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Evil Angel Video – A 30 Year Success Story

By on February 13, 2019

John Stagliano grew up in Chicago at the end of 1951 and went to high school from 1965 to 1969, when the sexual revolution was happening. “There were all these interesting images starting to come up in society and on TV. I’ve always felt that that was significant in my development. I was in college during the fall of 1969 and I dropped out of college after that for a few semesters. I just barely managed to avoid the draft because I was too young.”

“When I first came to California, it never entered my mind that I could have a career in the entertainment industry. I majored in about six different things in my first two years of college from English to Journalism to Engineering. There was a time when I really wanted to be a baseball player. Then I got into economics. By the time I got to my senior year I had lost interest in economics. I transferred to UCLA and when I was in my senior year at UCLA I took all the theater arts and modern dance classes, but at first that was mostly because the girls would wear these little leotards that would creep up into their butts. There were very few girls in economics classes.”

“I also started taking acting classes in 1973 but I was terrible as an actor. I was still trying to write a little bit. In 1975 I started taking dance classes seriously, I like the physicality of dancing. I had also developed an affinity for music, so that tied in as well. These were all things that I didn’t think I had any talent for. I don’t know if it’s my Italian heritage, the fact that some of my grandparents were from Florence but there was an artistic side of me that started to come out when I was in college. “

“In 1979, I answered the ad for male strippers at a club called Chippendales. I was in the first show that they put on. All the other guys in that first show were gay. Within a couple of weeks, the gay guys were gone, and contest dancers had taken their place. This was the disco era so guys from dance contests ended up being the dancers at the club. Since I had some dance training, I could do a more dramatic act. I stayed with the group. That was
a significant thing for me because I got to be creative with what I was doing.”

“So I was a stripper from 1979 until I started producing porn movies in the 1983. In 1982, I also began publishing a small pornographic magazine. In 1983 video was just starting. I was working basically three jobs and I saved enough money to finance this first video. It was shot in 1983 and was called, Bouncing Buns. “

“My first film was Dance Fire, filmed in 1988 starring myself, Trinity Loren, Brandy Alexandre and others so in 1989 I founded the company ‘Evil Angel’ to sell my own films. In 1989, I produced ‘The Adventures of Buttman,’ the first in a popular series which is credited with sparking the ‘gonzo’ adult film genre”. Thus, the year 2019, marks the 30 year anniversary of Evil Angel.

“From October 2004 through February 2008, I produced and directed a Las Vegas show called Fashionistas based on my porn films of the same name. Then in 2008, we won the ‘Best Director – Video’ award for Fashionistas Safado: Berlin (Safado is a Portuguese word meaning lewd or salacious).”

Legal Trial
in 2008, Evil Angel and Stagliano were indicted on federal obscenity charges by a federal grand jury in Washington, D.C. The scenes selected by the government to support the prosecution involved urination, use of enemas, and bondage.

In 2010, a federal trial began in Washington, D.C. with Stagliano as defendant and after three days all charges were dismissed. The judge stated, “I hope the government will learn a lesson from its experience,” and called the evidence linking Stagliano to the production and distribution of the DVD videos “woefully insufficient”. Although he dismissed the charges on the grounds of insufficient evidence, the judge cited the “difficult, challenging and novel questions” raised in the case against Stagliano, questions concerning extant federal obscenity-statutes, the internet, free speech, and the rights of criminal defendants.

Brands and Directors
Initially Evil Angel was founded to distribute and sell John Stagliano movies but over time it has become a distribution house for multiple directors/brands. “I sell my videos, and I also sell the videos of other directors. We are different in that I do not own the videos of these other directors. I only sell their videos and keep a percentage as a fee for my services. I started this arrangement because of my experience selling movies to other companies; they would buy my movies and own them themselves. I found that it was very difficult to build my reputation with the public this way, and I also didn’t get any more money if I did a video that sold exceptionally well.”

“At Evil Angel, I wanted to create an environment where the directors could be rewarded for the hard work they put into creating their product. Here, the directors make more money if their videos sell more. This is a great incentive for them to find new and better ways to make movies. This system has worked very well for 20 years. The DVDs that we make are the best-selling in the business. Each one of our directors is unique in style and content, but similar in their commitment to create the best product possible.”
The following directors’ titles are distributed by Evil Angel and this list is by no means exhaustive –

Aiden Riley, Aiden Starr, Angel Long, Anikka Albrite, Bryan Gozzling, Chris Streams, Erik Everhard, Jay Sin, Jessy Jones, Joey Silvera, Kevin Moore, LeWood, Lisa Ann, Mick Blue, Misha Cross, Nacho Vidal, Proxy Paige, Rocco Siffredi, Toni Ribas , Belladonna, Bobbi Starr, Bruce Seven, Christoph Clark, Raul Cristian, Dana Vespoli, David Perry, Jake Malone, Jazz Duro, John Leslie, Lexington Steele, Manuel Ferrara, Mike Adriano, Sean Michaels, Steve Holmes, Timo Hardy.

www.evilangelvideo.com

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