Page 69 - AVN Men 2021

“New Orleans is around the area that I’m from,
and I remember having to pay to get into the
bars—and now the bars pay me to come there.”
Nearly a year removed from his win as 2020 GayVN Performer of the Year, Cade Maddox
still vividly recalls the moment.
“That night was a huge shock. I was up for several awards, but I didn’t even think I had
a chance at Performer of the Year. I thought maybe I was going to get some other award.
There were too many great guys in that category.”
As the night progressed, his name was never called. Doubt crept in. “I was like, ‘Oh my
gosh.’ And then Performer of the Year was one of the last ones, and they said my name,”
Maddox recalls, pausing as he reflects. “I was excited, shocked…it was such an honor.”
But it was a lot more than that—it gave him newfound confidence.
“It was really nice to go back and tell my mom,” Maddox laughs. “My mom is super
religious, right? When I told her I was getting into porn, I was just fucking with her and
I said, ‘Mom, I’m packing up tomorrow and going to be a porn star.’ And this was back
when I had just met a producer that was traveling the United States by car. But I didn’t
think it would turn into what it’s turned into. So being able to go back and be like, ‘Hey, I
won Performer of the Year!’ was cool. And for me, it just made me feel like…I don’t know,
a professional? I said to myself, ‘Okay, maybe I know what I’m doing.’”
That carries over on his visits back home to small town Mississippi.
“I feel like I have a great confidence about me now, and I see that when I go back
home—but I’m kind of the same. New Orleans is around the area that I’m from, and I
remember having to pay to get into the bars—and now the bars pay me to come there.
And when I go to the gay bars, people ask to take pictures with me,” Maddox marvels,
laughing at the thought. “It kind of makes me feel like a star. It’s really cool.”
He backed up his career-defining year with another one, building on his momentum as
a Falcon|NakedSword exclusive—a contract he originally signed in the summer of 2019.
That included a role in A Murdered Heart, NakedSword’s look at gay conversion therapy
camps. It was an experience that hit close to home.
“That was kind of touching, because it was like the South again—kind of that mindset. It
reminded me of religion in some ways, how people think it’s a choice still. I remember my
mom used to try to get me do all this ‘guy’ stuff with my dad, like hunting and fishing and
all that. She said she always knew I was going to be gay, but I think she did that to try and
make me not gay, I guess. The same thing that they’re doing in those camps.”