What's the first thing that you think of when you hear the word "fluffer"? Do you think of pillows? A pet cat? A sandwich made with marshmallow fluff? What about the person in charge of making sure that a porn star maintains their erection between takes? If you thought of the last one, you're on the right track. Life-partners and creative collaborators Richard Glatzer and Wash Westmoreland co-directed and wrote the movie The Fluffer ( First Run/TLA ) , which tells the story of gay-for-pay porn star Johnny Rebel ( Scott Gurney ) and Sean ( Michael Cunio ) , the man who becomes obsessed with him when the copy of Citizen Kane that he rents at his favorite video store turns out to be Citizen Cum. At turns funny and dramatic, if you enjoy The Fluffer, rest assured that Glatzer and Westmoreland's first film collaboration probably won't be their last.
Gregg Shapiro: Your movie, The Fluffer, opens with a quote about Narcissus from Ovid's Metamorphosis. How narcissistic does a person have to be to be working in the porn industry?
Wash Westmoreland: You don't have to be a narcissist to work in the porn industry. There are lots of different reasons for doing porn. I think our story centers on a gay-for-pay porn star who is a straight guy who does gay pornos for money. Ultimately, I think you see that it's not an issue of gender, whether he like's boys or girls. It's the issue that he gets turned on by the attention that is sent his way. He's really a complete narcissist and just wants to see his own reflection in other people's eyes. We meant it specifically about that character. We weren't making a generalization about all porn stars.
Richard Glatzer: It's interesting, too, for Johnny Rebel...and I do think this is true of some other porn stars...that they use the economic imperative as an excuse for gratifying narcissism. It's always, "It's about money. You don't make money in straight porn." But then, I think there is ultimately an element of narcissism for some people.
WW: They like being worshipped.
GS: And he's definitely worshipped in the movie. In addition to some newer performers, the cast of The Fluffer includes several familiar names and faces, such as Deborah Harry, Taylor Negron, Guinevere Turner and Robert Walden. Will you please say a few words about the casting process for The Fluffer?
RG: For us, we were an underdog project in Hollywood. Everything is ruled by agents and managers who want stars to do the safe sitcom rather than an independent movie called The Fluffer. What we found was that, in terms of leads, there were very few people, who were known in any way, who could fit the role or whose agents or managers would allow them to even consider it. We had to go and find completely new faces for our three leads. We were really excited about that. Then you find that there are character actors who are somehow liberated from that burden of being "the next big thing in Hollywood," who can do what they want to do ( laughs ) . We were gratified to get people who came in on their own, read for us, except for Debbie, for whom it was just a matter of sending her a script and having her say she loved it. They ( the supporting cast ) really supported the project and got it. We have this interesting thing where our supporting cast is really well known and our leads are completely new faces.
WW: We take pride in the fact, as well, that there are a lot of characters in the piece, but each one is very three-dimensional. That, I think, is the result of having a great cast.
GS: Did you have a specific actor, such as Scott Gurney, in mind for the role of Johnny Rebel when you were casting the part?
WW: It wasn't written for Scott. We were auditioning lots of Johnny Rebels, who came in off the street. Some people's interpretations of what this porn star should be are quite hilarious ( laughs ) . When Scott walked in, it was like electric in the room. He had this charisma and this kind of cocky attitude. He got the fun of the part. The part, as well as being very serious, there is also an element at the beginning when he is riding high and on top of the world. Scott really got that. He was Johnny Rebel ( laughs ) . As soon as he left the room, we were like, "That was Johnny Rebel. We just met him." He claimed the part for himself.
RG: Basically, almost every other actor saw the character as tragic, and the character never sees himself as tragic. You would feel this heaviness about everything...any scene you would give them to read, it was like, "Oh, how tragic that he's a porn-star." Scott was really one guy who had the looks and the one actor who got the idea that if you're at the top of that industry, you feel great about yourself. Even when he's falling, he thinks it's just a matter of time before he's back on top.
GS: It was cool to see actual porn industry people, such as Chi Chi LaRue and Ron Jeremy, in the movie as well.
WW: There were a lot of porn people in there. The industry really supported the making of this movie in tremendous ways. We actually used a porn office as our production office. We ran our film production from Men Of Odyssey productions ( laughs ) . I went into the porn industry to do research and actually started making adult features. In the process, I made a lot of friends and got to know a lot of the characters within the industry. When it came time to shoot the film, it seemed totally natural to bring these people on and have them in the movie. The movie came organically out of the porn industry.
GS: Is the character of Johnny Rebel based on a particular gay-for-pay porn actor or is he more of a composite?
WW: The character of Johnny Rebel is a type. When I first started working in the industry, I did a series of interviews with porn stars and I found that there was this gay-for-pay type who is really the universal hustler who is used to hanging around gay guys, but being the straight guys. They would give you a little bit of flirtation, the occasional wink, put their arm around you sometimes. But you're never going to get it. They kind of work that. That is what fed into the idea of a Johnny Rebel type. I think he's a classic type, not only in the Greek myth of Narcissus, but if you look at the writing of Tennessee Williams, he was really obsessed with that type. The sailor from the ship who would occasionally go down on a dark night. For gay people, the idea of a straight guy who will blur the boundaries of sexual identity is a very tantalizing one and it has obvious appeal.
GS: You have both worked, individually, as directors. What was it like to direct collaboratively on The Fluffer?
RG: Even though it was Wash's script and his idea, I was involved with the writing of it from the very beginning. He hadn't written a script before and I come to movie-making from a screenwriter background. I was the story editor of it. This goes back about six years ago. I really loved it and I loved the whole idea of the movie. We were working on it from the very beginning and it just seemed like the natural extension of the script to direct it together. It was this very organic process. Because it was Wash's terrain, I would take a back-seat if there was some decision about a detail in terms of the milieu. Although I have been around porn sets and have worked with him on movies. It never devolved into you, "You work with the DP on the camera work and I'll work with the actors," or anything like that. It was just a very organic process. We were completely on the same page as to how the movie should be. That's the way it worked out. We really enjoyed it. We'll do it again. ... We have two projects, right now, that we're working on getting financed. We wrote two scripts this summer. I took a vacation from film festival ( laughs ) and went off to write scripts. That was a mistake I made after Grief ( his first film ) , not having a next project ready. It's very important. The independent film world is a very demanding world where you've got to be constantly ready to go with your piece. We are now.
