March 21, 2006 | Celeb Watch

Celeb porn explosion

Once upon a time, way back in 1997, Pamela Anderson and husband Tommy Lee filmed themselves having sex. The couple's videotaped sexcapade didn't stay at home for Pam and Tommy's private viewing, however. Somehow it found its way to computer screens around the world, inciting a public fascination with amateur celebrity porn.

That fascination exploded in 2004 with the Paris Hilton sex tape and has expanded further with the surfacing recently of tapes featuring rockers Kid Rock and Scott Stapp, as well as Irish actor Colin Farrell. And as The New York Times points out in a recent backgrounder on the subject, celebrity porn is only getting hotter.

The proof is in the numbers. According to The Times, Red Light District, the company behind Hilton's "1 Night in Paris", has sold more than 600,000 copies of the tape. The company currently is trying to win a legal battle for rights to distribute a tape featuring Rock and Stapp receiving oral sex on tour together in 1999; if it wins, it says it can sell as many as 400,000 copies.

The popularity of celebrity sex today stands in dark contrast to 20 years ago, the Times reports, when actor Rob Lowe filmed himself having sex with two women, one of them a minor. While that tape ruined Lowe, today's accidental porn stars, including Anderson, Hilton and former pro wrestler Chyna Doll, seem to benefit from a sex-inspired career jolt.

"The huge difference between nearly 20 years ago and now is that pornography is more easily available, therefore there is far less of a stigma attached to it," Joe Levy, executive editor of Rolling Stone, told the Times.

Still, while the popularity of celebrity porn soars, its legality remains murky at best. The Rock/Stapp tape currently is held up in court over arguments about ownership -- Red Light argues that the copyright lies with the third party that filmed it, not with the rockstars who starred in it -- as is a tape featuring Farrell and former Playboy Playmate Nicole Narain, who hopes to distribute it for profit.

What's next on the rack of celebrity skin flicks? Red Light says it is pursuing a tape featuring an unnamed female musician. Of course, we have a wish list of our own: Our fingers are crossed for amateur tapes from a raft of celebrity hotties that make Kidd Rock and Scott Stapp look like - well - Kid Rock and Scott Stapp. 

• Sex, lawsuits and celebrities caught on tape [New York Times]
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