Why the porn industry threatened to boycott Samuel L Jackson: “Superheroes don’t steal”
As one of the industry’s most popular and prolific actors, Samuel L Jackson will never be out of work for too long. He’s also the highest-grossing performer in cinema history, which made the threat of a boycott from the porn industry carry little weight when it was lobbed in his direction.
After all, he’s been in ten movies that have cleared $1 billion at the box office, another seven that have cleared $500 million, and a further 13 that have soared past $250 million in ticket sales. Clearly, he knows how to choose roles that will be seen by the widest possible audience, so some backlash from the adult entertainment industry didn’t stand a chance of knocking the wind out of his sails.
That said, it’s impossible to understate the influence porn has on several media evolutions. Yes, it’s an oversimplification, but it’s not untrue that one of the major reasons why VHS defeated Betamax in the home video wars is that porno sided more with the former than the latter, which gave it a significant advantage in terms of sales.
Skin flicks also helped phase out the Laserdisc when DVDs arrived on the scene, never mind that porn was also an early adopter of subscription-based websites, video streaming, and infomercials. What does any of that have to do with Samuel L Jackson? Well, he ruffled feathers when he recommended what’s become one of the biggest thorns in the side of porno professionals: watching it for free.
When promoting Marvel Studios’ Captain America: The Winter Soldier, the franchise’s Nick Fury was asked what he’d recommend to Chris Evans’ Steve Rogers, the World War II super-soldier who spent almost seven decades frozen in ice before being defrosted in the modern world, and his response wasn’t Disney-friendly.
“RedTube,” he declared. “It’s one of the best pop culture achievements of the last 50 years.” He might have been joking, or he might have revealed too much information about how he spends his free time when he’s not on set, but one thing that was definitely true is that he pissed off some porno veterans.
Tanya Tate explained that pirating free porn directly affects her livelihood because she also produced the content she performed in and directed. “I would gladly send a catalogue of adult movies I have directed to Mr Jackson if he would be so kind as to recant the comment,” she kindly offered. “I have a stack of porn for him to help see the error of his ways.”
Catalina Cruz called for a boycott of Jackson’s movies until he apologised for his comments, likening the free websites that took money from the pockets of the people who made the films to Hollywood’s battles against piracy and illegal streaming, which naturally gained much more public attention than the similar plight that had befallen the porn business.
Their mantra, and opposition, toward the Kangol hat-wearing icon was simple: “Superheroes don’t steal porn.” Technically, Nick Fury isn’t a superhero, but you get the point. Did he issue a public apology and insist that everyone pay for their porn? Not as far as anyone is aware, but the less we know about his porno habits behind closed doors, the better.
