Page 51 - AVN May 2015

FEATURE
Michelle Austin Productions, and since she was the founder of Kennston, we had to ask, why the new label?
“We separated the two a little bit because Kennston is going in a different direction,” she said. “We have an
FTM magazine that’s not adult related and a clothes line and different things for trans men, so we separated
the two. Michelle Austin Films is more of the porn film producer, and then Kennston is everything; it’s like the
umbrella. Kennston is about sexuality, but it’s not Playboy or something; it’s more like, yes, there’s boys talking
about their sex lives, but it’s still geared to—everybody can read it; it’s trans. It’s a trans men magazine, so it’s
basically trans guys talking about transitioning, talking about relationships. We have a guy who does all sex toy
reviews for trans guys. It’s unique, so we’re trying to get it all out there.”
We also caught up with Jesse, who’s also been absent from the movie production scene recently, though for a
different reason than most.
“I just had my tenth boob job, so the girls are bigger and better than ever, and so now I’m back,” she told us.
“I went to a bad doctor for my second boob job and I’ve spent ten years trying to fix it, but now they’re perfect,
better than ever; I’m fully healed now and I’m back to work starting today. I’m here to hit up the companies and
get them to start hiring me again.”
both the Best Scene Award (for Phoenix’s Marie’s TS
Threesome) and Best Hardcore Performer on top of her
AVN wins for Transsexual Performer of the Year, the
fan-voted Favorite Trans Performer and Favorite Cam
Model. The wins at the AVN Awards, she said, put
her “past Cloud 9, all the way to Cloud 13!”
“I took a mini-vacation after the AVN Awards,
went on a little cruise and all that, but I’m springing
back from everything,” she said. “I just got to L.A. a
couple of days ago and I’m already busy. I’m doing
a magazine cover, a centerfold, I have four scenes
coming up, and I’m doing a dance tour, so I’m
pretty super-crazy busy, and then I’m actually going
to Europe and I might be filming in London with
Grooby. I’m trying to get them to do that. It’d be fun.
But right now, I’m just here selling my DVDs and
meeting my fans. I like meeting everybody. That’s my
favorite part.”
Next to Aubrey was another star who’d also been
on vacation for a bit: Tyra Scott, holding down the
fort at the Mancini Productions table with company
Public Relations Manager Fran Marquez.
“I’m just getting back into the swing of things;
took some time off and now we’re getting back into
the game 100 percent, full-blown, full speed ahead
again,” Tyra explained. “I had some other stuff going
on in my personal life that I had to deal with and get
all taken care of, but now I’m ready to get back to
work.”
On the table was Tyra’s latest title, American Tgirl
Strokers: Tyra Scott 2, a mix of solo and couples scenes.
“Almost every DVD out there is all hardcore action,
but I think you need to mix it up a little bit and do
something different, and we’re doing three more Tyra
Scott DVDs that will be coming out this year from
Kennston, so I’m very excited about that.”
Though Sammy Mancini himself was not on the
floor, Fran was doing a fine job of representing the
brand.
WE ARE WORKING ON A KIND OF
“I’m here promoting our She-Male Strokers; we are
SURPRISE PROJECT. I CAN’T REALLY SAY
one of the top three websites for trans content and
trans erotica, and we are here with our lovely model
ANYTHING YET, BUT WE ARE DEFINITELY GOING TO BE INCREASING
Tyra Scott, who’s promoting our line of DVDs and
signing autographs, and we’re here to give out our
She-Male Stroker of the Year award—and to see what
OUR BRAND AWARENESS THROUGH A
everybody’s wearing. Sammy’s here; he’s just busy
shooting. We are also always interested in finding
REALLY AWESOME NEW PLATFORM.
new models for sure, always.”
—FRAN MARQUEZ OF SHEMALE STROKERS
Anything new on the horizon?
“We are working on a kind of surprise project,” she
confided. “I can’t really say anything yet, but we are
definitely going to be increasing our brand awareness
through a really awesome new platform.”
Just down the row from Mancini was Kennston
Productions’ Michelle Austin, who told us she was
happy to live in Houston, “one of only three big cities
in Texas that are mostly Democratic.”
“We just released, and AVN featured it on their
website, Transcest, the DVD,” she said. “It’s the first
time that a trans company is tackling the incest/
step-mommy/step-kids genre, but our company is
always trying to do things like that: Either make fun
of straight and gay porn and stuff like that through
Trans Men Adventures, or tackle a taboo that really is
not tackled in trans porn. That’s Transcest, and we
ended the DVD in a way that it could be a series. FTM
Hunter is the new DVD I’m working on, coming out
in the next month or so, and that is basically kind of
like Tranny Chaser, that type of thing, but I’m chasing
FTMs and using them as bait.”
We also noted that the title was released by
Though the following night’s awards passed her over for Best Solo Site and Fan Favorite, Jesse has her eye set
on history: “Hopefully one of these years I’ll get one of the Legend awards. I’ve been pushing for that from both
AVN and the TEA Awards; I think I’ve earned the Legend award by now. This is my 11th year in the business;
how many girls last 11 years? But I guess I look like a newbie, so ...” she trailed off, smiling.
Also working the floor were some unfamiliar faces, including the very soft-spoken newcomer Micha Angela,
who started posting to her website in 2004 but, she said, “I haven’t really gotten into it here until the past
three years, so I guess I’m very new; back then, the dabbling was just recreational, so I’ve really been in it about
three years, and I like what I see so far. I’m waiting for more opportunities to come my way, and they’re slowly
trickling in.”
But what was particularly interesting about her was what she does in her spare time.
“I wear a lot of hats,” she said. “I live in South Lake Tahoe, and I snowboard on a very high level, and I have
a snowboard agent who has represented Olympic snowboarders, and we’ve been trying to figure out a way to
combine the masculine-driven action sport world with the trans erotica world, because I’m in the middle of
it. I snowboard hard and I am a model, so I’m working on being the trans snowboarder. I’ve got 19 seasons of
snowboarding under my belt.”
Her goal is to be a sponsored trans action sports athlete. “That would be huge,” she said. “It would dispel
so many of the misconceptions … and show everybody that we are just as capable if not more capable than the
general population, especially when it comes to spiritual fortitude because of the pain—you have to be strong.”
Meanwhile, Micha’s been creating content for and editing her own website, MichaAngela.com.
Other trans women and men at the show included Nikki Montero, Trixxy Von Teese, Honey Foxxx, Natalie
Chen, Jelena Vermillion, Kacy Tgirl, Chloe Wilcox, Kai Bailey and Phoenix Savage.
FEATURE | By Mark Kernes
5.17 | AVN.com | 51