BijouBlog

By Josh Eliot

In the spirit of All Hallows Eve month, I thought it might be appropriate to write about a very sinister sounding fellow. The sheer mention of his name draws fear and anticipation of an upcoming doom. This guy will cut you if given a chance, and trust me you’ll be in stitches. Okay, enough of this dramatized text. The haunting character I am referring to is none other than YouTube sensation Captain Psychopath.

 

Born, raised and currently living in West Norway, the Captain’s real name is Didrik. His initial YouTube channel featured gaming videos, but was quickly deleted because Didrik was unhappy with the videos he was posting. He decided to start a new channel in which he would post video reviews and critiques of other channels' gaming videos. He fully intended his reviews to be hard hitting and edgy, so he chose a name that reflected the critic’s attributes, Captain Psychopath. He found some success amongst the gaming crowd, but things took a more focused direction when he came across the “PG” version of a little movie posted on the Catalina Collection NEO YouTube Channel which I affectionately call Boy Band.

When he discovered the movie Boy Band and saw the viewers responding from around the world, he realized that its cheeky content united people from all different sexual orientations. The movie featured an all-male cast and the central character of Nance Freeley, music agent, played by Sharon Kane. The viewers really embraced the campiness of the movie, and started creating “memes” from assorted scenes. Keep in mind that the Captain is a straight, whiskey drinking guy who is comfortable with himself and has no judgment or negative connotations about watching and enjoying an all-male movie, albeit “PG.” We need more like him, and as the story goes on you’ll see that there are thousands just like him who appreciate and embrace the content of all-male action. The fact that these movies have made their way and flourished within the mainstream audiences of Instagram and YouTube is something I never expected when making them. It was always assumed that gay men and maybe gay women (I read that Rosie O’Donnell liked to watch all-male gay porn) were the only audience. A major percentage of the subscribers to the Captain Psychopath and Catalina Collection channels are straight and from all over the planet.

When the Captain discovered Boy Band, he thought to himself, “Hmm, no one’s done any videos reviewing gay pornos, maybe I should try.” What the Captain meant by reviewing gay pornos was not your typical review. The Captain uses humor and a little bit of sadistic ribbing to make his well-rounded videos so funny and watchable. Trust me, some of the reviews he did of my movies hurt in places, but he always had me laughing my ass off! They are so well done that I always feel the need to “share the link” with friends. Once deciding how to proceed with his channel, the Captain reached out to his friend at Hikikomori Media to collaborate with him to review Boy Band and other features from many adult gay studios. The guys' joint venture received 10x more views than anything else he uploaded in the past. He wants me to mention that he was “way too hard” on Sharon Kane in the Boy Band review. It was his first time seeing her, and because he associated her with her character Nance Freely – who, let’s face it, was a bit of a cunt - he went to town on her. Which he regrets to this day, as she’s really won him over, just like so many of us.

Even though he felt that he hadn’t quite nailed his style with the Boy Band review, he persisted. Realizing that there were a lot more movies out their like Boy Band, he got in touch with Kurt from Catalina Collection, who shared content with him to use for his cutting and humor filled reviews. I personally discovered the Catalina Collection and Captain Psychopath’s YouTube channels during the Covid-19 lockdown and I’m so glad I did. It actually flooded me with so many memories when watching these movies back after 20 some odd years! I hadn’t viewed most of them since I initially watched them for release on VHS. It lit a match under my ass to start editing again and start an Instagram and YouTube channel of my own. The Captain really inspired me with his tongue (get your mind out of the gutter) and cheek approach to re-embrace these little mini classics from the 1980’s and 1990’s and help re-introduce them to a new audience. In fact, we are teaming up in October for a joint release. I will be releasing the new, enhanced and updated 25th Anniversary Edition Director’s Cut of CatalinaVille (“PG” version) for my YouTube Channel, and the Captain’s channel will release the new movie with Director’s Commentary, as he questions and “ribs” me on the spot throughout the movie. I hope I’m not a big bore!

Instead of candy for this Halloween Season, I’ll give you some “Eye Candy.” Here are a number of links to some of the great content on Captain Psychopath’s YouTube channel:

 

With 28k views and counting: Pizza Boy 2 & 3
With 32k views and counting: Cockpit
With 68K views and counting: Voyager
And with 163K views and counting: Billy Herrington- Did You Know Gay Men? (A parody on “Did You Know Gaming?” which is a huge YouTube channel on gaming.)

The Captain forwarded me some pics he found from a magazine story on Voyager that I didn’t remember existed. Vincent Lambert was along on the cruise as a “press agent” and covered the whole sadistic affair - even photographing me having an interior breakdown when the ship fried one of our video decks. Since Voyager was really “Voyager of the Damned” (see previous blog), a fucking nightmare cruise straight to hell, I thought sharing the pictures here would be Halloween appropriate!

Bio of Josh Eliot:

At the age of 25 in 1987, Josh Eliot was hired by Catalina Video by John Travis (Brentwood Video) and Scott Masters (Nova Video). Travis trained Eliot on his style of videography and mentored him on the art of directing. Josh directed his first movie, Runaways, in 1987. By 2009 when Josh parted ways with Catalina Video, he'd produced and directed hundreds of features and won numerous awards for Best Screenplay, Videography, Editing, and Directing. He was entered into the GayVN Hall of fame in 2002.

By Josh Eliot

My beautiful home state of Rhode Island, “Little Rhodie” as we affectionately call it, is famous for its sandy shores and seaside Colonial towns. It is most known for its capitol Providence and, attached by a bridge, the islands of Jamestown and Newport. Newport prides itself on starting the very first jazz festival, America’s Cup, and the Gilded Age Mansions such as The Breakers. With over 400 miles of coastline, it features an amazing “Cliff Walk” that ventures past the backyards of these enormous “summer homes” originally owned by America’s wealthiest families including the Vanderbilt’s, the Astor’s and the Morgan’s. Taylor Swift purchased and occupies an 11,000 square foot mansion on Watch Hill, a nearby beach community in Rhode Island. There is a lot of beauty in this small seaside state, the smallest state in the country in fact, one that you can literally drive across in 45 minutes to an hour. If you do take that drive, just beware that not everything in the state of Rhode Island is as welcoming or inviting. In fact, there is quite a dark and scary side to some of the state’s history.

This is my second out of three Halloween-inspired blogs I am writing this month. Today I will focus on a few of the places that literally made my blood run cold as a child and teenager. Now, of course this is a blog for Bijou World, so I’ll try to squeeze in the occasional blowjob with facial cum shot along the way!
 

The Sockanosset Training School for Boys, affectionately known to all Rhode Islanders as “The Bad Boys School,” opened in the late 1800s. It was part of a “state farm” which included an asylum for the insane, an adult prison and a state almshouse. The gothic looking dormitory cottages were built in 1881 to 1895. The approach to dealing with “Wayward Boys” was to offer them structure and discipline through labor-intensive work such as farming, construction and shoveling coal from a small coal mine on the property. There are many stories about the headmaster abusing his powers and submitting the boys to mental and physical punishments. When our family would drive past the Bad Boys School, my mother would never miss an opportunity to tell us that we would be sent there if we didn’t behave ourselves. Something dozens of mothers and fathers across the state used as leverage to keep their kids on the straight and narrow. This certainly worked for my brother and me, as Sockanosset was terrifying from the outside. I can’t imagine what it was like inside! In disrepair for many years and due to lack of funding, it closed down in 1985 and sat there vacant for over two decades.

Before moving to California to attend film school, I took a lot of pictures of the building and grounds knowing one day I would somehow find a way to make a movie about this place. As you can see from the pictures, it was definitely the thing that nightmares are made of, and stories of spirits haunting the grounds were rampant. Years later when Chi Chi and I were assigned Powertool 2, I considered using my photos as the exterior shots of the prison, but when I saw how “vanilla” the script was coming I struck that idea. If production with Catalina Video had continued past 2006, I’m sure I would have eventually found a way to make the movie Bad Boys School, probably with an S&M or Leather twist to it. I’ve been accused many times of making movies that don’t necessarily fit into the porno movie mold. Hey, what can I say, I was a young horror movie buff who just happened to have complete control (mostly) on the projects I wanted to direct. With Thrill Me!, it was: “Dead bodies and porn don’t mix!” Well, you know what? I made it mix! In Night of the Living Bi-Dolls, it was: “Are you nuts? Zombies are not sexy!” Well you know what? I made it sexy and it won Best Bisexual Picture that year! For Single White Male, it was: “A criminally insane lead is not a proper subject for a Catalina Feature!” (a Scott Masters quote). Well, you know what? Rob Cryston won Best Actor at the Gay Video Guide Awards that year and I picked up Best Screenplay.

So why wouldn’t I do a Bad Boys School movie some day?! The image on the faux lobby card below was a must; no matter what the box cover looked like, that shot had to be there. Says it all, don’t you think?

Now, let me get back to what I was saying about the criminally insane! The Boys Asylum - Ladd School - really does take a top prize for one of Rhode Island’s most haunted. Founded in 1908 by Joseph P. Ladd and originally called “The Rhode Island School for the Feeble Minded,” this caring and loving facility carried out cruel treatments like shock therapy, ice-bath therapy and lobotomies. The boys dormitory filled up in 1909 and a girls dorm was erected. Consisting of 10 buildings on 331 desolate acres, it also featured padded cells, operating rooms, a morgue and crematorium; more like an overcrowded prison where the occupants slept head to foot with only nine inches of separation between beds. Most were committed to life sentences, often never having committed crimes. Women were confined until menopause or death and sometimes sterilized for extramarital affairs or having a child out of wedlock. Known in modern day as Ladd School, it continued to function as a facility until 1986. Sitting vacant and isolated before this hell hole was finally demolished in 2013, the property was a hot, white hot, spot for paranormal activity.

Here is an excerpt from The Pawtucket Paranormal Society from a day trip to the property before it was razed:

“As we got close to the place, I began to feel a strange feeling settling into my gut. I can not say that I knew straight away this place was causing it, but I had a feeling. We drove onto the property and the feeling grew so much stronger, like there was a veil we passed through. We began to pass old, dilapidated, boarded up buildings, when a wave of sadness washed over me. I began to feel the hatred that seeped from the very ground we drove on. We stopped a few times so I could take pictures of the buildings, when I began to hear the whisper of many voices, all young and seeming to plead for mercy. When we came to the Fogerty Building, it felt like all the bad pooled in one place. The whispers grew stronger, they wanted to be released from the hell that bounded them. We came to what was left of one of the playgrounds. All that remained was a rusted, twisted swing set with one swing remaining. Dawn (team leader) did not want to get out of the car because [as] she stated to me later... she had the feeling of being watched. When I got close to the swing set, I heard a young girl asking me to follow her. I approached the swing… I had to feel it. I had to know how many sad souls sat upon it. When I got close to it, I heard the child say, 'Mine, mine, mine.' I proceeded to touch it. When I did, I immediately felt pain go up my right side and across my chest. It felt like I was being burned. This place is a tumor on the face of the earth.”

This report was just one in a long line. In previous instances, various investigators noted: a low moaning sound haunts the basement; blasts of wind can be felt and noises of footsteps and shattering chains can be heard; an ethereal figure haunts the halls; the walls bleed. A horde of “orbs” were caught on film, as well as a peculiar dark figure. One investigator’s camera slipped from her hand and, when she picked it up, it was slapped from her hand again. In the morgue, noises of a little girl can be heard as well as the sound of heavy footsteps. On the second floor, there were voices of people talking, things getting thrown and people screaming for help or weeping.

The list goes on and on, but I won’t. You know why? Because I don’t want a fucking thing to do with this place! I have no wish, desire, craving or itch to make Ladd School a movie. Nope. Nada. That is a bridge too far… even for me! Oh, you know what? I’ve just noticed that I never got to that blow job. Apologies. I promise it will be included in my third and final Halloween blog this season. It’s called Vampire's Grave, and it’s named after a real place located a short distance from the “actual” Conjuring house, which is also in Rhode Island.

I’ll add the BJ to that one!

Bio of Josh Eliot:

At the age of 25 in 1987, Josh Eliot was hired by Catalina Video by John Travis (Brentwood Video) and Scott Masters (Nova Video). Travis trained Eliot on his style of videography and mentored him on the art of directing. Josh directed his first movie, Runaways, in 1987. By 2009 when Josh parted ways with Catalina Video, he'd produced and directed hundreds of features and won numerous awards for Best Screenplay, Videography, Editing, and Directing. He was entered into the GayVN Hall of fame in 2002.

By Josh Eliot

The biggest movie in context of size, scope and budget I ever made was called CatalinaVille. I was tasked by our general manager to come up with a title that incorporated the company name. It took a couple of days going crazy before I finally came up with one that I somewhat liked. One of my very favorite movies is Peter Bogdanovich’s The Last Picture Show. Its not-so-epic sequel Texasville somehow, some way popped into my head. I went into the office thinking, “This is shit, he’s going to hate this title, it’s so random.” To my surprise, he not only loved the title CatalinaVille, but L-O-V-E-D it! Okay, check that one off. He immediately became excited and shared specifics of what he was looking for in this movie. He wanted it to be a showcase for Steve Rambo that featured him as an “action hero.” He said he was willing to double or even triple the normal budget (normally $13k). I was told to come back to him with an idea and we would work it into our production schedule to shoot in conjunction with the other two movies per month we were normally producing.

Well, I can’t say it wasn’t music to my ears when he basically told me it would cost what it would cost. It released me from the chains that held me down from coming up with big ideas. I immediately knew that I wanted a huge cast of at least 20; we ended up casting 23. Double cum shots are always a plus, so whenever possible we would shoot the oral and cum shots one day and then the anal and second cum shots the next day. Travel was definitely a must in my book. We couldn’t possibly shoot this movie in the same used and reused locations around Los Angeles, no way. We had been shooting the International Mr. Leather Contest in Chicago for a couple of years by this point and I knew we had carte blanche access to the Congress Theater where the event was held. We always got to get into the theater a day or two before to inspect it for setting up to shoot the show. I was hopeful that they would let us in a day or two before the show to shoot some sex scenes. Luckily for me the producers agreed! I wasn’t sure about anything regarding the storyline at this point, but I knew that the climax of the movie had to take place at the Congress Theater during the International Mr. Leather Contest. I remembered seeing an Alfred Hitchcock movie with a dramatic climax (or was it the opening scene?) that took place during a live show in a theater. This movie needed something like that.

The previous year while shooting the International Mr. Leather Contest, we discovered a guy who we were determined to be our new exclusive. The hotel had two towers that looked into each other’s rooms. This hot man in leather had stuck a giant dildo to his window sill and was “showing off” for everyone to see. Like any great head of production would have, Brad Austin counted the windows and went to that tower, tracked down that room and got this stud to meet us in the lobby bar. We created a verbal exclusive contract, verified with a hand-shake. This guy had to be in CatalinaVille! His name was Ray Harley, and we would shoot his premiere movie, Meet Ray Harley, and his scene for CatalinaVille in the same weekend at our second location, Breckenridge, Colorado. It was a gorgeous location, very picturesque, although the altitude was atrocious and made it hard to breathe! We chose Colorado because we regularly booked models from Colorado, where one of our top agents lived. We figured the money we saved on their airfare could be used to fly myself and the crew to Colorado.

Catalina Island was a no-brainer as yet another location - it had our company name! Just off the coast from Los Angeles, it was the perfect place to start the movie. Lovely, picturesque and the perfect rural setting for our star Steve Rambo’s locale. The movie opens with Steve Rambo and his lover, played by Brad King, enjoying each other orally on the open seas in a motor boat. That setting wasn’t planned, though. We rented the motor boat, took off with the crew and equipment along the coast and found a secluded cove. The plan was to shoot the oral and anal in this beautiful setting. We anchored the boat and swam to shore with the equipment on a blow up raft - at high tide, nonetheless. I don’t have to tell you how grueling it was; we were in freezing cold water, struggling and out of breath, but we made it to shore. I started to shoot a bit of dialogue when suddenly a pontoon showed up with about two dozen tourists and laid their anchor right the fuck in the middle of our cove! I couldn’t believe our luck, or lack of it. We thought we would wait them out, but they all started snorkeling and we knew they weren’t going anywhere. I made the decision to take Rambo and King along with Brad Austin and myself out to the open sea in that tiny fucking motor boat to shoot some sucking. I could not under any circumstances let this day be a bust, so that was my plan B!

We went out into the ocean and shot that oral scene, which was a nightmare to shoot. I almost fell out of the boat while trying to get different angles so many times. Brad Austin had to take us further out to sea to get away from other boats so they could not see what we were doing! Luckily Rambo and King did not have any hard-on problems or trouble cumming on cue! After shooting the oral scene, we went back to the cove to pick up the rest of the crew and equipment. The snorkelers were still there, of course. We headed back to the mainland, returned the boat and had a great expensive dinner, which we 100% deserved. The next morning, we rented a golf cart, because no cars are allowed on Catalina Island, and shot some footage of Rambo jogging with island vistas in the background for the opening credits. I felt okay but not great about the opening scene. The fact that there was no fucking bothered me, because it’s not the best way to open a movie! In the storyline, Rambo’s character plays an IT computer tech who gets a phone call from a co-worker (Doug Jeffries) based in Chicago. The co-worker is involved in some shady practices with underworld characters from Scottsdale, AZ (another one of our locations). Long story short, Rambo tries to help his friend by downloading the info onto a floppy disc (because floppy discs were all the rage in 1998?), causing the underworld characters to now target Steve Rambo. While trying to get their hands on that disc, the underworld characters shoot and kill Steve Rambo’s lover Brad. Distraught and confused, Rambo narrowly escapes and runs off with the disc and is next seen on a ferry heading away from Catalina Island and off to ______????

That is where I need to end “Part 1” of this blog. Sorry to leave you with this cliffhanger, but a movie as big as CatalinaVille definitely needs a two-part blog. See you in two weeks!

Bio of Josh Eliot:

At the age of 25 in 1987, Josh Eliot was hired by Catalina Video by John Travis (Brentwood Video) and Scott Masters (Nova Video). Travis trained Eliot on his style of videography and mentored him on the art of directing. Josh directed his first movie, Runaways, in 1987. By 2009 when Josh parted ways with Catalina Video, he'd produced and directed hundreds of features and won numerous awards for Best Screenplay, Videography, Editing, and Directing. He was entered into the GayVN Hall of fame in 2002.

By Josh Eliot

 

When I left off last week in my blog "The Making of CatalinaVille," Steve Rambo's lover was killed by underworld hoods trying to get a floppy disc Steve possessed. Steve was on the run with the disc, via a ferry taking him off Catalina Island. He makes his way to Breckenridge, Colorado to meet up with his professor (Ray Harley) from when he was in IT Tech school. When he arrives, Ray is tutoring four young studs played by Logan Reed, Sean Dickson, Dillon James, and Brian Daniels. The four models were local Coloradoans who were driven to our house rental by our Denver agent. This time, the crew going to the models instead of vice versa helped keep our travel expenses to a minimum. It was the first time working with most of them, and Brian Daniels was dressed in this hideous disco shirt, so I literally took the checkered flannel shirt off my back for him to wear in the scene. He was super cute, which definitely added some spice to the scene when the veteran models chowed down on him! Breckenridge is at an elevation of 10,000 feet, which makes the air very thin. It was hard on our lungs, and just walking upstairs made it hard to breathe. We hated that, but all really loved the location and fabulous restaurants we would go to each night!

Ray sends the boys home, then works with Rambo to see who is behind the murder of his lover. When going through the virus on the disc, he sees the "fingerprint" of underworld kingpin Robert Carpathian. They devise a plan to get Rambo onto the kingpin's property by going undercover as a catering assistant for Ray's friend Lyle. Tired and exhausted, the two hit the sack, but evidently they weren't too tired to revisit their past sexual connection. Even though this movie came out way after his debut in Meet Ray Harley, this was truly the first scene Ray Harley shot for Catalina. I was surprised how natural he was when shooting dialogue, and how "un-nervous" he was shooting his first sex scene!

Rambo heads to Sedona Arizona, filmed in Scottsdale (because we really couldn’t afford to shoot in Sedona). I had some great footage of Sedona from a previous vacation, so I incorporated it and used it as the location. Rambo meets up with Lyle, played by my right hand man and head of the crew, Brad Austin. They are catering the Kingpin's poolside sex-party where hard cock and bubble butts are on the menu. Robert Carpathian is played perfectly by Tony Bullitt. Can I just say that Tony Bullitt was one hot fucking stud on the set that day. Not a typical look for a Catalina movie, but what a look! His two henchmen, Cole Tucker (winner of the GayVN for Best Supporting Actor 1998 for this role) and Tom (DJ Tommy Rocker) Walker (winner of the Grabby 1998 for Best Non-Sexual Performer), really elevate the movie with their performances.

The pool scene was shot at the beautiful home of a doctor and his lover... who thankfully gave me a prescription, because I had a terrible case of bronchitis that came over me the day before. I was wheezing and feeling like shit, but the movie needed to be made. To make matters worse, I was barely able to breathe (again!) and had to shoot a good portion of it with an underwater camera. A hot blond model who I had never worked with before named Matthew Anders had the best bubble butt I'd seen in ages! The shots of him getting rimmed and sucked underwater while hanging onto a raft was some of the hottest footage of the day. Even if it nearly killed me. Just the day before, we were at a gay resort in Phoenix where we were supposed to film scenes for another movie and reside there for the time we were in Arizona. The owners were nice, but the resort was pretty sketchy, with some shady characters coming in and out of the place. The whole vibe sucked and it was right across the street from what seemed to be "no" income housing. I felt like we were going to get our equipment stolen if we ever let it out of our sight. The crew was freaked out as well, so Brad Austin and I called around and found a great "hetero" place in Scottsdale, which was so accommodating after hearing about our predicament that they gave us great room rates. I was convinced that the shitty showerhead from the gay resort that basically had you shower in a "mist" gave me the bronchitis. The poolside orgy scene with the large cast worked out great and Rambo got the information he needed by sneaking into Tony Bullitt's office!

 

Rambo now had what he needed to get in the hands of his buddy (Doug Jeffries, who started the whole mess), so he flew to Chicago. Unfortunately for him, Carpathian knows he's going there and sends his two henchmen after him. Being a two hour porno movie where the name of the game is sex, the two henchmen simply stumble upon Steve Rambo in Chicago while he’s in a phone booth talking to Jeffries. A foot chase ensues, which was great fun to film on the streets of Chicago, mostly around the Ramada Congress Hotel. Rambo on the run is cornered in an alley and slips through the side door of some unknown building. Once he enters that door, we see that he has found himself backstage at the Congress Theatre where the 1997 International Mr. Leather Contest is in full swing. We were set up to shoot the show and only had about one hour to get some shots of Rambo and the henchmen running through the halls of the theatre filled with leather men. I swear, they barely even noticed us shooting the scenes because this place was a cruise fest! It seemed such a waste to be having to work while all this was going on! Rambo runs and hides in a bathroom stall in a scene that we shot the day before when the theatre was empty. He overhears two guys going at it, then the henchmen come in and he overhears their conversation. Once the two leather dudes blow their loads and the henchmen leave, he comes out of the stall only to run into old friend Tony Zerega, who he hadn't seen in years. Zerega is at the contest with Rambo’s old buddies Max Grand, Cliff Parker, Mark Hamilton, and Antonio. The group of guys help Rambo trap henchman Cole Tucker by seducing him before overpowering and handcuffing him. That group scene was also shot the previous day in the theatre. I'm exhausted just remembering all we had to pack into that shoot day!

To wrap things up, Cole Tucker is detained, but henchman Tom Walker shows up, pulls out a gun and chases Rambo through the theatre and down into the bowels of the complex. Rambo's only way out is through a sewer drain. He jumps down into the sewers, followed by the gun-wielding Tom Walker. The sewers, actually, were filmed in this really cool pool off Mulholland Drive in Los Angeles. The house was a few houses down from the gates to Jack Nicolson’s home, which added to the fun! After shooting the box cover for CatalinaVille with Rambo in a tank top, waist deep in the sewer, we shot the scene between him and Walker. Kudos to both of them, as it was fucking freezing (for L.A., that means 60 degrees) and the water was even colder. We ran garden hoses down the stone walls of the pool, which made for a great effect, and got very creative with the camera so as not to ruin the illusion. Rambo conquers all, of course, with a kick ass fight finished by shooting the henchman. Weeks later, we shot him coming out of a real sewer in Tarzan, California, near the 101 freeway and the Catalina Offices. He gets the floppy disc to the authorities. "The End." Credits roll.

 

Making CatalinaVille, for me, was one of the very high points of my career. Even though it’s not a perfect movie, it has a lot of teeth and some really fabulous sex scenes. I just finished restoring and re-polishing the "PG" version of the movie on my YouTube Channel for a Thanksgiving release. The "PG" version is only 38 minutes, perfectly “do-able”… take a peek if you’d like. Steve Rambo won Best Actor at the Grabby Awards 1998 for his role in this movie and he just messaged me to say he would be watching Thanksgiving Day. Even if he was the only one I enhanced and cut this new version for, it would be worth it to me. Steve Rambo really gave everything he had to this role, got himself in the best shape of his life and, in turn, our bond as co-workers was sealed.

Bio of Josh Eliot:

At the age of 25 in 1987, Josh Eliot was hired by Catalina Video by John Travis (Brentwood Video) and Scott Masters (Nova Video). Travis trained Eliot on his style of videography and mentored him on the art of directing. Josh directed his first movie, Runaways, in 1987. By 2009 when Josh parted ways with Catalina Video, he'd produced and directed hundreds of features and won numerous awards for Best Screenplay, Videography, Editing, and Directing. He was entered into the GayVN Hall of fame in 2002.

By Josh Eliot

Catalina releases The Young Cadets (1987) and Private Dick (1990) both stand out to me as milestone movies for many reasons. Dan Allman worked on many of William Higgins movies and all of John Travis and Scott Masters' Catalina movies until 1989 as art director and videographer. He also directed under the name Cameron Leight. I previously thought that Cameron Leight’s movie Bad Boys Club, starring Johnny Davenport, was the only movie he directed. I was wrong. Once I tracked down DVD copies of Private Dick and The Young Cadets, I started getting back a flood of memories. The Young Cadets starred Chris Williams, included a supporting cast featuring Derek Jensen, Mike Gregory and Tony Marino and marked the screen debut of Sparky O’Toole. Sadly, Chris Williams passed away in 1991 and Sparky in 1999, and just now discovering this is absolutely shocking to me. This was one of the very first features (after Bulge) that I worked on as a new employee. Once I re-watched the “paddling scene,” I was taken back to 1987. I was pretty much the “fill light guy,” basically being attached to the hip of Dan as he compiled shots of the assorted sex scenes. I would follow him with the additional 400W light to kill any shadows if he was underneath, overhead or panning across the bodies. It gave me my first insights into how to get good angles. This was also the feature where Dan let me shoot the second cum shot angle on camera 2 for the first time. I think I fucked one up by not rolling on it quick enough. I could tell Dan was pissed that I missed it, but of course acted like it was “okay.” I never did that again!

Regarding Private Dick, when I re-watched this little masterpiece for the first time in 33 years, I started remembering shooting it like it was yesterday. First, let me say that I am so happy that Cameron Leight got to make this movie. Bad Boys Club, though extremely popular upon its release, was a bit of a mish-mash. The Young Cadets was polished and had great sex, but was a pretty simplistic story. Private Dick, on the other hand, was well thought out, written and executed. Dan and I built some really fun, fabulous sets for it, like the private investigator’s office and a photographer’s multilevel studio. All the lighting and costumes and story were very Film Noir. It was a passion project for him, and watching it back, I really got a glimpse of how awesome a director he would have become. Unfortunately ,shortly after making this movie Dan, out of the blue, left the company. This was a huge loss for Catalina, as he was one of the pioneers along with Higgins. We discovered he was ill and it wasn’t long before we got word that he had passed away.

Dan was always very positive, despite the pressure of running the San Francisco studio and being at Scott Masters beck and call. I learned later just how draining that could be! Scott Masters, being great at the job of producing, found a hot new face to star in Private Dick. His name was Bill Marlowe. He had several movies under his belt prior to being cast as the lead. Bill Marlowe appeared in Lust Boys and Sex, Lies and Videotape both for Sierra Pacific, as well as Heat in the Night for Huge Video. He was handsome, with leading man good looks, had the perfect persona for the undercover investigator and lived locally in San Francisco. In the story, Victoria Hunt enters the investigator’s office asking him to track her husband, as she is convinced that he is having an affair. When Dan asked me if I had any friends who could play the role of Victoria, I knew right away that I wanted my friend Sandy. Sandy was from Minnesota and to me was a dead ringer for a young Meryl Streep. She starred in my video school class project as the 1920’s Coca-Cola girl, running around San Francisco with a bottle in her hand being pursued by her male lover. I ended up using that footage years later in the opening credits of my movie Score. Sandy was gorgeous, but not in the porn industry; luckily, it was San Francisco in the 80’s and everyone and everything was free and easy. She said yes to working on the XXX movie, we gave her the stage name Rita Davis (Rita Hayworth / Bette Davis gene mixture) and before we knew it she was on the set opposite Bill Marlowe shooting their scenes together. She shows up to the office dressed very “Alexis Carrington Colby,” fabulous hat and all, and then again at the end of the movie with her golden locks styled in the latest 80’s hairstyle. Dan was thrilled that her performance elevated his movie.

The cast was a virtual who’s who of the time including Lou Cass, Keith Panther, Tony Lanza, Brad Carlton and Vic “We Waited 8hrs for a Cum Shot” Summers. One other addition to the cast was Chris Dano. In 1989, Chris Dano’s debut into the porn world occurred in Hard Men 2: No Strings Attached, a Chippendales-type video where the models stripped and danced with hard-ons. He then performed his first hardcore scene in the Scott Masters movie Head of the Class 2. The next year, Chris also appeared in John Travis’ Foxhole and Cameron Leight’s Private Dick. Chris Dano was literally the only model I continued to work with on and off throughout my entire 20+ years of making movies with Catalina Video. I literally watched him grow up throughout the years. When I researched him for this blog, I found that Chris, also known as Ekzavir Falcon Wray, continued making a ton of movies all the way up until 2010. He is currently 57 years old and still looks amazing! He is one powerhouse performer who always got that giant uncut dick hard and came on cue always with a smile on his face and a great attitude.

Bill Marlowe, the lead for Private Dick, continued making movies - not as long as Dano, but for a significant amount of time, including a movie called Gorgeous in 1993 for Bijou Video. Unique to most performers of the time, Marlowe as a leading man both topped and bottomed in his roles. Born in 1967, he is currently 56. After running into him in the Castro while on a trip to San Francisco in 1992, I ended up casting him as a co-lead in the movie Easy Riders when we returned to San Francisco to shoot it. Always a great guy on and off the set, Bill Marlowe had a long and successful career with an array of studios.

I can remember it like it was yesterday when I met Dan Allman and his boyfriend John in their Twin Peaks neighborhood apartment a few days after interviewing with John Travis and Scott Masters in that Tenderloin fleabag motel. Dan and John made me feel comfortable and welcomed, giving me their blessing on becoming a new member of the crew, literally on my 25th birthday. Dan took me under his wing and showed me all the nuts and bolts of building sets and managing the studio. Living in San Francisco, I didn’t own a car, so Dan would pick me up each day in the company's Chevy van when we went to the studio, eventually letting me use the Nissan when it wasn’t needed for the directors and models. We searched for and found an apartment to house the directors and models and furnished and decorated it together. He taught me how to build flats for sets, introduced me to Duvateen Fabric (jet black cloth for a nighttime look) and trained me on the initial protocols with the video cameras. Having only taken “wood shop” in high school, my building skills were at a minimum, but he really got me to a good place with carpentry. I wish I had more time working with Dan and had inherited his job under very different circumstances. I would draw upon my interactions with him regularly throughout my career with Catalina Video, asking myself, “How would Dan handle this?” I wish the gay porn world could have experienced more movies directed by Cameron Leight, because this small trio of movies really tells us just how good he was at the craft. He was poised to become Catalina’s newest top ranking director had his opportunity not been cut short. Drawing upon his vast experience working with Higgins, Travis and Masters, I am convinced that his contribution to the industry would have been significant.

Here is a trailer for Cameron Leight’s Private Dick.

Bio of Josh Eliot:

At the age of 25 in 1987, Josh Eliot was hired by Catalina Video by John Travis (Brentwood Video) and Scott Masters (Nova Video).Travis trained Eliot on his style of videography and mentored him on the art of directing. Josh directed his first movie, Runaways, in 1987. By 2009 when Josh parted ways with Catalina Video, he'd produced and directed hundreds of features and won numerous awards for Best Screenplay, Videography, Editing, and Directing. He was entered into the GayVN Hall of fame in 2002.