(Not much about language, but about the construction and maintenance of personas and the business of making gay porn. With considerable very frank discussion of men’s bodies and man-man sex, though the XXX-rated images are on AZBlogX; but still, not for kids or the sexually modest.)
Or: The Short Sexy Life of Jeff Quinn.
Pornstars tend to have short professional lives, just two or three years; it’s erratic, mostly poorly-paid work, hard to knit into a satisfying personal life, no matter the lure (for some performers) of wooing an audience with your hot sex.
Quinn was in and out in less than three years. We know almost nothing of his life before and absolutely nothing of his life after. While he was in the camera’s eye, he shone. Publicity photos like this one usually made him out to be knowingly, even menacingly, sexual:
(#1)
— but in fact his characters tended to be engaging and amiable, charming rather than commanding. And enthusiastically sexual. In combination with his easy masculinity, that’s what made his career in gay porn.
From the Boys in the Sand site on 1/3/15, with nostalgia for the man:
Jeff Quinn was one of those porn stars you do not forget and as such, the feature of this installment of my Vintage Gay Porn series. While his output of movies was limited; his impact was great. Blonde hair [or, depending on the light, brownish], perfect smooth toned body and green eyes that could mesmerize you he often was cast as a bottom in the pre-condom era he starred in. Jeff Quinn starred in Falcon’s epic Giant Splash Shots II – where Chad Douglas gave him a poolside fucking for the ages. He also appeared in several bi movies and military themed flicks as well – once co-starring with Kevin Williams. He was a Playgirl centerfold in December 1985 under the name Rhett Routley. It appears Mr. Quinn just took his money and ran. Wherever he may be we hope beauty, born in 1957, is doing well.
I don’t know where he got the 1957 birth year (possibly from publicity writeups), but that would be about right; it would make JQ around 30 at the time of his career burst, and that’s a good age — young enough to be really hot, old enough to be assured.
One page of the Playgirl feature:
(#2)
Four front shots, sexy but not into X territory.
The other page from Playgirl (#2 on AXBogX) has two dick shots and two butt shots, plus the quote (aimed at hopeful female readers of the magazine): “When I was younger, I picked up girls like all the other guys. Now I’ve gotten more serious.” (#1 on AZBlogX has a body-display publicity shot, with Quinn’s hard dick as its central feature.)
He was probably gay for pay, but like some other straight (or mostly straight) guys doing gay porn, he was drawn to serving as a bottom, a role that a fair number of g4p guys prefer because it doesn’t require getting and maintaining a hard-on for sex with other men. In any case, Quinn was enormously enthusiastic as a bottom, very satisfying to watch; examples to follow.
[Digression on acting. As an actor, reading lines, Quinn was merely serviceable, like most porn performers (though a few pornstars really can act, and a fair number are so wooden their directors try to keep them down to grunts and cries). The job doesn’t require a lot of standard acting skills — sexual enthusiasm can carry the day — though many gay porn flicks have actual story lines, which are enhanced by decent acting.
In the documentary Tab Hunter Confidential (2015), the (mainstream) actor tells of being discovered and impelled into the movies, and his consequent dreams of Being a Star — though what he got at first were B parts that ran on his extraordinary physical presence and magnetic personality. He was not well reviewed. Eventually, he reports, he realized that acting was a craft, one he’d have to learn if he was going to stay in the business, so he applied himself to the task, as he did to other challenges: singing, horseback riding, figure skating. And got to be pretty good (or better) at them all.
I was left wondering what Jeff Quinn would have been like if he’d gotten an acting coach.]
Highlights of JQ’s gay porn career, alphabetically by title:
(1) Big Guns, Catalina 1987
*(2) Bigger Than Life, Huge Video 1986 (with Jeff Stryker)
*(3) Giant Splash Shots II, Falcon 1987
(4) Hot Rods: Young and Hung 2, Laguna Pacific / Catalina 1986
*(5) Inch by Inch, Falcon 1986
(6) Try to Take It, Falcon 1986
The asterisked flicks have spectacular JQ fuck scenes in them.
Stryker on Quinn is one scene from flick (2), described in a 12/8/12 AZBlogX posting on standing fucks; an illustration of this moving event appears as #3 in my JQ posting on AZBlogX.
Flick (3) has a scene in which super-manly, dominant Chad Douglas is served by JQ and Lance. In #5 on AZBlogX the two are attending to Douglas’s cock and balls. Douglas goes on to fuck both men; #6 in AZBlogX shows Douglas on JQ, JQ face-down with his ass humped up for his fucker. Poolside delight.
Flick (5) has a famous subway sex scene in it, which culminates in Jim Pulver fucking JG, who’s on his hands and knees over the back of a seat. #4 in AZBlogX.
Three hot scenes from classic gay porn, illustrating three positions for the bottom in fucking: in flick (2), flectional (bent over at the waist for a standing fucker); in flick (3), prone (on his belly); and genicular (on his hands and knees). Also three locations for fucking, two (in an alley, #3; and by a pool, #6) staples of gay porn, one (in a subway car) rather more inventive.
In Gayland, the fantasy world of gay porn, guys have sex pretty much everywhere, wherever and whenever desire strikes; but there are favorite spots, beyond bedrooms and sex clubs, which are, you know, designed for sex: anywhere close to or in water (pools, beaches, showers, bathtubs); any secluded or little-visited spot (alleys, doorways, stairwells, underbrush, woods, etc.); prisons, frat houses, barracks, other places where men live in groups; garages, construction sites, and other locations of high-masculinity work; mens rooms; in or on cars and trucks. And since this is Gayland, in flagrantly public places like on mass transit, in train stations, shops and stores, wherever. Just. Do. It.
March 20, 2019 at 3:32 pm |
I grew up with Jeff Quinn, though won’t reveal his his real name here. Oddly, he got in touch with me a few days back. He lived something of a tortured life post-porn: addiction, prison, etc. Still, he has always managed to look better than most at any age and seems to be doing ok now. I notice his stats are often wrong. He is actually 6’0″ and not 5’9.” I will let him know people are still talking about him 🙂
April 13, 2020 at 5:16 am |
Send him my regards! 🙂 I really loved him! I hope he is doing well now!
July 24, 2021 at 12:27 pm |
Josie- can you please send me his email or have him email me at meg.o at aol dot com? We want to interview him for a doc[*]. It’s paid.
[* AZ explains, just in case: documentary (film)]
April 9, 2019 at 2:18 am |
Estoy enamorado de él.
July 28, 2019 at 2:09 pm |
I just discovered him this year because of the Falcon movie Giant Big Shots II, omg for me he is the most handsome charming guy in gay porn history, love him so much, and for [supposed to have] been gay for pay he really acts pretty well, I admire all of his works, perhaps some day he returns and we could have a chance to meet him, what a breath taking man.
May 16, 2020 at 4:08 pm |
Jeff was one of the hottest stars of the Eighties, his scene where Jim Pulver fucked him hard is among the best bareback shots ever, and he was amazing taking Stryker’s massive cock in Bigger than life. The guy is fucking hot
February 11, 2021 at 8:09 pm |
The word “beautiful” comes to mind for Jeff. He was just stunning and I bet he still is. I truly believe he could’ve been a big-time A-list mainstream movie star actually, but who knows if that’s anything he even wanted. He is breathtaking and I wonder if he knows it?
September 5, 2021 at 12:30 pm |
meg,
any updates on the doc?
is jeff with us?
his ability to disappear leads one to ask why? his reason would have be right for him, in a very good script
September 5, 2021 at 1:40 pm |
Your queries were directed at Meg, but there are a couple of things I should add.
Remember that JQ’s brief time as a bright star in porn was about 35 years ago. No porn actor lasts as an actor in the business very long; everyone goes on to something else (even if it’s some other role in the business). Also: every ex-pornstar is also an ex-sexworker, and that brings with it gigantic social penalties; you can see why they might not want to return imaginatively to past days. (In fact, most former sexworkers spend a great deal of time and energy erasing their pasts.) On top of that, many of them were (like JQ) g4p actors who were at best uneasy about the work and so are doubly reluctant to go back in time.
In any case, you can’t go back again. Every so often someone will write me to say how much they admire something I wrote 30, 40, or 50 years ago, and I really don’t know how to respond, beyond thanking them for their nice words, saying that I’m happy that what I did gave them pleasure (and continues to do so).Some of my old stuff I continued working on, expanding on ideas or reworking them or rejecting them and starting afresh. There are a few that I re-read now and think, yes, that’s a beautiful piece — a brilliant idea, nicely argued, in an admirable style — and I’m pleased to have created it. But mostly the past is just past and there’s no way I could get back there even if I wanted to. I’m a different person now, and I’m doing different things.
January 24, 2022 at 7:54 pm |
All of your comments are touching, appreciated and put a smile on my face. For the record, indeed I am 6ft and born in ’59 and am much closer to 9ʺ than 8.
January 25, 2022 at 9:18 am |
Well, seeing a response from you put a very big smile on my face. (Many thanks for the corrections on the stats.) I would like to post some more about your history, and will e-mail you for your permission, and (I hope) some comments about how your life has gone. (Reassuring — and warning — note to readers: to post comments on my blog, you have to provide a genuine, usable email address, which only I know; I do not divulge such addresses, or for that matter, real names behind pseudonyms, without the writer’s permission.)
October 20, 2022 at 10:43 am |
Arnold…any response you can share?
October 20, 2022 at 11:20 am
Beyond getting the stats right, he chooses not to say more about his career or his current life, and I respect that.
March 10, 2022 at 8:24 pm |
I sure hope to hear more about Jeff Quinn today. He was THE hottest of almost anyone I can think of in the last 40 years!
March 21, 2022 at 9:56 pm |
jeff comes across as more real than most in the game. let’s hope he’s doing well in his current life. more importantly he seems to have his head on straight in being mindful. he seems to have come a long way. i share your 9
July 24, 2022 at 6:11 pm |
Yea Rhett was hot. I knew him before he entered porn. When I would see him in Seattle it was awkward because I always wanted to say I saw your acting but chickened out….I first met him on Capitol Hill in Seattle, actually his mom called me and asked if I had a boarding room for his then 21-year-old son. I was managing a 15-room boarding house then at 19 years old and attending college. I had one room vacant. It was the biggest room, ballroom, she paid the deposit and first two months’ rent. She was strikingly beautiful. One of the prettiest woman I had met… When I met Rhett that evening with his mom it was clear to me where he got his beauty… As the manager I had to be professional but I had the biggest crush on him.
He didn’t give much time of day but he was always polite, good manners, and treated people with respect…. One of the most handsome men I had ever met to this day….I hope he reads this. Hope he is good….. Duane Dorsey
February 5, 2023 at 1:43 pm |
Glad to know he’s still alive and apparently a decent person despite his past struggles. Knowing he’s still among us is enough to make my day and I’ll respect his wish for privacy.