Page 78 - AVN January 2016

AVN SHOW PREVIEW
Quigley to Quip at AVN Awards
Industry folk who attended November’s AVN Awards Nomination Party got a taste of what’s to come at the 2016 AVN
Awards Show when Kate Quigley took the stage to announce the contenders for Most Outrageous Sex Scene. The
actress and comedian will show off her standup skills at the 2016 AVN Awards Show, presented by Chaturbate. The
event takes place Saturday, January 23 at The Joint inside the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Las Vegas.
“I’m so excited to be hosting the 2016 AVN Awards with the lovely Joanna Angel and Anikka Albrite,” Quigley said.
“Mostly because I know my mom will have to explain what the show is about to all the ladies in her quilting club.”
Quigley will bring that sly wit to the AVN Awards. Known as a standup comedian, host and actress, Kate is clearly a
star on the rise. She is the up-for-anything host of Undercover on Playboy TV, and her other TV credits include The Office,
The Josh Wolf Show, The Danny Comden Project, The Megan Mullally Show and Talkshow with Spike Feresten. Quigley also hosts
THE Hollywood Pool Party on Periscope.TV, which gets more than 20,000 views per episode, and her popular podcast,
#DateFails on the SideShowNetwork, is at more than 30,000 downloads per episode. Kate recently began touring as a
headliner and can be seen regularly in Los Angeles at The Improv, Laugh Factory and Icehouse. She also just returned
from a tour where she performed for American troops in Japan, Singapore, Guam and the Diego Garcia atoll.
“Kate Quigley is smart, funny and a little outrageous. Thus, she’s the perfect addition to the 2016 AVN Awards
show, and we’re very excited to have her,” said Beth Noonan of AVN Media Network. “I know Kate will keep the crowd
laughing all night and make this show what we want it to be—the biggest and wildest party of the year!”
Quigley joins a comedic A-list of past AVN Awards hosts that includes Lisa Lampanelli, Dave Attell, Jim Norton,
Rebekah Kochan, April Macie, Thea Vidale and the late, great Robert Schimmel.
The annual AVN Awards Show is the premier gala of the adult industry and recognizes titles, individuals, and
companies for contributions to and excellence in the industry. For information about the show, go to AVNAwards.AVN.
com. (At left, Kate Quigley at the 2016 AVN Awards nominations party; photograph by Rick Garcia/@IndustryByRick.)
FEATURE
Class of 2016: The AVN Hall of Fame Inductees
Each year at AVN Awards Show, AVN Media Network salutes a handpicked
group of individuals who have made their mark in the adult industry and
inducts them into the AVN Hall of Fame. Performers and directors enter AVN’s
original video-based Hall of Fame, and there are other branches in the AVN Hall
of Fame as well: a Founders Branch, for those who created companies back in the
day; an Internet Founders Branch, for those who built the online sector; a Pleasure
Products Branch, for manufacturers, distributors and retailers of sex toys; and the
Executive Branch, for key members of the industry who work behind the scenes
in the C-suite or excelled in other capacities—for example, in sales, marketing or
education.
In all branches, a minimum of 10 years in the industry is required for
consideration. Every year, Hall of Fame committee members survey a list of
deserving candidates and choose individuals have made valuable contributions to
the various sectors of our industry.
Below you’ll find some information on the Class of 2016. We invite members
of the adult industry to join us at a celebratory cocktail party the night before the
AVN Adult Entertainment Expo to salute these accomplished individuals. The
celebration will take place January 19 at the newly revamped Circle Bar at the Hard
Rock Hotel & Casino Las Vegas. We’ll offer special cocktails so we can all raise a
toast to the inductees. The bash is open to all AEE and ANE trade attendees.
For information on AEE, go to AVNShow.com. For information on the AVN Awards Show, go to AVNAwards.AVN.com.
FOUNDERS BRANCH
engineer, to take over the running of the company, giving Sutton pointers on
adult production and distribution when Sutton visited Arno in federal prison.
VIDEO
Eventually, Sutton bought out Arno’s remaining interest in the company, and
spent most of the next 20 years growing the country’s interest in VCX’s 400
classic adult films such as Debbie Does Dallas, Devil in Miss Jones and Little Girls
Fred Hirsch
Blue, as well as producing new films, several directed by classic star Ginger
To call Fred Hirsch a “founder” is putting it mildly. After leaving his job as
Lynn. However, Sutton became ill with COPD in the early 2000s, and moved
a stockbroker, Hirsch went to work for Reuben Sturman’s General Video of
the company from North Hollywood to Las Vegas in part to escape Southern
America in 1972. Soon after, Hirsch convinced Sturman to distribute hardcore
California’s smog. He died in December of 2006.
8mm loops and was sent to Los Angeles to make it happen. Once established in
L.A., Hirsch began producing the loops himself, as Sunrise Distributors, and later
full-length features, signing on directors such as Gerard Damiano of Deep Throat
fame. Within a few years, however, the video revolution took place, and Hirsch
headed up several video production companies including Adult Video Corporation,
which released the Nina Hartley classic comedy Debbie Duz Dishes, and Executive
Video, well-remembered for its Butts Motel series. Hirsch is also the father of Vivid
Entertainment moguls Steve and Marci Hirsch.
Rudy Sutton
Rudy Sutton sort of fell into the adult video business. According to son David,
Rudy was the cousin of VCX owner Norman Arno, and when Arno was convicted
of obscenity charges in 1986, he asked Sutton, who had been an industrial
Eddie Wedelstedt
Eddie Wedelstedt (no one calls him Edward) is one of the founders of the
modern adult industry, sharing a place with such stalwarts as Reuben Sturman,
Mel Kamins, Mike Thevis and several others. Wedelstedt, through his holding
company Goalie Entertainment, was the co-owner of M&M Sales, an adult
distribution company, as well as owner of the Romantix chain of adult stores
until he was forced out of the adult industry by the U.S. Department of Justice,
which indicted Wedelstedt and six others in 2005, charging them with interstate
transportation of obscene material and other offenses. In order to prevent the
DOJ’s threatened indictment of his wife, Wedelstedt pled guilty to one of the 23
counts with which he had been charged and spent 13 months in a federal prison
camp in Colorado, his home state. Wedelstedt was well known for sponsoring
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