Svengali – The Chuck Traynor Story: Part 6, The Marilyn Chambers Years, Podcast 136

On the previous episode of Svengali – The Chuck Traynor Story:

To everyone’s surprise, the sex film Deep Throat (1972) had become a financial hit and a cultural phenomenon. And everybody involved was determined to capitalize on the film’s success – and that included Chuck Traynor, husband and manager of Linda Lovelace, the movie’s leading lady.

When the film blew up, Chuck put Linda through his self-styled media training, positioning her as a small-town, sex-fueled hippie who’d hit the jackpot in the Big Apple. And he got busy putting together deals: he negotiated a lucrative contract for her in the sequel Deep Throat II (1974). He secured a healthy advance for Inside Linda Lovelace, a pseudo-autobiography. He convinced Linda to move to California with him where they ingratiated themselves with high profile figures like Sammy Davis Jr. and Hugh Hefner. And keen to expand Linda’s profile beyond the adult world, Chuck landed her a stage show at Miami’s Paramount Theater.

But as Linda’s star rose, so did her self-confidence. She began to realize that she was drawing the attention and money, not Chuck. And as Linda’s esteem grew, Chuck’s attempts to control her weren’t quite as powerful as they had been.

Finally, in September 1973, after almost three years under Chuck’s thumb, Linda decided to stand up for herself. She filed for divorce, citing abuse and irreconcilable differences. She had a new man at her side too: she was dating David Winters, an English-born dancer and choreographer.

She was free from Chuck and could start a new life. Chuck was ancient history, and would now disappear into the rear-view mirror, right?

Wrong.

Welcome to Episode Six in our series ‘Svengali – The Chuck Traynor Story’.

You can hear the last episode of the Svengali series here.

This episode running time is 66 minutes.

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1. An(other) Autobiography

In early 1974, a second autobiography of Linda Lovelace hit the shelves. It was called ‘The Intimate Diary of Linda Lovelace’. This is how it begins:

“I am taking my life in my hands by writing this. That may sound like a dramatic way to start a book, or just a joke, but it is true. If my arms are broken or I end up in a ditch somewhere, if acid is thrown in my face or I am shot, I want it in black and white.

Once and for all, I have got to be free. Maybe if I tell the whole story, the true story, I will finally get if off my chest and out of my system, and I will be able to forget it forever.

“I have been threatened by a man who is very sick. He is full of violence. He has threatened the lives of my brilliant attorney, my business manager, the man in my life, David Winters; my secretary Dolores and her daughter; and, of course, myself.

“Sometimes I think I will go live in a different country and just never be heard from again. But that would be giving up my life in another way and I am not going to do that either. I am a star now. Here I am, the sex symbol of the seventies, the woman who really believes in giving love and enjoying it, and who is “really free.” The truth is that there was a time when I wasn’t allowed to go for a hamburger by myself. Now I am working to become really free. Free in every way.

“If you noticed the black and blue marks on my body in the movie ‘Deep Throat’, you might have wondered where they came from. I’ll tell you. My husband. Little souvenirs, reminders that he was the colonel and I was the private. From the time I met him, I never did anything, said anything, or went anywhere that was not his idea. That might have been okay if I had been willing. But I was doing terrible things that I didn’t want to do. Not ‘Deep Throat’. I enjoyed doing what I did in ‘Deep Throat’ – it’s what happened sexually with Chuck that I hated.

“The reason I married Chuck wasn’t because of moonlight and violins and love; I married him because he swore to beat the shit out of me if I didn’t. When I refused, he threw me to the ground and kicked me. Somehow, I was persuaded.

“You might wonder how I finally put it all together to get away from Chuck. When I became a big name, everybody wanted to meet me. I began to be myself again. I was around people who were sensitive and kind and treated me like a person. Before I met Chuck, I had been carefree and happy.

“Let me say one final word to my ex-husband. I don’t have any hard feelings anymore. As a matter of fact, I wish you only what you wish yourself: Shit.”

Linda Lovelace

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2. Chuck Responds

‘The Intimate Diary of Linda Lovelace’ was written in three days by a ghost writer, Mel Mandel. Mel had got to know Linda and her new boyfriend, David Winters, and spent hours with her listening to her account of years of abuse suffered at Chuck’s hands. The resulting book was part manifesto, part financial gambit.

When the book was published, Chuck was predictably livid that Linda had gone public with her story. When contacted by reporters, he alleged that the book was paid for with money that was actually his. As Chuck said to one reporter:

“All I know is that I gave David Winters $10,000 to teach her to dance for Linda’s big show. Next thing I know, all of a sudden, Linda, David, and my $10,000 disappear.

“Anybody in his right mind is not going to take that sitting down. Suddenly my creation walks out with some schmuck because she thinks he’s the biggest hustler in Hollywood.

“But none of them realized that I was Linda Lovelace. That body, that throat, and those silicone tits walking around were bullshit, you know? Linda was nothing. But David thought she was a gold mine.

“And Linda bought it, you know? She just listened to everybody telling her what a big star she was and how I was handling her all wrong. That was her mistake.”

When asked about Linda’s claims that he’d started harassing her after she left, Chuck pretty much admitted it:

“I heard from her attorneys that she was filing for divorce and that she wouldn’t honor any of the contracts – she said she considered them illegal because she’d been forced to sign them.

“So I was left in a real bad position by Linda because we were doing pretty good. We’d made about $100,000 in a little less than a year. So, yeah, I was flabbergasted because not only had somebody stolen my old lady, but because I was president of our corporation too.

“So of course, I reacted. I wanted her back. In fact, we have a commitment in Miami that a friend of mine has put up a $10,000 bond on. As you know, somebody is going to suffer if these contracts are broken.”

Linda and David Winters

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3. D-I-V-O-R-C-E

And so Chuck kept on pursuing Linda, using every trick in the book. Linda wrote about Chuck’s pleas in her autobiography:

“Look, I love you and you are my wife,” he said. “I do not think you have sufficient reason to stay separated from me. I was kind enough – and am kind enough – to put up with it for a little bit. I have not given you grounds to stop loving me. And you better not fucking act like I fucking have. I have done nothing wrong. If you go to court with me, you’re going to look like a complete asshole. I haven’t fucking run out on you. I don’t drink. I supported you well. And I’ve taken care of you.”

Linda was adamant however, and when she made clear that there was no way she would remain Chuck’s wife, he changed tactics, trying to appeal to her business sense. Now he’d say: “If you don’t want nothing else, just fake it, babe. If you hate my guts, fine, sleep in the next room. But don’t fucking blow the whole business. That’s all I ask.”

Whatever Chuck said, Linda wasn’t listening any more. In fact, she wanted nothing to do with him. But Chuck retained an ability to surprise. And just as she was bracing herself for a long, drawn-out divorce battle, all of a sudden, Chuck seemed to have a change of heart. He stopped fighting the divorce and said he was willing to let her go. There was one catch: he just wanted what he was entitled to. He filed papers stating that he alone had made ‘Linda Lovelace’ and thus was about to lose out on substantial contractual agreements like their upcoming Paramount theater show in Miami. He argued that he deserved most everything they had as a couple. Yearning to be free of Chuck, Linda relented and gave it all to him.

So Chuck and Linda met at the lawyer’s office and played out the dynamics of their relationship one last time. Chuck recalled: “Linda kept coming on like I was the enemy. I was going to give her a check and started to make it out to Linda Traynor, and she said, “My name’s Linda Lovelace.” I said, “Hey, you’re still my wife, and your name’s Linda Traynor.” But she insisted the check be made out to Linda Lovelace. So I said, ‘Fuck you. It’s going to be Linda Traynor or no check.’”

After finalizing the divorce, Linda recalled Chuck turning to her, and for one brief moment, Linda thought she saw a flash of vulnerability: “He said, ‘Just remember that I love you. And if you ever change your mind, I’ll always be there.’

For Linda, it was too little, too late. All that mattered to her was that she was finally going to be free of Chuck Traynor. To celebrate the divorce, Linda went down to the Los Angeles Superior Court, and legally changed her name to Linda Lovelace, finally claiming the only part of her that Chuck wanted to hold on to.

Linda, photographed by Milton Greene

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4. Moving On

The Traynor divorce may have been final but the legal battles were far from over. Linda’s scheduled show at the Paramount Theater in Miami was under threat – largely because Linda was spending all her time with David Winters. When it was obvious that the rehearsals were going to be delayed, the show’s producer agreed to push back the opening date by a month. But even with the added time, Linda wasn’t ready – or perhaps willing – to go ahead with the performance. So in the end, she decided to break the contract. David suggested that they use illness as the reason, but the organizers weren’t buying it, and they sued Linda Lovelace Enterprises for breach of contract. Rumor was that it was Chuck behind the scenes who was pushing for Linda to be sued.

That was only the start of her legal problems. Remember Phil Mandina from the first part of our Svengali series? He was the lawyer who represented Chuck in his 1971 drug smuggling case. The same lawyer Linda said was actually Chuck’s partner in the drug smuggling operation.

Well, he’d stuck around. In fact, he’d helped Chuck and Linda set up Linda Lovelace Enterprises and acted as their representative for almost all legal matters. When Linda and Chuck divorced, Chuck encouraged Mandina to sue Linda for nonpayment of legal fees for services rendered in 1973.

Linda tried to fight back by revealing sleazy details she knew about Mandina’s past – which didn’t just include being a possible accomplice to drug smuggling. She declared:

“The story of Philip J. Mandina is particularly juicy, as intricate as any espionage novel. In fact, his background is an open cesspool. It involves grand larceny, tax dodges, a wealthy heiress, a call girl, and a cast of sleazy secondary characters that would make any TV writer drool.”

Linda’s lawyers tried to use the information to discredit Mandina’s legal case against Linda but to no avail. Linda ultimately was ordered to pay $32,000 to settle the case.

Linda needed new income streams to pay her bills. She no longer had Chuck making deals for her, so she turned to her boyfriend David Winters. In December 1973, Winters signed a contract for Linda to appear in a touring production of a bedroom farce called ‘Pajama Tops.’ Linda was nervous about signing a long theatrical commitment as she had little acting experience, but she needn’t have been worried: the play closed after just a week due to dismal ticket sales.

Next Winters signed Linda up for a tour of college campuses. Linda spoke at 25 schools in the first six months of 1974 for a fee of around $4,000 a pop. In reality, while Linda did the talking, it was actually Winter’s words she was speaking. He’d written a script for her which was essentially a defense of sex films, and included statements like: “We show action and dying in movies, so why can’t we show love? And sex is a part of love, so why can’t we show sex and why can’t we show love? Why is that banned?”

While Linda worked the university circuit, Winters was also keen to maintain a profile in Hollywood that they could exploit – and sure enough, Linda was invited to attend the Academy Awards. Linda wanted to make a splashy entrance, so they hired a coach drawn by white horses and accompanied by footmen to take her there. When Linda stepped out onto the red carpet, she was wearing a leopard-skin bikini walking a great Dane. Later that evening they partied at the Playboy mansion – a place they visited regularly, often staying for several nights.

But while Winters was working hard to exploit Linda’s name, things weren’t moving fast enough for his liking. So in early 1974, he decided they should make an extended visit to his home country of England. Linda would be a huge hit across the pond, Winters reckoned. Sex comedy films had grown in popularity there, and Brits were hungry for more. ‘Deep Throat’ had been banned from theaters in England, but bootleg copies of the film were still circulating and stories of the film’s popularity in the U.S. were legendary.

Linda in London

Winters started the trip by contacting the English tabloid, the News of the World, and made a deal for front page coverage of Linda. He invested in a campaign that featured photos of Linda on the back of a London double-decker bus. He even rented two Rolls Royce cars for them to drive around and be seen in – one with a license plate that read ‘penis’, the other emblazoned with ‘womb.’ Tasteful, no? Unfortunately, the PR blitz didn’t make much of an impression, and before long they returned to the States, tails between their legs.

Back in California, David tried to secure funding for a production of a comedy about a young inn keeper in the Midwest who murdered her guests and buried them in the backyard. It was a bust – and the play went nowhere. So he came up with another idea: a film called Linda Lovelace for President (1975).

The movie’s plot would be simple and fun. Linda would run for president on a platform of free love, touring the country along a route shaped like an erect penis. Er, and that was it. Remarkably, Winters raised $800,000 for the movie and assembled a respectable cast and crew: the screenplay was by a regular writer for ‘Rowan & Martin’s Laugh In.’ The director was well known for his work on ‘I Dream of Jeanie.’ And the supporting cast included comic Chuck McCann, actor and musician Scatman Crothers, and Micky Dolenz of the Monkees.

Winters arranged for Linda to get a salary of $125,000 and 15% of the film’s profits. And after convincing Hugh Hefner to devote ten pages in Playboy magazine to the movie, Winters was confident those profits would be sizable. But then the film was released.

Reviews appeared quickly and they weren’t kind. Here’s an example from The Boston Globe in early 1975:

“’Linda Lovelace for President’ is rated X, presumably for Xcrutiating. This is, without question, the most witless piece of trash ever made, so bad, in word and deed, that its blistering ineptitude outranks any movie I’ve ever seen. And, Miss Lovelace is best when she keeps her mouth shut.”

The film didn’t fare better at the box office either, and was a complete financial failure. Winters quickly turned his attention to the next vehicle for Linda. He’d recently met a highly prolific Italian film producer named Ovidio Assonitis who was making a name for himself in B-movies. Ovidio thought Linda would make an ideal leading lady for his next picture, an unofficial sequel to the box-office smash, Emmanuelle (1974). The new softcore film was to be called Forever Emmanuelle (1976) (aka Laure), and Linda Lovelace was cast in the lead role earning a salary of $120,000 while Winters would get a healthy sum as co-executive producer. When the film was released in 1976 however, Linda didn’t feature. Ovidio was contacted in recent years to find out what happened, and he claimed he’d had to fire Linda because of her drug use and for refusing to do any nudity.

By now Linda’s relationship with Winters was starting to fall apart. Cracks had started to show as early as January 1974 when Linda and Winters were arrested for cocaine possession in Las Vegas and Linda strongly suspected Winters had set it up for publicity.

Linda noticed how easily David spent their money, lavishly rewarding himself for every project he helped put together – whether it was a success or not. She was surprised one day when Winters came home having bought two Bentleys without even consulting her. And then she learned that while his car was purchased, hers was just leased.

What made it even worse was that Winters had started to exhibit the same type of controlling behavior that she’d endured so painfully in her previous relationship. Winters started demanding that she do exactly what he wanted. This was obviously a sensitive area for Linda, and so she accused Winters of acting just like Chuck. Winters flatly denied this, but at times his words did sound suspiciously like Chuck. See what you think. This is what Winters said to a friend:

“Chuck controlled her in a nasty and terrible way. I controlled her because we had a joint vision – which was to create this incredible movie star and be happy together. She was the product, and I molded her as I wanted her to be.”

But in truth, Linda wasn’t the only one growing weary of the relationship. Winters was tired of what he felt was Linda’s childish and petty behavior. He said she never stopped complaining about Chuck, or lamenting that her fame was still tied to ‘Deep Throat’, a cheap pornographic film.

Even Sammy Davis, Jr., Linda’s ex-lover, pulled Winters aside one day and put it bluntly: “You’re killing your career, kid. What are you doing? Don’t base your life around her.”

The writing was on the wall: Linda’s and Winters’ relationship was on its last legs.

Linda, Keith Moon – drummer from The Who, Micky Dolenz from the The Monkees

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5. Trying Again: Chuck Meets Marilyn Chambers

So, while Linda was trying to make her own way in life and figure out her relationship with David Winters, where was Chuck? Was he waiting in the wings, pining for Linda, and hoping she’d have a change of heart and come running back to him?

Not so much.

As soon as Linda grew close to David Winters, Chuck realized that his grip over his former ingénue was slipping. So what was a guy, who’d dedicated years of his life shaping the persona and professional path of his protégé, supposed to do?

Publisher and provocateur Al Goldstein interviewed Chuck at this time. and asked this very question. Chuck laid out his views:

“I was Linda’s, of course, manager and agent, and sort of over-looker. So I had to keep an eye out on the horizon for who was coming up in the business. And the only person that I could see, that looked like they were gonna come on pretty strong, was Marilyn.”

Marilyn Chambers

The ‘Marilyn’ Chuck is referring to is Marilyn Chambers. She’d become a break-out adult star thanks to the film Behind the Green Door (1972), produced by Jim and Artie Mitchell. The Mitchell Brothers had jumped into the porn business head-first in the late 1960s, opening the infamous O’Farrell Theatre in San Francisco’s Tenderloin neighborhood. Marilyn became the personification of their success and a nationally famous figure.

Artie and Jim Mitchell

Back to Chuck:

“This was about the time Linda met David Winters and decided she was gonna be a big legitimate actress, dancer, and whatnot. And I could see things happening, so I was talking to Marilyn on the phone, Marilyn knew who I was by reputation. And Linda walked out one day about noon time and I called Marilyn about 1 o’clock and she arrived in Los Angeles… 24 hours later. And I just said, “This is the situation. This is the way I operate.” she said, ‘Fine.’”

Marilyn Chambers had started life as Marilyn Briggs, a 19-year-old aspiring actress originally from a middle-class family. As Marilyn later shared in an interview with journalist Geraldo Rivera, she’d always wanted to perform:

Marilyn: “Well I first started in this business when I was about 15 years old. I started communicating into New York from Westport Connecticut.”

Geraldo: “A very staid, respectable community in Connecticut – a suburb of New York really.”

Marilyn: “Right. And I was with about four modeling agencies. And I did a lot of print work – the Ivory Snow box – when I was about 18 I did that. I did a Clairol commercial, Pepsi generation, that kind of thing. I did a lot of television…television work. And I was in a film called ‘The Owl and the Pussycat’ (1970).”

Geraldo: “With Barbara Streisand…”

Marilyn: “Yeah. And at that time I was going to acting school in New York for about a year and a half. And uh Columbia Pictures sent me out to California to do a publicity tour for ‘The Owl and the Pussycat’. And I really fell in love with California. And I decided to move out there – San Francisco. But to my dismay, San Francisco was kind of a… It was a very hip place but it certainly wasn’t the place for an entertainer to be looking for work. So I read an ad in the newspaper one day, hoping I could find a movie part…

Geraldo: “What did the ad say? This I have to hear.”

Marilyn: “’Now casting for a major motion picture.’ Oh, this is my… this is my spot. So I went down and met the Mitchell Brothers. They explained the whole story to me. And I really like the story. About that time in my life, I really decided that instead of being another starlet around Hollywood, you know, who gets lost in the stampede, I thought this is going to be the ‘in thing’ – you know I really had that feeling that this is the way that films were turning.”

Marilyn Chambers

‘Behind the Green Door’ became one of the highest grossing adult movies of the era and Marilyn, motivated and ambitious, was keen to capitalize on the film’s success. Together with Linda Lovelace, Marilyn Chambers was the most famous adult film star of the era.

But whether Chuck approached Marilyn or Marilyn approached Chuck is unclear. Author John Hubner, who profiled the Mitchell Brothers, claimed it was Chuck who pursued Marilyn, reinforcing Chuck’s alpha-male persona. Hubner wrote: “Chuck had approached Marilyn Chambers while he and Linda were still married. After he and Linda split up, Chuck began pursuing Marilyn in earnest. Marilyn finally agreed to meet Chuck while on a trip to New York, and Chuck had a limo waiting for her at the airport. Basically, Chuck convinced Marilyn Chambers that he, better than anyone else in the business, knew how to appeal to the eternal twenty-one-year-old lurking within all men.”

But Marilyn later declared it was actually the other way around, and that it was she who was the one who set her sights on Chuck:

“It was my mission to find Chuck Traynor. I had to find him, had to get this guy. And I wanted him to become my manager because I wanted him to do for me what he did for Linda. My whole life I wanted to be Ann-Margaret, that’s all. I love Ann-Margaret. And that’s who I wanted to be. And I figured Linda was going to get there first. I thought, I’ll be darned if I’m going to let that happen. So I said to Chuck, ‘I really want to meet you.’”

Whomever initiated contact, at this point, as we know, Linda had already started publicly sharing troubling details of her life with Chuck, painting him as cruel and sadistic, a master manipulator. That didn’t deter Marilyn however – she still wanted to meet him, driven by a youthful naiveté that was a combination of ambition and curiosity. During her first meeting with Chuck though, she did look for signs of the abuser that Linda described. This is how she remembered their first encounter:

“Chuck and I got along really well. And I’m thinking, ‘Why are these people saying these horrible things about him? He’s a really nice guy. He’s one of the most intelligent, soft people I’ve ever met in my life. He’s really on the ball. We stayed up all night talking. And he didn’t try to put the move on me at all, which was like “Thank you, Jesus!” He was very much a gentleman.”

So Chuck and Marilyn hit it off from the start, and it didn’t take long for them to agree to form a partnership. Chuck asked his long-time lawyer Phil Mandina to draw up paperwork formalizing the collaboration, and brought it to Marilyn with the expectation that she’d sign then and there. But while Marilyn may have been young, she was no easy mark. She looked it over, made a bunch of red-line edits, and renegotiated her stake in the partnership. Chuck – equal parts irritated and impressed – wasn’t used to this independence from his days with Linda. Nevertheless he signed, and Chambers-Traynor Enterprises was launched.

Just as quickly as Marilyn and Chuck formed a working relationship, they started a romantic one as well. In truth they were both seeing other people at the time: Marilyn was still married to a bag-pipe playing street musician back in San Francisco, and Chuck had started dating Jayne Mansfield’s daughter, Jayne Marie. No matter, from the night they signed their agreement, Marilyn went back to Chuck’s place and moved in.

Now that they had both a business partnership and a romantic relationship, Marilyn made her goals explicit:

“I told Chuck I didn’t want to do erotic films my whole life. I wanted to do a couple of them – and then get out of it. Like I said, I wanted to be Ann-Margaret. I want to be able to make my own decisions, to know exactly where the money’s going, where to put it, how not to get ripped off in taxes by the government. In short, I didn’t want to be a star – I wanted to be a superstar.”

By this time, Marilyn already had another adult feature film under her belt – Resurrection of Eve (1973), another Mitchell Brother’s production.

Chuck agreed with Marilyn: if they wanted her to break into the mainstream, they needed to start diversifying away from the adult industry. And because of his experience with Linda, Chuck had the perfect vehicle in mind: Marilyn should star in her own variety stage show.

To set this up, Chuck needed to secure financing, and for that, he turned to one of his old contacts, Lou Perry aka Lou Peraino – the producer of ‘Deep Throat’ and son of Colombo crime family member Anthony Peraino. Lou was skeptical at first: he wondered if Chuck had another Linda Lovelace on his hands – a woman with a sexual gimmick, sure, but light on talent. But then Marilyn auditioned for Lou by performing a song and dance routine, and he was genuinely impressed, exclaiming “Would you believe that the girl has never had formal training in her life?! This girl has talent!”

Chuck also introduced Marilyn to Sammy Davis Jr., eager to show off Marilyn’s abilities, and see how Sammy could help. Marilyn was understandably nervous about performing in front of such a legendary talent as Sammy, but she needn’t have worried. As she remembered when they went to see him after a performance:

“Sammy came down from a show by cooking and having sex. He was kinky. Sexually, he was into everything. He’d call and say, ‘Come up to the suite after the show, I’m cooking chili.’” The night would inevitably end in an orgy.

Sammy was rumored to have put Marilyn’s latest show together, but when Chuck was later asked by a reporter how much Sammy had been involved, he predictably took credit for it himself. Chuck said:

“My dear friend Sammy Davis Jr. gave me a few pointers, but I was the guy who put this act together.”

Marilyn, with Rip Torn (left)

Just as he’d done with Linda, Chuck told Marilyn exactly what projects she should take on to increase her marketability. In fact, Chuck went further and told her how she should behave. She remembered his instructions in the following way:

“Chuck wanted to create a fantasy where I was untouchable to the people that I was around, but on screen, he wanted me to be very touchable. He said that any star should be a mystery and a fantasy. That’s why guys want her – because they don’t know that she farts and that she is a regular person. Chuck told me, ‘Always give people what they don’t expect.’”

One example of this was that Chuck insisted that any time Marilyn ordered room service at a hotel, she answer the door naked and offer the attendant oral sex in place of a tip. Chuck said he wanted to “create an image of a totally uninhibited sexual creature who would be happy being anything you wanted her to be.”

By December 1973, Marilyn’s stage show – which Chuck titled ‘Skin ‘n’ Grin’ – was ready for a trial run. With Lou Perry’s help, Chuck landed a three-week engagement at the Capital Theater in Passaic, New Jersey. The show opened with Marilyn, clad in a rhinestone-studded costume, singing covers, including “Satisfaction,” “Let the Good Times Roll,” “Green Door,” “Light My Fire,” and “Johnny B. Goode.” The show also included appearances by adult stars Harry Reems and Marc Stevens.

Marilyn on stage

Unlike Linda’s shows with David Winters, the reviews for Marilyn’s were pretty good. One reviewer wrote:

“Marilyn did not disappoint in her valiant job of singing and dancing. Stepping out of a huge mock-up of an Ivory Snow carton dressed in purity white, she gradually stripped down to bra and tights for the finale, when singing and swinging like an old man’s vision of teenage lust, before she disappeared through a green door.”

The theatrical run ran its course and did well, but as with most productions that Chuck had a hand in, this one wasn’t without its problems. In this case, he ended up suing the theater owners claiming Marilyn wasn’t properly paid for her performances. The owners counter-sued, stating Chambers failed to live up to the publicity terms of her contract. The matter was ultimately settled out of court.

In early 1974, they put on the show again, this time at the Riverboat Restaurant in New York, located at the base of the Empire State Building. The New York reviews weren’t as stellar, with one critic writing, “if she wants to go on working in clubs as a star attraction, I suggest she get herself a trapeze again” – referring to the famous sex scene which was at the center of ‘Behind the Green Door’.

Marilyn backstage

But not everyone was underwhelmed by Marilyn’s talent. When the Riverboat engagement closed, Chuck was contacted by Maynard Sloate, the entertainment director at the Union Plaza hotel in Las Vegas. Sloate was staging a comedy called ‘Mind with the Dirty Man’ that featured a porn-star character, and he was interested in casting Marilyn. In truth, Sloate had contacted Linda Lovelace first, but after being turned down, he opted for the only other porn star he’d heard of.

After some negotiation, Chuck and Marilyn agreed to the play and decided to settle in Las Vegas. They bought a ranch just outside of the city and Marilyn began rehearsing the comedy which would premiere in October 1974. Everyone involved was optimistic though unsure of how the production would be received. After all, this was Vegas – home of the big glitzy shows and it would be difficult to compete with many of them. Maynard Sloate himself was cautious, and only set up a three-month run. Much to everyone’s relief, and thanks in large part to heavy promotion featuring Marilyn, the show was popular from the first night.

Suddenly everything was golden in Chuck and Marilyn’s world. Offers flowed in and lucrative opportunities presented themselves each day. Chuck decided they should publish a tell-all ‘autobiography’ of Marilyn, just as he had done with Linda. And, as with ‘Inside Linda Lovelace’, Chuck had a heavy hand in writing it. In truth, the resulting book, titled Marilyn Chambers, My Story, was a quick and dirty effort just like Linda’s autobiography had been. Predictably Marilyn’s dedication on the first page paid tribute to the eternal Svengali in the shadows:

“To Chuck, my Traynor and constant companion,” it read. “Thanks for making my life so beautiful!”

Meanwhile Chuck was about to sign another contract with Marilyn. In December 1974, Chuck and Marilyn got married in Las Vegas, with Sammy Davis Jr. as best man. Their decision to get married is interesting in light of how Marilyn – or Chuck – ends the book:

“People ask if Chuck and I are going to get married. Sure. Of course not. Definitely. Never. The truth is, we don’t know. Marriage isn’t a big thing for us, and if we do it, it will be for very private reasons and it will be done in a very private way. Right now, we like the way we’re living and have no desire to change it, but who knows how we’ll feel next week? I love Chuck, I love making him happy, love pleasing him… And he loves me. And does it really matter if I’m married? Mrs. Chuck Traynor or not, I’ll always be your girl next door.”

Chuck’s public take on their nuptials was a little less romantic. Asked by ‘Time’ magazine why he’d gone from being married to Linda to marrying Marilyn so quickly, Chuck said: “You gotta trade in your old car when it can’t make the hills.”

To which Marilyn responded: “I just hope I’m never your old car.”

Marilyn and Chuck

Instead of a honeymoon, Chuck and Marilyn went on a national book tour to promote the book ‘Marilyn Chambers, My Story’. They did make a pit-stop in Canada before they kicked off the tour. They were there to negotiate a deal to co-publish a book with Xaviera Hollander, the sixth in the Happy Hooker’s pulpy paperback series.

This range, breath, and pace of their activities would come to define Chuck and Marilyn’s partnership. There were TV talk-show appearances. More plays like ‘The Last of the Red Hot Lovers’. Stage shows at venues like Caesars Palace. Parts in mainstream films like David Cronenberg’s ‘Rabid’ (more on that later). And a return to adult films, including the ‘Insatiable’ series about an orphaned heiress with a voracious sexual appetite. She sold shares of her body to fans. She posed for men’s magazines including Genesis, Playboy, and Club. She sang with a country band called “Haywire”. She even released a disco song titled ‘Benihana’ to capitalize on the popularity of adult film star Andrea True’s chart topper ‘More, More, More’.

In short Chuck and Marilyn worked hard to maximize their commercial opportunities. And Chuck was doing what he’d always wanted to do with Linda – exploiting his wife’s talents for her benefit – and for his.

But as much as they made hay while the sun shone, the specter of ‘Deep Throat’ still continued to linger – and sometimes it was downright scary.

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6. The Return of ‘Deep Throat’

On July 7, 1974, ‘Deep Throat’ star Harry Reems was awakened by a knock at the door of his Chelsea apartment in New York. Reems remembered:

“I looked through the peephole and there were three guys holding guns and FBI badges.”

Harry Reems and a collection of mobsters involved in the production or distribution of ‘Deep Throat’ were being indicted in a Memphis federal court for conspiracy to transport obscene material across state lines. The prosecution’s choice of Memphis as a venue was both cynical and creative. Logically since the film was being distributed from New York, and since most of the defendants lived there, New York would have been the natural location for a trial. But to win the case, the government had to show that ‘Deep Throat’ was offensive – and have you ever tried to offend a New Yorker?

Chuck was called as a witness, but Linda, ‘Deep Throat’s star, was not. Along with Gerard Damiano, the film’s director, she was granted immunity in exchange for her testimony behind closed doors.

As for the prosecutor, that was an up-and-coming assistant U.S. attorney named Larry Parrish. He was clear about his position in the interviews he granted before the case went to trial:

“My own personal inclinations are much more strict than the law. From the time I was a little child, I went to church. I rarely missed a Sunday, even in college. I never lost my devotion to Christ or my sincere belief in the Bible and in Scripture. I teach Bible class, mostly to adults. I’m an elder of my church, the First Evangelical Church. If you want to know why I am a prosecutor, you can read Romans 13.”

For those unfamiliar with scripture, that particular Bible verse is a warning to sinners that God has appointed ministers on earth to carry out His wrath against them.

On April 30, 1976, the Memphis jury found all the Deep Throat defendants guilty. A number of the distributors went to jail, including Chuck’s friend and associate, Lou Peraino. Harry Reems immediately appealed, retaining lawyer Alan Dershowitz. To raise money for his defense, Harry was the beneficiary of fundraisers thrown by the likes of Warren Beatty and Jack Nicholson. These famed celebrities claimed Harry’s conviction would have a chilling effect on their profession – and on the First Amendment protection of freedom of speech. Harry’s conviction was finally overturned a year later, though not before Harry had become an alcoholic largely as a result of the stress. Consuming as much as half a gallon of vodka a day and blacking out for months at a time, he contemplated suicide. Harry ultimately was able to free himself of his depression and addiction, but it took years.

Chuck, on the other hand, escaped from the trials unscathed. But he was about to be tried in the court of public opinion.

Harry Reems, with Jack Nicholson and Warren Beatty

*

7. Ordeal

While Chuck was successfully developing Marilyn Chambers’ career, Linda Lovelace was having difficulty moving on with her life. Her relationship with David Winters had finally ended and she was now broke. She was however owed large sums of money from activities that Winters had contracted for her, and so she was in need of help to collect the money due to her.

On a trip back to Florida to see her parents, Linda spent time with her sister Jean and Jean’s ex-boyfriend, a guy named Larry Marchiano. Linda had met Larry years previously in New York when he was dating Jean.

Linda liked and trusted Larry, so when she found out that Larry was between jobs, Linda asked him to return with her to California to help her recover the money she was owed. Larry liked the idea, and he liked it even more when Linda took him to see Sammy Davis Jr. perform in Miami, and Sammy handed Larry a $5k gift to help Linda out.

So Linda and Larry returned together to L.A. and Larry spent most of 1975 trying to help Linda turn her finances around – with limited success. At the end of the year, Larry accompanied Linda on a national tour to promote ‘Linda Lovelace for President’, and it was on this tour that Linda and Larry’s relationship turned from friendly to romantic. By 1976, the two were married and pregnant. Despite Larry’s efforts however, they were still struggling financially as Linda’s career had stalled, so the couple decided to return to New York and settle on Long Island where Larry could find a regular 9-5 job.

In 1977, Linda gave birth to a son. Her domestic life was happy, and though Larry was able to pick up occasional construction work, for the most part, income was still limited so the family went on public assistance.

Linda and Larry

Money became such a problem, they hatched an idea: they reached out to a lawyer named Victor Yannacone who had helped them collect some of the money that Linda was owed. They asked Victor if there was an opportunity to sue Chuck and claw back some of the money he’d made off Linda’s back at the expense of her pain and suffering. Yannacone was straight with them: he didn’t think that was likely. He told them he couldn’t see a path to pursue criminal or civil charges, but he had another idea: he suggested that Linda write another autobiography. This time it should be a serious memoir, he said. He argued that Linda could make her case against Chuck to the public. It was a compelling story, and they could earn some money while doing so.

Linda and Larry liked the idea, so Yannacone introduced them to a journalist and author named Mike McGrady. McGrady remembers first hearing the pitch:

“When I heard about the idea, it was the result of her lawyer speaking to my lawyer and saying, “Gee, I know this woman who’s living in great poverty, they’re eating dog food. They don’t have two nickels to rub together. And her name is Linda Lovelace.”

McGrady was no stranger to writing about sex: he’d gained notoriety several years earlier when he orchestrated the writing and publication of a book titled Naked Came The Stranger. The idea for that book was simple: McGrady wanted to exploit and point a finger at America’s obsession with vulgarity, so he pulled together 24 of his Newsday colleagues to each write a sexual vignette that he then collectively published under the alluring author name, Penelope Ashe. Rather than being considered ridiculous however, the book became a huge success, and spent thirteen weeks on the New York Times bestseller list.

Radley Metzger’s film adaptation of ‘Naked Came The Stranger’

When Yannacone first floated the idea of writing a book with Linda Lovelace, McGrady wasn’t convinced. But like many others, once McGrady met Linda he was taken by her warm and authentic personality. So the two decided to jointly write Linda’s third autobiography and split any income that the book produced.

McGrady said the book was fairly straightforward to write – even if Larry Marchiano was a disruptive presence: Larry insisted on being there all the time, and McGrady had no choice.

If anyone was in any doubt as to the tone the story would have, the book’s title made the book’s content very clear: it was called Ordeal, and the majority of the book’s vitriol was predictably aimed at Chuck. It ended with the following cautionary note:

“How can you identify a Chuck Traynor? The answer: You can’t. It could happen to me and it could happen to you. I knew that God would one day show me the way to get away from Chuck and that’s what kept me going and accepting all the things that had happened. I put my faith in God and got through it.”

In painful detail, Linda described her abusive relationship with Chuck and how he coerced her into making ‘Deep Throat’ – but she expressed anger against other men in her life too. David Winters was described as someone primarily interested in her bank account, and Linda also apportioned some blame to Sammy Davis Jr., saying he used her and didn’t truly help her when she needed it most.

With the book complete, McGrady needed to find a publisher. He was turned down by over thirty who clearly didn’t have the stomach for a story of sexual violence against a porn star. He finally got some interest from a company called Citadel Press. The Citadel guys liked the story, but didn’t want to commit to publication unless Linda passed a polygraph test first. So a test was hurriedly arranged, and it was administered by a former FBI agent who had extensive experience in the field. Linda passed with flying colors.

Citadel were relieved and declared themselves to be fully onboard. They clearly felt that they had a potential sensation on their hands if they marketed it correctly, and so to prepare for the book’s release, the publisher leaked the contents to gossip columnist Liz Smith in November 1979, who started to whip up salacious stories in the newspapers.

When news of the book’s pending publication reached Chuck, he did two things. Firstly, he got his lawyer Phil Mandina to kick off a libel suit against Linda. It was an unsuccessful tactic: Linda’s attorney, Victor Yannacone countersued on Linda’s behalf seeking significant damages for kidnapping and bondage, so Chuck dropped the idea. Then Chuck decided if he couldn’t beat them, he could join them, so he contacted Mike McGrady to propose that Mike write Chuck’s side of the story. Chuck even had a title for it: ‘Training Women.’ McGrady couldn’t believe Chuck’s brazen attempt, and declined the invitation.

*

8. Chuck (and Marilyn Chambers and the General Public) vs. Linda (and the Feminists)

And so, in January 1980, ‘Ordeal’ was finally published. To help sell the book, Linda went on several TV talk shows to promote it.

Question: “Why would Chuck Traynor always have to involve you with people that he would want to be involved with. Have you ever thought about that – why he couldn’t simply leave you at home?”

Linda: “No. I was an object to him. I was what he considered the most perfect woman. A superfreak, always wanting to do some kind of perverted sex.”

Linda didn’t expect that she’d be met with universal sympathy, but she still had a rude awakening. As she shared stories of her abuse at Chuck’s hands and its role in her porn participation, she was met by victim-blaming masked as skepticism.

Question: “I had always heard that to be hypnotized you had to be willing?”

Question: “Is there something about the way you were raised that made you vulnerable to this?”

Questions: “I still find it very hard to believe that you have become a changed person?”

Question: “I can’t understand how you were forced into it through lust. How the hell did you manage to smile?”

Linda: “I wasn’t forced into it through lust. I was forced into it through daily beatings, physical beatings, physical abuse. It became a choice – smile or die. And I decided to live.”

One particularly dated example of the way Linda was treated occurred on Phil Donahue’s interview show which aired on Valentine’s Day in 1980. Donahue set the tone by calling ‘Ordeal’ “the grimmest book I’ve ever read in my life.” After Donahue interviewed Linda, his audience began aggressively questioning her claims. Donahue summed up their doubts, saying:

“The audience is having a hard time understanding how you could be so helpless. You’re blaming other people and not taking responsibility on your own.”

Linda was disappointed but unsurprised at the audience’s response. She told a journalist:

“I expect people not to believe me. Catholic girl, policeman’s daughter, living in a house where the pin money came from Tupperware parties. The easiest thing for people to do in society when faced with something unpleasant is to say, ‘I just don’t believe it.’”

Some people saw what was happening and weren’t as willing to accept this type of reaction. They sided with Linda, and one of them was renowned feminist and publisher Gloria Steinem who reached out directly to Linda.

Interviewer: How do Linda Lovelace and Gloria Steinem join forces? How do the two of you get together?

Gloria Steinem: I saw Linda on the Phil Donahue show and she was being questioned by Phil – who I think usually is a more sensitive questioner than he was this time – and by the audience with enormous disbelief. And yet she was still being asked what in her background had led her to become essentially a hostage.

Interviewer: What did lead you to become a hostage if we can now ask the question – does it go back to your childhood that you were a susceptible person?

Gloria Steinem: But see now what you’re doing…you’re doing what made me so angry. We don’t say to the hostages in Iran what in your background led you to be in that embassy…

Interviewer: But the situations aren’t nearly comparable, Gloria.

Gloria Steinem: They are. It’s force.

Linda with Gloria Steinem

Steinem introduced Linda to fellow feminist Andrea Dworkin who in turn introduced her to Catharine MacKinnon. Dworkin and MacKinnon were founding members of an influential organization called Women Against Pornography. The group believed all pornography exploited and oppressed women, and so they worked to educate the public and lobby politicians about its dangers.

The irony was that when Dworkin and MacKinnon first met Linda, they too questioned her in detail about her version of the story. But their reason was different from the interviews that Linda had gone through: they were keen to see if there was an opportunity to take some kind of legal redress for Linda. Dworkin later recalled it was a difficult first encounter: “I want to tell you, you don’t want the two of us questioning you. It was another ordeal for Linda.”

The two feminists spent a good amount of time with Linda over the next couple of years before deciding to help Linda bring a legal claim against Chuck alleging that he’d violated Linda’s civil rights.

They wanted to start by enlisting Linda in an anti-pornography campaign, believing nothing could add more legitimacy to their cause than the world’s best known porn star denouncing the industry. The problem with this tactic was that Linda hadn’t exactly been an eloquent or staunch anti-pornography crusader so far. Don’t forget, this was Linda in an earlier interview at the height of her fame:

“I don’t think anybody should regulate anything. I don’t believe in censorship…That’s taking away your freedom. That’s taking away your individual right to make up your own mind for things. And the last person that started censorship was Adolph Hitler, and look what happened there.”

Now however Linda had to change her tune, but what’s interesting is that at first she didn’t so much blame pornography but rather, she said her issues were Chuck’s fault. Here’s Linda being interviewed by chat show host, Tom Snyder:

Tom Snyder: “What about some of the people in the pornographic industry? I’ve had them on this program, Gerry Damiano has been on this program, Al Goldstein has been on this program, Hugh Hefner has been on this program, Larry Flint has been here. And they all talk in lofty terms of the First Amendment, the public’s right to see, representing the kind of entertainment that a certain segment of the population wants. And when you sit here and talk about it, it’s very sterile, it’s antiseptic, and it sounds good. Speaking generally, what kind of people are there in the pornographic industry, what kind of values do they have, and what kind of men and women are they?

Linda: “Well, I can only really relate to Chuck Traynor. If he’s an example of the typical pornographic people, I don’t think they really have the right or the mentality to make the decisions of what’s healthy for the public to view.”

Eventually MacKinnon and Dworkin convinced Linda that they needed her support if anti-pornography legislation was going to help other women avoid the abuse Linda had endured.

So Linda changed her position again, and this time, expressed a new more anti-pornography stance:

“Most people in the States or probably even here don’t really know what goes on in pornography. And I felt it very important to take a stand and let people know that pornography was not a victimless crime, and to speak up and set the record straight as to what happened to me.”

The feminists declared themselves happy with Linda’s support.

Andrea Dworkin: Well initially her role was to be an apologist for pornography and to make people believe that women liked it and had a good time in it. And her repudiation of that really tore open a window into the world of pornography that most people had never had before.

Susan Brownmiller: It was amazing to us because you know we had our feminist theory, our feminist analysis, and it’s one thing you know to hear from a feminist who’s saying these women aren’t enjoying this at all – they can’t possibly be, you know? And it’s quite another thing to see such a famous figure of the pornography world come forward and say, “I did not enjoy it. The whole thing was a lie.”

Ultimately however the case that the Women Against Pornography group had hoped to bring against Chuck was shelved when they felt it would be too difficult to win.

Meanwhile, in the face of Linda’s public appearances, a number of women who worked in adult film came forward to defend the industry. Some, like adult star Gloria Leonard, called Linda an “Aaron Burr” who did a “traitorous turn to the adult industry.” Others, like p