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Sasha Grey

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Sasha Grey
Sasha Grey attending the AVN Awards Show at the Palms Casino Resort, Las Vegas, Nevada on January 9, 2010
Born
Marina Ann Hantzis[1]

(1988-03-14) March 14, 1988 (age 36)
North Highlands, California, U.S.
Height5 ft 6 in (1.68 m)[2]
Websitehttp://www.sashagrey.com/

Sasha Grey (born Marina Ann Hantzis on March 14, 1988) is an American pornographic actress who is also active outside pornography through mainstream acting, modeling and music.[4][5]

After growing up in North Highlands, California, Grey moved to Los Angeles and began appearing in pornographic films shortly after turning 18. Grey was featured in a 2006 issue of Los Angeles. She won several AVN Awards in 2007 and 2008, and 2010. During the same period, Grey began modeling and was cast in Steven Soderbergh's non-pornographic feature film The Girlfriend Experience. Grey also recorded an industrial music project, aTelecine.[6][5]

Early life

Grey was born[1] and raised in North Highlands, California to a working class family.[7] Her mother worked for the state of California and her father is a Greek-American mechanic.[7]. Her parents divorced when she was 5 and subsequently she was raised by her mother, who remarried in 2000.[8][7] Grey states that she felt miserable at home around her stepfather, and as a result at 16, informed her mother she was going to move out. It is unclear as to whether or not she in fact left the home.[7] She's stated that while her parents don't like everything she does, they get along.[9]

Grey attended four high schools, among them Highlands High, before graduating, having been unhappy in each one[7], though it should be noted she graduated a year early, at 17.[10] In autumn 2005, she attended junior college and took classes in film, dance, and acting.[7]

She waited tables at a steakhouse through March 2006 and saved $7,000 for a move to Los Angeles.[7]

Career

Adult films

In May 2006 Grey moved to Los Angeles and started her career in adult films just after turning 18.[7] Originally she toyed with the name Anna Karina,[7] taken after the French New Wave actress, before deciding on her present name. The name "Sasha" was taken from Sascha Konietzko of the band KMFDM,[11] and "Grey" represents Oscar Wilde’s novel The Picture of Dorian Gray[12] and the Kinsey scale of sexuality.[2] Her first scene was an orgy with Rocco Siffredi for The Fashionistas 2 by John Stagliano. Nearly six months after entering the adult industry, Grey was featured in the November 2006 edition of Los Angeles where she was flagged as a potential major star, perhaps the next Jenna Jameson.[7]

Less than a year after entering the industry, in January 2007, Grey was the recipient of awards for "Best Three Way Sex Scene" and "Best Group Scene" at the AVN Adult Movie Awards.[13] She was also nominated as "Best New Starlet", but lost to Naomi.[13] Grey was named Pet of The Month for July 2007[14] and was photographed by fashion photographer Terry Richardson.[15] In 2008, she became the youngest person to win the AVN "Female Performer of the Year" award.[16] as well as "Best Oral Sex Scene" for a scene.[17]

In December 2006, Grey was interviewed on the syndicated entertainment industry news show The Insider. In February 2007, she appeared on The Tyra Banks Show, discussing teenagers in the sex industry. There was speculation that the show was heavily manipulated through editing, and did not include her defense of pornography as a career choice. The show was also criticized for twisting Grey's depiction to increase its dramatic value.[18][19] Grey was profiled in the Rolling Stone "Hot Issue" for the December 2008 edition.[20]

Grey represents herself in the adult industry through her own agency, L.A. Factory Girls[21] Grey has indicated particular appreciation for the work of Andrew Blake and Kimberly Kane.[22]

A. O. Scott of The New York Times described her pornographic career as "distinguished both by the extremity of what she is willing to do and an unusual degree of intellectual seriousness about doing it."[23]

Modeling

In addition to pornography, Grey also models.

Grey was featured in the artwork for The Smashing Pumpkins 2007 album Zeitgeist,[24] and appears in their music video for "Superchrist". Grey was also featured in the music video for the song "Birthday Girl"[25] by The Roots.

She has modeled for French fashion designer Max Azria's ready to wear line Manoukian,[26][27] Italian footwear brand Forfex for an international campaign,[28] and American Apparel. She's modeled for Richard Kern as a part of Vice magazine's anti-fashion layout, and appeared in a three-part VBS program, "Shot by Kern".[29] She also appeared in Taschen’s 25th anniversary reprint of Terry Richardson’s Terryworld.[30] Among other collaborations with Richardson, she has also appeared in Wives, Wheels, Weapons, a companion book to James Frey's Bright Shiny Morning. She has also modeled for artists James Jean, Frédéric Poincelet,[31] Zak Smith.[32] and David Choe.[33]

In January 2010, Grey appeared nude in an ad campaign for PETA advocating animal birth control.[34]

Acting

Grey appeared in an episode of James Gunn's PG Porn with James Gunn,[35] as well as a cameo role[36] in Dick Rude's independent film Quit, and stars in [37] the 2009 Canadian low-budget black comedy/horror film Smash Cut from the Ottawa-based Odessa/Zed Filmworks. She plays a TV news personality who goes undercover as an actress in a horror film production, only to discover her older sister's murderer.

In March 2010, Grey was cast as an anti-sex Christian in the horror film Hallows, directed by Richard O'Sullivan.[38]

Grey was cast for the seventh season of the HBO show Entourage, where she played a fictionalized version of herself. Her character was Vincent Chase's new girlfriend in a multi-episode arc.[39]

The Girlfriend Experience

Grey played the lead role, "Chelsea", in Academy Award-winning director Steven Soderbergh's film The Girlfriend Experience.[40][41] Soderbergh cast her after reading an article profiling her in Los Angeles magazine, commenting that "She's kind of a new breed, I think. She doesn't really fit the typical mold of someone who goes into the adult film business. ... I'd never heard anybody talk about the business the way that she talked about it."[42] Journalist Scott Macaulay indicates that her casting was probably also prompted by Grey's interest in a variety of independent and art film directors, particularly Jean-Luc Godard, but also Harmony Korine, David Gordon Green, Michelangelo Antonioni, Agnès Varda, and William Klein.[43]

In having Grey prepare for her role in The Girlfriend Experience, Soderbergh asked her to watch Godard's Vivre sa vie and Pierrot le fou.[44] Vivre sa vie concerns prostitution, while the relationship portrayed in Pierrot le fou was suggested as a model for the dynamic between Chelsea and her boyfriend and clients.[22] Grey and Soderbergh also interviewed two escorts, and borrowed character traits and behavior from them.[22] Grey indicated that she played the character partly as embodying the assumptions projected onto her; while Grey describes herself as very self-conscious and introspective regarding her sexual choices, Chelsea is controlled mainly by her own vanity.[22]

Critics had mixed assessments of Grey's performance. J. Hoberman of The Village Voice writes:

Are we watching an authentic scarred monster playing the part of a cute little chippie—or is it vice versa? (Imagine one performer embodying both the Marlon Brando and Maria Schneider roles in Last Tango in Paris.) Grey isn’t the first porn actress to go straight, but she may be the first to allegorize her own situation—projecting an on-screen self-confidence that’s indistinguishable from pathos.[45]

Roger Ebert of Chicago Sun-Times commented on Grey's portrayal of Chelsea:

"Once she allows her mask to slip: a surprising moment when she reveals what she may feel. Grey perfectly conveys both her hope and her disappointment, keeping both within boundaries." [46]

Conversely, Moira Macdonald of The Seattle Times writes:

How do you tell the difference between an unskilled actor's flat performance and a skilled actor's realistic performance of an utterly flat character? It can be tricky, but if the question gets raised, the acting's probably to blame.[47]

David Denby of The New Yorker expressed a similarly dim view of Grey's acting abilities, calling The Girlfriend Experience "inert" because "Sasha Grey was so wrapped in egotism that she forgot to give a performance."[48]

In April 2009 while doing press for The Girlfriend Experience, she visited Brandeis University for an interview with Los Angeles Times blogger Scott Feinberg followed by a Q&A with 300 students.[49]

Music

In 2008, Grey began an industrial music collaboration, called aTelecine, with Pablo St. Francis.[5] Their first EP, AVigillant Carpark, was released by New York label Pendu Sound in 7 inch vinyl only.[6] She also contributed vocals to the Current 93 album Aleph at Hallucinatory Mountain.[50] Narnack Records lists her as a guest artist on Repentance, the 54th studio album by Grammy-winning reggae icon Lee "Scratch" Perry, though Perry himself has denied her involvement.[51]

Personal life

Since 2006, she has been developing an autobiographical documentary, illustrating her experiences from the age of 18 to 21.[52]

She was reported in a Rolling Stone interview in 2009 as being engaged to filmmaker Ian Cinnamon.[8]

In February 2010, Grey stated that she supported animal birth control in a PETA interview.[53]

Partial filmography

Year Film Role Notes
2007 Homo Erectus Cavegirl
2008 Pirates II: Stagnetti's Revenge Maria
2009 The Girlfriend Experience Chelsea/ Christine Brown
2009 James Gunn's PG Porn Tricia Scrotey 1 episode of web series
2009 Smash Cut April Carson
2009 9to5 – Days in Porn Herself Documentary about the porn industry
2010 Quit Mini Mart Clerk #2
2010 The Girl from the Naked Eye Lena Post-production
2010 Entourage Fictionalized version of Herself season 7

Awards

  • 2007 AVN Award for Best Three-Way Sex Scene – Fuck Slaves (with Sandra Romain and Manuel Ferrara)[13]
  • 2007 AVN Award for Best Group Sex Scene (Video) – Fashionistas Safado: The Challenge[13]
  • 2007 XRCO Award for Best New Starlet[54]
  • 2007 Adultcon Top 20 Adult Actresses[55]
  • 2008 AVN Award for Best Oral Sex Scene, Video – Babysitters[56]
  • 2008 AVN Award for Female Performer of the Year[56]
  • 2008 XRCO Award for Female Performer of the Year[57]
  • 2009 XRCO Award for Mainstream Adult Favorite[58]
  • 2009 Genesis Number One Pornstar of The Year[59]
  • 2010 AVN Award for Best Anal Sex Scene – Anal Cavity Search 6[60]
  • 2010 AVN Award for Best Oral Sex Scene – Throat: A Cautionary Tale[60]
  • 2010 AVN Award for The Jenna Jameson Crossover Star of the Year[60]
  • 2010 XBIZ Award for Crossover Star of the Year[61]
  • 2010 XRCO Award for Mainstream Adult Media Favorite[62]
  • 2010 F.A.M.E. Award – Favorite Oral Starlet[63]

Notes

  1. ^ a b Lee, Chris (2009-05-21). "Porn star Sasha Grey gets a mainstream role". www.latimes.com.
  2. ^ a b c "Adult VOD — Porn Video on Demand". vod.adultemart.com. 2008-01-13. Retrieved 2010-04-18.
  3. ^ "sasha grey — internet adult film database". iafd.com. Retrieved 2010-04-18.
  4. ^ "The Roots: New videos on the way".
  5. ^ a b c "Review ATelecine". Re-gen Magazine.
  6. ^ a b "aTelecine (ft. Sasha Grey) « Pendu Sound Recordings". Pendusound.com. Retrieved 2010-04-19.
  7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Dave Gardetta (2006-11-01). "The teenager & the porn star: will 18-year-old Sasha Grey become the adult film industry's next Jenna Jameson?". Los Angeles Magazine. Retrieved 2007-03-30.
  8. ^ a b Vanessa Grigoriadis (2009-05-14). "The Dirtiest Girl in Porn" (PDF). Rolling Stone. Archived from the original on 2009-05-14. Retrieved 2010-09-29.
  9. ^ Eric Alt (2010-05-05). "Exclusive: Actress Sasha Grey Works "9 To 5: Days in Porn"". Maxim. Retrieved 2010-05-05.
  10. ^ "Sasha Grey Talks". flavorwire.com. Retrieved 2009-05-22.
  11. ^ "Sasha Grey at Adult VOD". Vod.adultemart.com. 2008-01-13. Retrieved 2010-04-18.
  12. ^ "Sasha Grey: Your New Girlfriend — BlackBook". Blackbookmag.com. 2008-10-17. Retrieved 2010-04-18.
  13. ^ a b c d "Past AVN Winners". AVN. Retrieved 2009-08-03.[dead link]
  14. ^ Peter Warren (2007-07-03). "Sasha Grey Crowned Penthouse Pet of the Month". AVN. Retrieved 2007-10-07.
  15. ^ "Memo Pad: Really It's Art... Picture This... Its Always L.A.'s Fault..." Women's Wear Daily. WWD.com. 2007-06-07. Retrieved 2009-03-08.
  16. ^ "Sasha Grey is a Star and not a Crossover Star". blueblood.net. 2008-10-23. Retrieved 2010-04-18.
  17. ^ "AVN Award Winners For 2010". Avnawards.com. Retrieved 2010-04-18.
  18. ^ Peter Warren (2007-02-09). "Commentary: Sasha Grey Goes on 'The Tyra Banks Show'". Adult Video News. Retrieved 2009-05-03.
  19. ^ Peter Warren (2006-11-17). "Sasha Grey to Appear on 'Tyra Banks Show'". Adult Video News. Retrieved 2009-05-03.
  20. ^ COED Staff. "The Girls of Rolling Stone's Hot List 2008 publisher=CoEd". {{cite web}}: Missing pipe in: |title= (help)
  21. ^ Mike Albo (2008-03-14). "Sasha Grey Set to Open LA Factory Girls Agency". AVN. Retrieved 2008-11-11.
  22. ^ a b c d Scott Macaulay, "Stimulus Package", Filmmaker, Spring 2009, vol. 17, #3, p. 50
  23. ^ Scott, A.O. (2009-05-22). "Movie Review: The Girlfriend Experience". New York Times. Retrieved 25 September 2010.
  24. ^ Ray (2007-07-21). "Sasha Grey On Pumpkins' 'Zeitgeist'". Porn Valley News. Retrieved 2007-12-21.
  25. ^ "The Roots » Sasha Grey". Blogs.okayplayer.com. 2008-04-09. Retrieved 2010-04-18.
  26. ^ Lux Alptraum. "Sasha Grey, Fashion Model".
  27. ^ "BCBG Max Azria purchase of Manoukian a fact".
  28. ^ staff. "Sasha Grey, for Forfex ad campaign".
  29. ^ "Shot By Kern".
  30. ^ "Terryworld".
  31. ^ David Sullivan. "Sasha Grey Strikes New Poses".
  32. ^ Smith, Zak. Girls in the Naked Girl Business. The Saatchi Gallery. Access date: September 22, 2009.
  33. ^ Todd Konrad. "Sasha Grey:No Boundaries Left to Cross".
  34. ^ Lila Shapiro (2010-01-19). "Sasha Grey Nude PETA Ad Promoting Animal Birth Control". The Huffington Post. Retrieved 2010-01-20.
  35. ^ David Sullivan (2008-09-26). "James Gunn Casts XXX Stars in 'PG Porn'". AVN. Retrieved 2008-11-11.
  36. ^ Quit (2009)
  37. ^ "Smash Cut Casts Sasha Grey". The Movie Blog. 2008-05-14. Retrieved 2010-04-18.
  38. ^ "Richard O'Sullivan Talks More About Sasha Grey Trading Porn for Purity in 'Hallows'". Horrorsquad.com. 2010-03-16. Retrieved 2010-04-18.
  39. ^ "Entourage Casts Porn Star as Vince's New Love". tvguidemagazine.com. 2010-05-06. Retrieved 2010-05-13.
  40. ^ David Sullivan (2008-10-14). "Sasha Grey Stars in Steven Soderbergh Feature". AVN. Retrieved 2008-10-17.
  41. ^ Mike Flaherty (2008-10-15). "Porn star cast in Soderbergh film". Variety. Retrieved 2008-10-17.
  42. ^ Scott Macaulay, "Stimulus Package", Filmmaker, Spring 2009, vol. 17, #3, p. 49
  43. ^ Scott Macaulay, "Stimulus Package", Filmmaker, Spring 2009, vol. 17, #3, p. 46.
  44. ^ G. Allen Johnson (2009-05-21). "Q&A with Sasha Grey". San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved 2009-06-04.
  45. ^ J. Hoberman, "Soderbergh's Girlfriend Experience Porn-Star Is a True Character", Village Voice, April 28, 2009. Access date: April 29, 2009.
  46. ^ Roger Ebert, [1], Chicago Sun Times, May 20, 2009. Access date: May 20, 2009.
  47. ^ M. Macdonald, "'The Girlfriend Experience': Soderbergh's sketch of a movie", "Seattle Times", May 21, 2009. Access date: May 23, 2009.
  48. ^ D. Denby, "Young Romantics", "The New Yorker", September 21, 2009, at p. 98. Access date: September 21, 2009.
  49. ^ Max Pearlstein. "Star of Steven Soderbergh's New Film to Visit Campus On April 30". Brandeis University.
  50. ^ "Current 93 - Aleph At Hallucinatory Mountain". Durtro.greedbag.com. 2009-05-18. Retrieved 2010-04-18.
  51. ^ "Dub Legend Lee "Scratch" Perry Sets the Record (Kind of) Straight". Flavorwire.com. 2009-02-18. Retrieved 2010-06-27.
  52. ^ Peter Warren (2007-02-18). "Sasha Grey Speaks to UCLA Production Class". AVN. Retrieved 2007-03-30.
  53. ^ "Sasha Grey Promotes Animal Birth Control". Action.peta.org.uk. Retrieved 2010-04-18.
  54. ^ Tod Hunter (2007-04-06). "Hillary Scott Big Winner at XRCO Awards". XBIZ. Retrieved 2007-10-07.
  55. ^ "Adultcon Names Top 20 Adult Actresses Honor Roll". XBiz. 2007-12-27. Retrieved 2008-01-01.
  56. ^ a b Jared Rutter (2008-01-12). "2008 AVN Awards Winners Announced". AVN. Retrieved 2008-01-14.
  57. ^ "XRCO Announceds 2008 Award Winners". Adult Video News. 2008-05-01. Retrieved 2009-04-17.
  58. ^ "2009 XRCO Award Winners Announced". Adult Video News. 2009-04-17. Retrieved 2009-04-17.
  59. ^ "Genesis Unveils 11th Annual Hot 100". Adult Video News. 2009-10-20. Retrieved 2009-10-20.
  60. ^ a b c "2010 AVN Award Winners Announced". AVN.com. 2010-01-10. Retrieved 2010-01-10.
  61. ^ Lyla Katz (2010-02-11). "XBIZ Awards 2010 Winners Announced". XBiz.com. Retrieved 2010-02-23.
  62. ^ "2010 XRCO Award Winners Announced". AVN.com. 2010-04-30. Retrieved 2010-04-30.
  63. ^ "The F.A.M.E. Awards Reveals 2010 Winners". AVN.com. 2010-07-10. Retrieved 2010-07-11.

Interviews

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