fantasies are the go-to option for a lot of guys.
“When I’m on set, it excites me that I’m in character…” explains Joel. “I’m playing a Dad character, and I draw on a lot of cultural references to create that – I’m drawing on how fathers are portrayed in popular culture. At the heart of it though, I’m projecting my own Daddy/Son fantasies – I’m giving my scene partner the Dad sexual fantasy that I always wanted to experience when I was a kid.”
“Growing up – and I think this is common for a lot of young gay guys – I was looking for an initiator…” adds Joel. “Someone to initiate me into what being a gay guy was – someone to take that father-figure role in a sexual way, someone to teach me. These days, I’m constantly being hit up by young guys who are looking for advice, or who are thinking about giving porn a try. I never discourage anyone who wants to do porn, but the one piece of advice that I give is to do it sober.”
The last time that I caught up with Joel, I’d asked him about his ultimate porn fantasy, and he’d decided that filming a scene with twins was probably at the top of his list. He’s now fulfilled that, filming a scene with twins Jason and Justin Morgan for Treasure Island Media. I wondered if Joel had a new porn fantasy that he was working on.
“More twins!” laughed Joel. “I love the Morgan twins. To do porn, you’ve got to be a bit crazy – your boundaries are a bit different. Their relationship is intense and intimate – they’re best friends, and that’s really special.”
“Actually, I’d love to explore that concept of initiation a bit more…” Joel decides, as we continue to discuss porn scenarios that might fuel his fantasies. “It probably sounds a bit cultish, but taking that Dad/Son scenario to the next level – Dads who embrace the responsibility of teaching their sons about sex, initiating them into the world of men.”
Joel’s initiation scenarios brought to mind some of the elements of a tantric sex workshop, or even the traditions of Ancient Greece – a society in which intergenerational relationships were common, as men took boys into their homes to mentor them and teach them about the ways of the world.
“Another thing that I’d like to do is to make educational videos about sex…” added Joel. “Videos that take the taboo out of sex. Videos that parents could give to their kids. I remember watching a video about douching that Sean Storm had made. It was so helpful – I learnt so much! I’d like to make videos about how to take a big cock, what consent means, how to put on a condom during sex – all sorts of stuff. I really want to get creative with it.”
“Porn is great…” continues Joel. “But kids are not just learning sexual practices from porn, they’re also learning social practices. Getting gang-fucked by a room full of guys isn’t the only way to have sex, and I think it’s important that we help kids to understand that. It’s important that we initiate them into how to have sex as gay men.”
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