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Retrostuds of the Past: Focus on Lee Ryder

Retrostuds of the Past: Focus on Lee Ryder

We at Bijou carry back issues of Manshots magazines, which was, I think, in its heyday (the late eighties and early nineties), offered a sophisticated approach to gay porn; its video reviews were generally cogent and intelligent, even scholarly. It treated gay porn in all its variety of genres like something that deserved thoughtful analysis, especially the movies now legendary directors like Steve Scott, Toby Ross, and Tom DeSimone made (movies Bijou carries, by the way).

And Manshots also offered some telling biographies of and interviews with most of the great gay porn stars of the past; again, treating their lives (and of course their activities on screen) as something as interesting and entertaining as any feature on a celebrity in a mainstream magazine like People.

And if there was a gay porn star, or “retrostud” who deserved celebrity treatment, it was Lee Ryder. But like many of the gay porn stars of that period, as noted in the all­too­common “Fade Out” feature at the back of so many back issues of Manshots, he died of AIDS-­related complications (in 1991).

Lee Ryder was born in 1959 as Darras Robert Pyron. He was California born and bred, raised in Laguna, and he graduated from Esperanza High School in Anaheim.

After Mark Reynolds discovered him and featured him in All American Boys, he literally made a splash in Falcon Studio's Huge in 1982.

He starred in thirteen features between 1982 and 1986, including Bijou titles Screenplay, A Few Good Men, Giants 1, and 2 X 10.

Now, of course, if one views these films, it's clear that Lee Ryder's cock is pretty much legendary. According to one Jeff Starkey, who reviewed the movie Screenplay in tandem with Ryder's appearances at the Bijou Theater to greet fans and sign autographs back in 1984:

"Ryder's cock is long, thick, and shapely and is criss­crossed by just the right number of lovely veins. Beneath it hang a perfectly balanced pair of what appear to be 5­pound balls. When his cock appears in public, it is usually hard as a baseball bat, with its swollen head looking purple and petulant."

Purple and petulant? Wow. Perhaps those adjectives could apply to the cock, but not the person.

In an interview with Stallion magazine, known for his sexually aggressive but also unforced, natural screen presence, seems rather low­key, both veering between a quiet confidence in himself, but also showing a somewhat self­-deprecating attitude. Definitely not the “divo” attitude of so many celebrities: “Everyone wants to look at me, I am the 
Adonis with the giant cock and all should worship me."

 

In fact, in the interview, he actually seems rather pragmatic: he does it for the money, and for his business (he actually was a successful floral designer), but ... he actually doesn't see himself as a sex symbol. He just enjoys being himself, and letting a chink of vulnerability come out, being wanted.

(We also find out in the interview he had a relationship with an older guy from ages 15 to 18, who tragically committed suicide soon after they broke up.)

To add to the complexity of his character, despite his appearance at the Bijou and other venues as a gay porn celebrity, he actually admits he would rather not be recognized (he even goes to Europe to escape the attention)... and he notices, even when he does, the guys stay away, or “they stare – I guess I do show a big crotch – or they look at my eyes.”

To be honest, at least for me, the eyes can be just as erotic as, especially in Ryder's case, a dick of death. And Ryder he admits in the interview that he loves his eyes. And rightly so!

 

His eyes make love to the camera, like those of that famous movie star Joan Crawford (completely the opposite in her approach to celebrity). The eyes themselves create a unique effect in the viewer; they seem to draw you in with a promise of something intense; you think he is looking directly at you via the camera, which could satisfy your desire, but you at the same time feel like you will always want more. Perhaps it's their narrow shape but also richly colored pupils. I don't know, but I can't stop looking at his picture on the cover on Stallion magazine as I write this piece.

And I promise you, you won't be able to take your eyes off of Lee Ryder in our remastering of Huge (now Huge 1) as he beats his meat while perched on the toilet ­ ­ making it bigger, hotter and harder. He, Rick Jensen and Matt Stoker roll around on the cold concrete floor, licking each other's hairy armpits and sitting on each other's faces.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


 

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Retrostuds of the Past: Focus on Pierce Daniels

Retrostuds of the Past: Focus on Pierce Daniels

“Pierce is quite stunning and every time I look at him I do get a bit weak. Looking at his photos that night I began to want to see him naked immediately.” – randyblue.com

I must say I agree with the above quote, especially after looking at some of the photos in our files.
 

In 1985, Pierce did a spread for Honcho magazine, challenging the viewer to touch, yes, just touch his virile, richly textured cock: “I know what you want; you're not the only one who wants it. But not everyone can have it. What makes you so special? … This is what you want. It takes something special to make me give it to you. Show me your hidden talents. Not bad; go ahead and touch it. If you're real good I'll let you do more than touch it.”

Getting aroused? I hope so. Sometimes the hunger is actually the satiation. Like Gypsy Rose Lee, he'll take it off, ever so slowly, but by doing to edge you to the point of ecstasy.

Pierce Daniels, aka Rusty Wolshez (Russell Wallace), was born on September 5, 1958 in Fresno, California. He was active as a performer from 1985 to 1994.

I don't have any more biographical information. Pierce's legacy, however, lives on in several movies Bijou Video carries (on DVD at bijouworld.com and streaming instantly at bijougayporn.com), including Gotta Have It, Perfect 10, Therapy, Lovers and Friends, Windows and Century Mining. He doesn't take on the starring role in these movies, but his “gay macho” look combined with his effortless sexual technique (he's so confident wielding his uncut manmeat) make him stand out.

In Gotta Have It, a silent Pierce Daniels (“rugged, bearded and pretty all at the same time”) is shown voyeuring the massive black hunk Tyrone Washington and Bobbie Davis,while jerking off his uncut dick.

In Perfect 10, Pierce Daniels gets a vigorous butt-pounding by Chaz Holderman while he's swallowing Chad's hard-on (he swallows all of it too, only matched (at least on video) by Gino Del Mar in that feat). Strong jabs encompass this hot fuck and the camera zooms in to show him pulling all the way out of Pierce's hole.

In Therapy, a guy enters an alley where two men are hanging out and sucks one of them off through his chaps. The second man (Daniels) whips out his foreskinned, cockringed meat and gets it beat off while watching the blowjob. Anal sex leads to a three-way and squeezed balls leading to orgasms.
 

In Lovers and Friends, Pierce Daniels rims and fucks Joel Curry (the lover of Ron Pearson in this movie) in a kitchen. Cole Taylor, playing a waiter, joins the twosome and throws a second fuck into the insatiable Curry. Kinkiness in the ensuing threeway includes Daniels turning Curry over, spreading vanilla topping all over his ass, and licking every bit of it off. Now, that is true food porn!

And in Century Mining, Daniels is in the opening scene. Eric Ryan lies in bed. His fellow mine worker, a ravishing Pierce Daniels, enters and scolds Ryan, "you're gonna be late!" Ryan has other things on his mind, mainly the throbbing boner beneath the sheets. He attempts to lure Daniels into bed, but is denied, as Daniels wants to keep his job and pre-shift sex will surely get them fired!

Daniels appears in the last scene of the movie, the orgy that occurs after the mine collapse. Yes, sex and death, always a combo! He spends what might be the last few hours of his life stroking his snake and twisting his low hangers around his shaft while fantasizing about some hot fuck-piggery he'd engaged in with Eric Ryan.

Tragically, the sex-death combination caught up with Pierce literally.

 

Like many of his compatriots, he died of AIDS-related complications, in his case, on July 8, 1995.

If anyone has any more information about this totally hot retrostud, please email bijouvideo@gmail.com.

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Retrostuds of the Past: Focus on Gordon Grant

Retrostuds of the Past: Focus on Gordon Grant

 


Gordon Grant! He's the total rock solid muscle hunk with a 9 inch uncut cock who's featured in several magazines and brochures we carry and on the covers of our titles Pleasures in the Sun and Hot Truckin'. In Hot Truckin', tough-looking Gordon, called Buck, is a handsome deliverman who sucks and fucks blue-collar types while on the job - first a carpenter, then a painter - both young, handsome, and horny. He and his co-worker (Nick Rodgers) end up picking up a hitchhiker … in more ways than one.
 

Born in Alaska of Dutch and Nez Perce Indigenous heritage, he appeared in such films many of the FalconPacs, like The Lifeguard, Working Late, and The Crotchwatcher in the 1970s and 1980s.
 

Gordon Grant on a beach in The Lifeguard

He also appeared in Dirty Words, billed as Falcon's first feature film (as opposed to loops). He also went by the name of Don Bowman.

According to a vintage Colt magazine, he worked for two years as a construction worker on the Trans-Alaska pipeline. Ripe fantasy material …

Gordon also did some stunning Colt photo spreads, often modeling two figures in the Village People gamut: cowboy and construction worker. Wow! Such big arms!
 

Gordon Grant cowboy Colt photo

 


He pretty much epitomizes the original Colt man, a direct descendant of all those muscle beefcake types that appeared in magazines like Physique Pictorial and Tomorrow's Man.



Gordon Grant - Backpacking to Nature - Colt photo


Gordon has passed on, but information is obscure. A couple of sources claim he died in the early 1990s from AIDS related causes, the fate of so many porn stars of that generation, but I could find nothing specific.

Still, he pretty much has entered the Mount Olympus of gay porn icons.
 

 


 

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Retrostuds of the Past: Focus on Leo Ford

Retrostuds of the Past: Focus on Leo Ford

 

The appeal of blonds. Flaxen hair, the color of wheat. Usually with blue eyes. 

Blonde bombshells. Dumb blondes. Ditzy blondes. Marilyn Monroe! 

Blond beach beefcake. Vikings. Nordic supermen.  Tab Hunter! 

But they are also portrayed quite often in the movies especially as villains

I am thinking of that bunny boiler Alex Forrest in Fatal Attraction, and more recently, Two­Face in The Dark Knight

So many stereotypes about blonds and blondes. What's the fascination? Some people really glorify that hair color, even while making fun of those who are born with it and making them evil. Perhaps some envy going on there? You know, I love and hate you because I'll never be naturally blond like you. 

The gay blond pornstar kind of fits more in with the clean cut blond beefcake image that harks back to the muscle beach culture of the 1950s and 60s. Later, the muscles became less prominent and the skinnier youngman became the ideal. 

The first gay porn studies like Falcon picked up on both images, and as the seventies progressed, the hair grew longer and the image became less clean cut. Think of the white trash blond Robert Prion type, still the boy next door, but a real sex pig. 

One blond porn star, who, as his obituary in Manshots claims, exemplified the more clean cut blond image that resurfaced in the “GQ-yuppie” eighties, was Leo Hilgeford, who shortened his name to Leo Ford when he began to make adult films. 

Leo Ford


Leo was pretty much a phenomenon, cranking out one legendary porn classic after another. 
 

Jamie Wingo and Leo Ford in Flashbacks

His career began when he and this then-lover, Jamie Wingo, appeared in J. Brian's classic 1981 Flashbacks. He also appeared in Blonds Do It BestSailor in the Wild, and Games.

 

In Games, Leo Ford portrays a swimmer participating in the first San Francisco Gay Games.

 

His sex scenes are phenomenal, totally unforced and natural, and he even gets one with the legendary Al Parker, who plays a photographer. 

 

Leo also inherited some slides from J. Brian. When he died, he was planning to make them into a video.

 

Bijouworld now owns these slides, and we have scanned them into our digital archives. 


Leo died of head injuries sustained in a traffic accident in 1991. He and his lover, Craig Markle, were riding on their motorcycle when another vehicle sideswiped them. 

 

Check out our website for Games and Flashbacks, and for other titles (Leo is also featured  2015 Retrostuds Calendar as the February coverboy) that show those sometimes sexily evil blonds do it best and have more fun. 

 

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Retrostuds of the Past: Focus on Lee Ryder

Retrostuds of the Past: Focus on Lee Ryder

 

We at Bijou carry back issues of Manshots magazine, which was, I think, in its heyday (the late eighties and early nineties), offered a sophisticated approach to gay porn; its video reviews were generally cogent and intelligent, even scholarly. It treated gay porn in all its variety of genres like something that deserved thoughtful analysis, especially the movies now legendary directors like Steve Scott, Toby Ross, and Tom DeSimone made (movies Bijou carries, by the way). 


And Manshots also offered some telling biographies of and interviews with most of the great gay porn stars of the past; again, treating their lives (and of course their activities on screen) as something as interesting and entertaining as any feature on a celebrity in a mainstream magazine likePeople

And if there was a gay porn star, or “retrostud” who deserved celebrity treatment, it was Lee Ryder. But like many of the gay porn stars of that period, as noted in the all­too­common “Fade Out” feature at the back of so many back issues of Manshots, he died of AIDS-­related complications (in 1991). 

 

Lee Ryder Fade Out feature in Manshots magazine

Lee Ryder was born in 1959 as Darras Robert Pyron. He was California born and bred, raised in Laguna, and he graduated from Esperanza High School in Anaheim. 

After Mark Reynolds discovered him and featured him in All American Boys, he literally made a splash in Falcon Studio's Huge in 1982. 

He starred in thirteen features between 1982 and 1986, including Bijou titles ScreenplayA Few Good MenGiants 1, and 2 X 10

Now, of course, if one views these films, it's clear that Lee Ryder's cock is pretty much legendary. According to one Jeff Starkey, who reviewed the movie Screenplay in tandem with Ryder's appearances at the Bijou Theater to greet fans and sign autographs back in 1984: 

"Ryder's cock is long, thick, and shapely and is criss­crossed by just the right number of lovely veins. Beneath it hang a perfectly balanced pair of what appear to be 5­pound balls. When his cock appears in public, it is usually hard as a baseball bat, with its swollen head looking purple and petulant." 

Purple and petulant? Wow. Perhaps those adjectives could apply to the cock, but not the person. 

In an interview with Stallion magazine, known for his sexually aggressive but also unforced, natural screen presence, seems rather low­key, both veering between a quiet confidence in himself, but also showing a somewhat self­deprecating attitude. Definitely not the “divo” attitude of so many celebrities: “Everyone wants to look at me, I am the Adonis with the giant cock and all should worship me. 

 

Lee Ryder on Stallion magazine cover


In fact, in the interview, he actually seems rather pragmatic: he does it for the money, and for his business (he actually was a successful floral designer), but ... he actually doesn't see himself as a sex symbol. He just enjoys being himself, and letting a chink of vulnerability come out, being wanted. 

(We also find out in the interview he had a relationship with an older guy from ages 15 to 18, who tragically committed suicide soon after they broke up.) 

To add to the complexity of his character, despite his appearance at the Bijou and other venues as a gay porn celebrity, he actually admits he would rather not be recognized (he even goes to Europe to escape the attention)... and he notices, even when he does, the guys stay away, or “they stare – I guess I do show a big crotch – or they look at my eyes.” 

To be honest, at least for me, the eyes can be just as erotic as, especially in Ryder's case, a dick of death. And Ryder he admits in the interview that he loves his eyes. And rightly so! 

 

Lee Ryder

His eyes make love to the camera, like those of that famous movie star Joan Crawford (completely the opposite in her approach to celebrity). The eyes themselves create a unique effect in the viewer; they seem to draw you in with a promise of something intense; you think he is looking directly at you via the camera, which could satisfy your desire, but you at the same time feel like you will always want more. Perhaps it's their narrow shape but also richly colored pupils. I don't know, but I can't stop looking at his picture on the cover on Stallion magazine as I write this piece. 

And I promise you, you won't be able to take your eyes off of Lee Ryder in our remastering of Huge (now Huge 1) as he beats his meat while perched on the toilet ­ ­ making it bigger, hotter and harder. He, Rick Jensen and Matt Stoker roll around on the cold concrete floor, licking each other's hairy armpits and sitting on each other's faces. 

 

Lee Ryder jerking off on a toilet in Huge 1
 
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