Candida Royalle Interviewed By Mikal Saint George Photographed By Evan Sung
Candida Royalle

Let me get this up front and out in the open right now. I LOVE Candida Royalle! A living legend in the adult entertainment industry, she proudly boasts “I got into adult films to support my art habit!” Her candor and wealth of experience comes across as both comforting and enticing. She is the type of person you want to confide in, share a joke with and buy a drink for. Oh yeah, and she is as beautiful as ever. As a gay man, this is the kind of assignment my straight-guy friends eat their hearts out over!

I had the opportunity to sit down with her over pineapple juice and club soda after her recent book signing at the Museum of Sex. Her book HOW TO TELL A NAKED MAN WHAT TO DO: Sex Advice from a Woman Who Knows (Fireside Books / Simon & Schuster, $20.00) is more than just another how-to sex tome geared toward the perpetually timid and frequently frustrated.

It is in fact filled with juicy advice and scintillating scenarios that have been culled from more than two decades in front of the camera, behind the camera and every position in between. (Note: it is nearly impossible to write a piece like this and totally avoid double entendres and seemingly lame witticisms without sounding like a report on proper upholstery techniques. Bear with me.) But if you are looking for a “dirty” book disguised in a plain brown wrapper of research, look elsewhere. Royalle was a sexual explorer when the term, not to mention the very concept was still largely relegated to clinicians and hushed “scientific” studies of “nymphomaniacs” and chronic “self-abusers.” Or even worse, free-lovin’ hippies.

As a result, Candida in many ways became a prototypical feminist, in charge of her own emotional sobriety and sexual independence. She made history with the founding of Femme Films, her adult entertainment production company that is now known worldwide, focusing on erotica from a woman’s standpoint and geared for the mutual pleasure of couples. No small feat in an industry then completely dominated by men in every respect.

My first question of course was the most obvious - why this book and why now? It turns out that the seed for How to Tell a Naked Man What to Do was planted a few years ago when she wanted to address the topics of guilt and shame that plague so many women. This evolved into empowering women (and men!) to feel comfortable exploring their own desires and expressing them to their partners.

“There was a time in my own life,” she recounts, “when I was with someone I really liked a lot but when we finally made love, it just didn’t work. So I was telling a girlfriend that I didn’t think it would work even though he was really great and wonderful. And she said ‘well, just tell him, talk to him about it!’ It seemed so simple and obvious! I wanted to get that message out to others.”

If you are surprised that Candida Royalle would be uncomfortable talking about what she wanted sexually, you can only imagine how surprised Candida herself was! “I thought, oh my God, if this is difficult for me, imagine what it must be like for other women.”

I myself find this fascinating. I have to wonder if this is a result of the way girls are raised - to be “ladylike" and avoid outward signs of aggressiveness. Boys on the other hand, are reared to take what they want and take no prisoners. “Absolutely!” responds Candida. “I think it goes back to the good girl / bad girl myth - especially in the American culture. Girls get all these mixed messages that they are supposed to go out in the world and look very alluring and sexually desirable and yet you don’t want guys to think you have too much experience.”

She goes on to relate an anecdote about a man she was dating who declared his desire to marry, but not to a woman with too much sexual experience. Why he would choose to share that particular story, in those particular words with Ms. Royalle momentarily flabbergasts me. “But,” she points out “those are the kind of mixed messages that are constantly put out there - and this kind of thinking has become so entrenched in our culture that it holds many women back.”

There is absolutely no male bashing on Candida’s part, a trap that could be easy to fall in to. When asked if men find strong women (emotionally, mentally, sexually) to be intimidating she is quick to disagree. In fact, she sees many men as coming a long way from that mode of thinking and acknowledges that as each gender evolves, both will reap benefits.

“The other part of the writing of this book was that we can’t expect men to read our minds and magically know what we want! It is so much more satisfying when two people enter a relationship knowing what it is they like and want and feeling safe enough to discuss it.” She concedes that spontaneity and exploration is fun - but a little knowledge beforehand goes a long way. No arguments here.

I want to make it clear that although this book has a female demographic in mind, men have a great deal to glean from it as well. I would have to believe that many of the women who read this book would LOVE for the men in their lives to read it as well. With the male neurological affinity for how- to manuals, this book definitely has cross-over appeal. Candida backs me up when she tells me how many men have come to her and said “I really learned a lot from this!” She is quick to acknowledge the amount of social pressure for men to “perform” and “know exactly what they are doing.”

Switching gears, I decide to talk about Femme Productions. Much to my surprise she is taken aback when I refer to her as a maverick. “I like that, but explain what you mean.” Uh-oh, have I chosen the wrong adjective? No, I explain that as a woman in an industry that, especially at the time, has been completely defined by men she decided to take it on, build a company and create a whole niche market that no one even thought could exist. “I have been called a pioneer but I like maverick even better!”

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