filed under Interview | trackback link
Savanna Samson
By Peter Landau
New York City is known as the financial capital of the world; it’s the nation’s media hub and fashion center. But the Big Apple has nothing to do with the forbidden fruit of the mainstream porno business. That is until now.
When Los Angeles-based Vivid Entertainment signed Scores exotic dancer, budding porno starlet, and New York State native Savanna Samson to its roster of randy talent, the city so nice they named it twice got that much nicer.
Savanna proves that East Coast girls are just as hot to trot as the more notorious West Coast porn stars. Maybe even more so, considering this blonde bombshell’s nightlife antics documented on The Howard Stern Show and The New York Post’s celebrity scandal sheet, “Page Six”.
Taking a break before flying out to Las Vegas to host the annual AVN Awards Show, Savanna was also excited about her coming web site, UniversityofSavanna.com and her new Vivid picture, a super-effects triple-X that began production in February 2005 and is based on A Midsummer’s Night Dream. So take a trip into Savanna’s enchanted forest, but don’t bother keeping your serpent in your pants!
Hi, is this Susanna?
Um, who are you calling? This is Savanna.
I’m sorry, I’m a bit scatterbrained this evening.
I guess you don’t know who you’re doing an interview with. But that’s OK.
First, I wanted to congratulate you. You’re going to be hosting the AVN Awards this year.
Yes, I’m so excited about that. I think it’s a really important year for the industry, what with all that’s happened with the whole outbreak of HIV. I’m really proud to be representing the industry this year. Thank God 2004 is over. That’s all I can say [laughs]. But it’s been an important year. It’s made us stronger and brought us closer together and reminded us how important our health is.
What do you have in store for the awards show?
It’s going to be really fun because it’s the first time that a woman comedienne (Thea Vidale) is going to be co-hosting with me. We have so many funny surprises for everybody. We’ve been working quite closely, getting to know one another, so it’ll be very natural onstage, working off one another.
That sounds sexy. Well, it’s quite an honor hosting the awards. So where do you go from here?
I was excited to be asked, really surprised. My big movie [was] the remake of The Devil in Miss Jones, but that didn’t come out this year. I played Miss Jones and Jenna Jameson played Miss Devin, the devil. I just figured, this isn’t my year, so I won’t be nominated for anything, but I’ll get to be onstage and, of course, I love being onstage [laughs]. But then I got eight nominations this year, which I didn’t expect at all. One including Best Actress for my film Bare Stage, female performer of the year, and I got three categories for girl-girl scenes, one with Jenna in The Masseuse, one with Lezlie Zen in Bare Stage, and one with Tera Patrick in Tera Tera Tera. And also, Best Couple scene and what else . . . ?
And you’re a winner from last year.
Last year I won Best Actress in Film, which was really exciting, and also Best Group Sex Scene. Oh, yeah, Best Threeway I’m up for too this year. When the nominations came out I was really so happy. I didn’t expect it at all. Though I did put a lot into the movie Bare Stage, because I had to use a Southern accent. It was all shot like a play, in sequence, and it was at a Shakespearean theater, which was like heaven for me to be onstage performing. So I did put a lot into it. I shouldn’t have been surprised at being nominated. But I was happy in any case.
Let’s go back a bit. How does a good girl from upstate New York become the hottest rising star in porno? Is it true you had your first onscreen sex with Rocco Siffredi?
Yes. I didn’t intend on having a career, I got turned on by the idea of porn. You know, I worked at Scores. I’m surrounded by people with such open minds, I got turned on to Rocco Siffredi. Watching him I didn’t know whether to be really turned on or really disgusted [laughs].
That’s a normal reaction.
I think what turned me on most about him was his voice and the way he’d get the girls to do anything, usually the part leading up to the sex, when he’s flirting with the girl. I ended up writing a letter to him. I mean, I had no intention of being a porn star. He doesn’t believe this, but at the time I just had this fantasy and figured it would be safe. I could go to Europe, make this one movie, get it out of my system. I wasn’t planning on a career.
But then the movie that I made with him, it’s called Rocco Meets an American Angel in Paris, got nominated for Best Foreign Film and it got so much publicity.
So much for your anonymity.
Right, and then I went on Howard Stern immediately and said, “Oh, yeah, I made a porno,” thinking that no one would know.
You really thought no one would know? I mean Rocco Siffredi is a huge star, so to speak.
I didn’t know anything about porn. And after seeing the movie, I really couldn’t even watch porno. I didn’t realize how much he hits me. It was brutal [laughs]. Basically, his hitting me took away what was happening to my ass. That movie sold so many copies and it was nominated, so I went to the AVN Awards and didn’t win but ended up going to the Vivid booth when I saw how beautiful the girls are. I figured I would never be offered a contract because I live in New York. I figured I would need to move and there was no way I was going to do that. Vivid offered me the contract. They loved the fact that I was on the East Coast. Then all of a sudden I was, “Wait a minute, I wasn’t really serious . . .” [laughs]. Of course, I didn’t turn it down and here I am.
That’s pretty unique, being a New York-based porn star. You live in Long Island, and I’m sure my aunt in Roslyn wouldn’t expect to have a porn star living in the next town. Is there a porn scene in New York? When I was living in the city there was a fetish scene.
There’s not really a mainstream porn scene. Yeah, there’s the fetish thing and, of course, there’s the strip clubs. But I’m valuable to Vivid here on the East Coast because of the East Coast Video Show, Howard Stern, and then I did the Alan Colmes show and Bill O’Reilly . . .
Wait, isn’t it true that Bill O’Reilly interviewed you right before allegedly having phone sex with one of his employees? Do you give that good of an interview? I mean, am I going to get in trouble after this?
I was there live in the studio and I really prepared for him because I believed he would really destroy my character. I had to think about every possible thing he would say, which really came in handy when I did the Alan Colmes show the night before, because of the audience calling in and they were brutal, you know.
But I was so confident going in, and I looked at him and didn’t take my eyes off of him for a second. He really couldn’t look at me too much. I don’t know, he was a pussycat really. He was very respectful. But it’s not easy for any man when someone like myself or Sunrise Adams walks into the room, let alone make our living through sex. I mean, the guy’s only human. Your emotions get stirred up, what can I say.
Look what happened to me, I couldn’t even remember your name at the beginning of this interview. And that’s over a phone. God knows, in a studio . . .
We’ll have to do our interview live next time.
I’ll probably melt.
You’re sweet.
Were you surprised when you discovered this multi-million-dollar lawsuit broke up after O’Reilly got so hot and bothered by you he allegedly had to talk dirty to a female producer on his show?
I guess I believe that everybody is just human, but I had a hard time believing that he’d make a phone call like that out of the blue. What I said was that he should have called me. I would have given him phone sex for a lot less, but he didn’t even ask me for my number. I’m sure they had some kind of history for him to feel secure enough to make that kind of phone call.
I heard in the background that you have a kid, but I’ve also read in The New York Post’s “Page Six” that you’re a pretty wild party animal. There was a recent item about you flashing you stuff at the Meat Market District’s Pop Burger, making out with a busboy and handing out your phone number to many happy male patrons at the bar.
Can I tell you something about Pop Burger? That night there was a party for me and Tera Patrick at some club in Manhattan for YRB magazine, which stands for Yellow Rat Bastard, there was a big article on us. Afterwards I went to Pop Burger and met my business manager; I was with my sister, my best friend, her girlfriend, and two friends of a guy that I see sometimes in Los Angeles.
We just had a great time. When I read the article I just couldn’t believe it. The thing that bothered me about it was it said in quotes that “I’m rolling.” Rolling is a reference to being high. I didn’t do that at all!
There’s a room there, you can watch porno; you close the curtain when you go into this little room. But I didn’t go near it, let alone pull a busboy in there. I said, “Why’d they stop at one busboy, why not make it two!” Giving out my number, you know, I recently broke up with my husband. But my girlfriend was, like, “You didn’t give your number to anybody.”
The only real truth to that was that I was there and I may have . . .
Go on . . .
I may have, like, laid down on the couch and maybe my skirt went up a little bit. I’m not sure exactly. As far as the drug reference, that’s totally untrue.
Are you always that wild when you go out, not drug-wise, but flashing your fine body?
Give me a few drinks and, you know, I probably do get quite provocative. Maybe I don’t necessarily behave. This happened to be a night where I was pretty tame. They didn’t catch the following weekend when I was with Gina Lynn. We went to Victoria Gotti’s surprise birthday party for the show, and after [the party] we went to some club and we were going crazy. Of course, that doesn’t make it to “Page Six”.
What about the wildest thing you ever did?
I’ve had sex in some pretty unusual places.
Do you mean your body or locations?
Oh, no, I mean location-wise. This is crazy. One was in the line for Space Mountain at Disneyland. The line was so crowded, but once you get inside it’s so dark. Someone was behind me and we just sort of had sex right in the line. That was crazy. I had short-shorts that were easy to move over.
You began you career as a dancer at New York’s famous strip bar Scores, and you’ve said that was a real education about what men want. What do we want?
I think what I realized working there, I just want to write a book: Women: How To Keep Your Men Happy.
Didn’t you write that book already?
How to Have a XXX Sex Life: The Ultimate Vivid Guide, yes. What I found about myself and working there at Scores, I can pretty much adapt to any situation or conversation depending on what the person needs. I learned so much about men and mostly that . . .
Come on, give it to me, I want straight answers: what are we really like?
The thing that I found is how many men actually fantasize about having another women with them, with their girlfriends. They want to share this with their girlfriends or their wives but think that they would never do it. I’m like, “Have you asked them?” It became so clear to me how many people, men and women, never even discuss with their partner what their fantasies are or ask them.
That’s sad. There must be a lot of frustrated people out there, which I guess is good for your business.
I think men are afraid to hear the answer. It’s very important to have an open dialogue about sex.
You live what you preach. If you sent that letter to Rocco Siffredi there’s certainly no rock that you won’t turn over, no offense to Rocco.
Well, I’m a woman that whatever she wants she goes after it.
Sounds like it keeps you happy. How’d you hook up with Howard Stern?
First of all, because I worked at Scores [manager] Lonny Hanover thought that I was somebody who’d be able to handle his show. He asked me if I’d be interested in doing his show, and I’m, like, of course! But I didn’t know I was going to go on the show.
I was hired to go to the studio and get on this party bus and drive around Manhattan and get people to come onto the bus and see a clip from his movie Private Parts. I said, “Sure, I’ll do that.” So I said, “What am I going to wear?” I wore my fur coat and black bra and panties and a garter and my beautiful shoes and that’s it. I showed up at the studio like this. I didn’t know I was actually going to go and meet Howard. I thought I was just going on the bus. When I did, he was, like, “What are you wearing under that coat?” I took off my coat and here I was in this black lingerie and it was winter and I went out like that in Manhattan, in the snow, getting people to come on the bus.
That bus must have been crowded.
From then on it’s history.
You’re still a regular guest?
Oh, yeah. I was expected to go on with [AVN publisher] Paul Fishbein to talk about the AVN Awards, because he does that every year. He thought it would be perfect because I’m from New York, go on and talk about the show because I’m hosting. And they said, “You know what, she’s on all the time. She’s coming on tomorrow.” [Sound of a boy asking for milk] I’m sorry.
How old is he?
He’s three and a half. Oh, I did a live interview for a radio station and he started freaking out and I thought, “Oh, no, that’s so not sexy.” Thank goodness, I look out the window and see that my pool boy is here. I just moved out to the suburbs, right, I have a pool and a pool boy. So they’re like, “Really, you have a pool boy.” Yeah, he’s hot. So they wanted to talk to him. I went out and asked him if he wanted to talk to Kansas City. And the pool boy gets on and they ask, “Do you know whose pool you’re cleaning right now?” It made for perfect radio. Thank God for the pool boy!
One final question, it’s about 7:30 in New York, so what are you doing tonight?
I just got back from the city and did my final shopping for AVN and I’ve got to concentrate on my jokes and my speech. I’m going to have to get some work done tonight, answer some fan mail and do some cancellations and stuff. So tonight’s a home night. I’m going to sit in front of my fire, have my tree lit, have some wine . . .
I hope you’ll at least be wearing something sexy.
Of course.
| 
