I started a thread some time ago about how you could have/define sexual harassment in a porn film – I don’t think there was any response.
It would seem perfectly logical for a director to demand a blow job during an audition for porn roles. How could porn stars NOT sleep their way to the top – yeah, yeah, I know it’s not about sleeping. 
I believe Sharon Stone once said: “You can only sleep your way to the middle.”
I wish Eve was around.
OK -
Hubby had worked for a Model and Talent agency for a while. He would come home and tell stories about prospective models and actresses (and sometimes, their mothers, if the girl was THAT much underage) that would be willing to trade sexual favors in return for, at least, a test. Hubby would show them to the door immediately (or, so he said - LOL!!) because, in his opinion, if you really needed to resort to that, you didn’t have “what it takes” - unless they could handle every viewer of their work.
Yes, it (according to him) happens all the time. His ex-wife (a popular actress) refused roles because of that requirement in her early days. She found a good (and prestigious) agent, and that “requirement” never reappeared. It turns out, that there are still some people in the industry who favor talent over other things.
Olive
But, are there any equivalent rules/policies in the Screen Actors’ Guild?
Let’s not kid ourselves. For every producer who’s willing to give a starlet a part for blowing him, there’s a starlet who’s willing to blow a producer for a part. The rules you outline might stop casting couch situations if they were universally followed, but there are going to be people on both sides who are willing to sneak around them.
Well, Heather Graham has a career, doesn’t she?
It’s ALL talent, it’s just of a different form.
Wasn’t her part in Bowfinger supposed to be based on Anne Heshe’s actual behaviour?
I read the biography of Don Simpson. Remember him of ‘Simpson/Bruckheimer’ movies? “Top Gun, An Officer and a Gentleman, Flashdance”
Anyway, they pointed said that in today’s Hollywood, producers don’t hand out parts to those that sleep with them.
Why?
Because you can easily get a top level prostitute. One that enjoys sex, knows what she is doing, and she won’t be revolted by any request you make of her. Whereas Sweet Sally Blue-Eyes just off the bus from Kansas will sue you.
Now somethings would be considered sexual harassment.
Like telling Debra Wringer that he didn’t want her for Officer because he didn’t see her as “Fuck-able”. Discussing how “Fuck-able” the female star of the movie was, and probably still is, an integral part of the movie making process.
Is there a casting couch scene in Entourage? I haven’t seen the whole series, but I’ve seen enough to know that if casting couches were still common there’s no way they wouldn’t reference it somehow.
Why, the United States of Suck My Dick, of course.
Did Don Simpson really say that about Debra Winger? If so, not only was he a sleazy creep whose only contribution to the world was a producing putrid crop of brain-dead (but, sadly, successful) movies but he was an idiot too.
if so, he is definately a idiot
Yep.
He also hated the song “Love lifts us up where we belong” but got over-ridden on that as well. Personally I agree with him on both counts but then again I hate the entire movie.
My favorite story was when they were casting Flashdance, they (Don and then Paramount head Michael “Disney” Eisner) showed photos of three actresses up for the role to average guys working on the lot and asked them which girl they most wanted to fuck. That is how Jennifer Beals got the part over Demi Moore and some other woman.
The point though, discussing, with an actress, her ‘fuck-ability’ may be considered sexual harrassment.
In the late 70’ and 80’s my Bro worked “in the business” in Hollywood, and I helped out. New “girls” trying to get a part fairly commonly offered oral sex. A hooker once offered my Bro a BJ for $20, and he laughed and told her that he “could get all the blow jobs he wanted from models and wanna-be starlets.” I got a few also.
Now, that was 20 years or more ago. I have my doubts if today it is anywhere near that common, but I also doubt if it has gone away entirely.
Oddly, note I said “oral sex”; my Bro said actual intercourse was very rare, and I never had such an offer myself.
Thank you both soooo much for the scintillating image of “gray cum,” which will henceforth cling like some unholy mucus membrane over my filmgoer’s eye.
Possible explanation: Winger is Jewish, and Jewish actresses have historically been taboo as love interests in Hollywood.
Yes, if you count this. Just last season on of the financiers offered to pony up the money for Medellin only if Vinnie would do his wife.
And Ari has referred to all the “offers” he gets from starlets.
FWIW, I once saw an interview with Ginger Lynn where she said that she never encountered any casting couch problems until she left porn and was trying to get into “legitimate” roles.