There aren’t many porn stars who can say they’ve been on the job for more than 25 years. Beyond Tiffany Mynx, who tends to go in and out of the business, it’s all guys. Rebecca Bardoux is unique. “Porn royalty,” she calls herself. Bright, petite and blessed with a razor-sharp wit, she takes no prisoners, including herself. Inducted into the Adult Video Hall of Fame in Las Vegas in 2013, amidst a sea of quoted clichés and fake gravitas, Rebecca stepped onstage and sighed, “I’m not wearing any panties, believe me!” 

A dark blonde with a surfeit of energy and a soft, naturally curvy body with the kind of fundamental appeal that calls to fans of ‘realistic’ starlets, rather than the usual dance-honed hard-bodies which dominate the adult scene. Two of the brighter producers in the business, John Stagliano and Patrick Collins, recognized that there’s more to sexual fantasy than the Playboy-type and turned Bardoux into the original MILF. It was a new kind of niche porn that changed the business forever. 

A natural performer and one of the hardest working women in the business, Bardoux has been in hundreds of movies but has always maintained an outside life, including doing political lobbying work against Proposition B in California’s state house when politicians tried to force adult industry performers to wear condoms on the job.  Additionally, she hosts a weekly radio show and performs an energetic, wickedly bawdy standup comedy act.

Interview: Rebecca Bardoux - the Original MILF

You’re no run-of-the-mill adult entertainment star, are you? I have to say first of all that, to me, one of the single hardest things to do in a serious way is standup. You know I love the Belz—Richard Belzer—and his live show is absolutely intense and awesome and, above all, very, very funny. Having been around him because he’s a friend of a friend’s friend, I said, you know, I Iike Homicide well enough, but I wish you’d tour with your comedy more. And it was pretty clear that he gets asked about that a lot. Essentially what he said was that doing standup is absolutely exhausting for him both physically and psychologically and it’d be even harder now that he doesn’t get all kinds of stoned before and after shows like he did for years. Are you just a tough lady who just goes out there and lets it rip?

I’m just a tough lady that wings it in life! I have never really rehearsed for much during my career. In adult we mostly got the scripts the day of the shoot and it’s hard to rehearse when you’re trying to prep for a sex scene at the same time. I have always been an improv girl, quick-witted and silly. Plus, when you shoot video there’s that thing called the edit and it all works out in the end. My first show I ever did was the Refried Comedy Show. Richard Villa is the creator of this show and also my mentor. Richard and I sat down three weeks before the show and had a writing session. He just told me to go out there and talk about my 20-year career in adult. I think the fact that I have been doing adult for twenty years; that makes the whole act. You have to have the history and experience to get the respect I get. Plus, I’m older and I look, well like not a porn star, and that fucks everyone up. My credits are real; you can GOOGLE the fuck out of me. My first gig was at Madhouse Comedy in San Diego. They just put me up and I did nine minutes. Which, for anyone out there that doesn’t know, in comedy if you get that situation for your first ever gig you are LUCKY. It was me letting it rip.  It was a good set. I have the audio of it. I have the audio for all my shows. My mentor Richard Villa told me “Record all your shows and no notes on stage!”

Interview: Rebecca Bardoux - the Original MILF

What I’ve learned after 16 months in stand up comedy is you can’t wing it. They want a solid 10, 15, 20… So, I am working on that, practicing in the mirror. As far as the physical and psychological exhaustion that Mr. Belzer talks about… yes, yes, yes. That is why I give all the respect in the world for those comics that hit the stage every night.

How do you feel about audiences? I mean all you need is one heckler, or a few people who chat through what you do. What do you do in those situations? Is it something similar for a stripper or different?

By no means does any of that bother me. I think most of the audience is in a state of shock that I’m up there talking about this stuff. Keep in mind I have traveled the world as an adult film star, got naked on stages all over the world in front of live audiences. Please, try to offend me! Nobody will ever be able to beat me up as much I have beat myself up over the years. Plus, before I did porn, I was in bill collections and commission cosmetics sales. Bring it on…

You’re from what my old students at Penn State when I was a Grad student used to call ‘Dreary Erie.’ Kind of like neither mid-west nor eastern. Does where you come from, make you?

I am nothing like the person from Erie PA. In high school I was made fun of because I was shy. They called me names because I had an overbite! I was shy, I never bothered anyone, so for them to bully me? It breaks my heart now to think back at what I went through as a young girl. Oh, and ’cause you asked, at the same time they were mean to me my sister was dying of a brain tumor. That was 1981 and we still haven’t got a handle on this bully shit yet! I went back to my 25-year reunion, I wrote a blog about it!

Interview: Rebecca Bardoux - the Original MILF

So I read you didn’t go into the adult business till you were 29. Can I ask you what you did up until then? I always like to ask what kind of shitty jobs my subjects have had along the road to wisdom.

Yep, I am a late bloomer in everything I do in life. I would like to say I had shitty jobs before I got into adult business, but I can’t. Right out of high school I got a job as an office manager. My real passion was cosmetics, I moved to New York and started working for a new cosmetic company that was just hitting the US market. I always had great jobs that I left.

How did you meet John Stagliano? You were already in the business by then, right? I think the first film I remember you in was Facedance. Were you experienced by then or still pretty new to the business?

It was a small business back then, it was by word of mouth. I did great scenes. I could deliver dialogue and was easy to work with. When I shot Facedance I had been in the biz just two months. I was lucky to get the parts I did. Okay, fuck that! It wasn’t luck. I worked hard, was good at what I did, showed up ready to work, respected everyone and I was humble. [She laughs] I used to be humble!

Interview: Rebecca Bardoux - the Original MILF

My old teacher Harry Bouras used to teach a class called ‘American Culture’ here in Chicago at Columbia College and he’d show clips of your bad self in Sodomania. He said that you and Stagliano changed the business forever by creating a new cougar/MILF persona that was glamorous instead of a certain kind of freak. He felt that from then on the business broke into scores of subdivided niches and fetishes. Any thoughts on that?

Really! I’m posting that on my Facebook; that is awesome! It was Patrick Collins that directed me in Sodomania. Sodomania is considered a cult classic in adult. With just two months under my belt in adult Patrick hired me for that role with two of the top guys in the industry, Peter North and Sean Michaels. It was an intense role that bought something out of me that only Patrick Collins saw in me. As far as the glamor image, that’s just me. It was the 90s; it was all about glamour. All the women I hung around in the industry were glamor. I love being a woman!

I think women of a certain age know how to be glamorous in the old-fashioned sense because they were submerged in a curtain kind of culture. Outside of some of Jonni Darkko’s movies, I don’t see glamor any more. It’s definitely my problem but I find some of the women in the business now, all covered in tattoos, to be a turnoff. Have you got any opinions on that kind of self-expression?

I think that is confused, temporary self-expression confusion. I don’t have any tattoos. I spent my life keeping my skin soft, smooth and as close to flawless as possible. My ancestors gave me good skin; I’m not fucking that up. I don’t like tattoos, on women. But who knows, because all the tatted girls have boyfriends and I don’t, maybe I need to change my thinking.

Interview: Rebecca Bardoux - the Original MILF

Of all the folks you’ve chatted with for radio, could you say who you’ve enjoyed letting it rip with?

Everyone is so unique and new. I love talking to people whether it’s the top grossing touring comic in the world or the cashier at the Walmart I just came from this afternoon. Its funny too, because I think the woman at Walmart is happier in her life than the people with fame and money. I would love to have the woman that works at Walmart on my show, we could all learn a lot. People and their lives have always been interesting to me. For some reason, people seem to feel comfortable revealing their dark side to me. Imagine that!

That blow job you give Darkko is really relaxed and wonderful. You don’t seem to mind the taste of cum or getting it all over the face. Umm, how ‘cum’? [I ask that with a smile] A lot of young ladies aren’t so much unwilling to get into fellatio, per sé, but say they hate the taste of cum because it tastes of what you eat. My old roommate used to drink a giant-size can of pineapple juice every day? Are you normally particular about that?

It’s part of the job. You can tell a lot about a man from his cum. Pineapple is great for men and women to taste good. I never really did all that stuff. We had to douche before scenes anyway and we all took care of ourselves. Besides, most of the money shots had to be visual. They didn’t want us swallowing that stuff; they needed it for the stills. Nowadays, I’m only swallowing if I’m in love.

Interview: Rebecca Bardoux - the Original MILF

I don’t know if you’ve ever seen Leonard Cohen in concert, but he does like to hold forth before he plays a song called ‘The Future’ that the explosion in popularity in anal sex is because of ‘porn people’ and that it proves that the end of civilization really is just around the corner. I’m all for doing whatever you enjoy, but some of those Mike Adriano films seem to pull the girls’ asses out like tripe. I definitely wouldn’t like to go through some of the hemorrhoid surgery they’re going to need. Any thoughts?

That pisses me off. Back in the 90s, I was one of the anal queens. We didn’t do crazy stuff. It was vanilla anal sex. I have had fans come up to me and thank me for my anal sex scenes. They said their wife watched it and it looked like I was enjoying myself and that is why they tried it. As far as these extreme anal scenes, in my opinion, it shows lack of creativity in movie making and some serious personal issues. Nothing wrong with a little anal sex.

What kind of music do you listen to?

All kinds. But no club music or rap.

What kind of movies do you watch?

Comedies of course.

Interview: Rebecca Bardoux - the Original MILF

Finally, have you thought seriously about writing a memoir? Do you think you’ve got enough stories to tell? I’m really curious as to what you’ll do next.

Yes, I want to write it… well most of it is done. Trying to find a real writer to help me has been holding me back. As far as having enough stories. I think I could fill a few pages.

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Be sure to check out Rebecca Bardoux on the radio and definitely catch Rebecca’s stand-up routines on her YouTube channel.

You can  follow Rebecca on Facebook and Twitter.

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