HOOK: E-zine By, For, and About Men in the Sex Industry

We had taken cover in the remnants of a Jewish temple in Capital Hill just off Madison and 15th. These remaining walls have little nooks and window ledges from a building that at one point was fairly dark. They rebuilt it bigger, and the newer building stands to the side while Will Clark and I rehash some of what we talked about over dinner. In person, this popular porn star seems unusually calm - perhaps part laidback California and part that our dinner conversation seemed to ease both of our nerves [We admitted early on that we were both nervous. I can't imagine why he was.]. Eventually over duck and salmon, we relaxed and talked the sex business, connections and the challenges of being a porn icon, a sex hungry man, and the images that it takes to build a life out of so many strange pieces.

This took us to these remnants and the opportunity to speak in private about how Will Clark handles being Will Clark. With or without the internet, the huge porn following, the late night sexual adventures that everyone expects him to have. And then there are his responses to clients, like the ones that offer to pay in narcotics...

Will Clark: I’d be more than happy to take drugs from you, but money is what Mastercard will take. And that’s what my landlord will take. So, I would love to pay my Visa bill with cocaine, but you know, strangely, they don’t take that.

HOOK: So what about drugs?

WC: I don’t think I really did many drugs before. I don’t really drink alcohol, although I like a good bourbon once in a while. And a good Budweiser. How is that for Southern? So, totally not where I am from, but that’s what I really like. For clients calling you at 3 in the morning, they are clearly on something. It was always great for me, because as a cheapskate and somebody who generally never knows where to find stuff. I guess I could have but I always feel embarrassed asking people. It’s great when a client would call up and I would think, “Oooh, great, I get to do drugs tonight. “ And then I have to think it out. What do I have to do tomorrow. What do I have to do the next day, and then I gotta plan it out. What I can do, what I can’t do, How much and whatever. When your with a client and you are there for five hours you kinda forget that you have a meeting to go to at noon tomorrow. Life wasn’t all that planned at that time in New York. It was all about escorting. And planning for the next movie I would do. I would be home for a couple months and plan my next trip to LA for two weeks. Oh, I need to plan for this movie. Oh, I gotta coordinate with the porno awards. And for escort gigs. So I can pay for the tip and where am I gona stay. It was always a leapfrog existence. And taking care of ads for that city. So, I could escort there.

For me, and I am not really sure about other people, it has been a really great experience. Sexually, it’s been fabulous. It’s been a great self-teaching experience in marketing, promotion, client relations, custeomer service, and answering my fanmail. I answer fanmail fairly quickly online. I have built up lists and lists of people from around the world by diligently collecting them one day at a time and then I have a list of people I can send mail to. These are people I can call. Like when I go to NY, I have a list I can call. Now, granted, I have been out of some markets for the last couple years, but there are places that are very good to me. Chicago is always very good to me. DC. I had .to turn people away because I don’t have time. When I say I am booked, I mean I am doing two a day. I have done four in a day, but that is really a lot. To me, the delineation between hustler and escort to be that a hustler gets you off as they can so they can go off to the next client so they can make another hundred and an escort is an amount of money for 60 minutes for whatever you want to do. Someone told me that when I first started escorting. It was like going to school. He said this is all the legal stuff. Here is a handout. It was freshman orientation. He was great. Of course, he got busted a year later on child pornography issues, but that’s a whole other problem. His information lasted and it was very complete.

HOOK: So you like hustling?

WC: It is really a turn on for me. Even five years later, it is still a huge turn on. You would think that five years later, the fantasy would have worn itself.…like good pornography Like a good movie. You watch it and you think it is really great but hen after a while now I am over this and I am gonna go to the next one. Or it is a fantasy and we all have fantasies of the year or fantasies of the month. This year’s fantasy is…and you kinda work itt out in your mind to such a degree or with yur sexual partners or in your own masturbatory fantasies. That you eventually workthrough whatever it was that you were turned on by and you develop the next scenario. You would think that after five years, that there would be no more power left to that concept for me. But yet, someone once said I was a born hustler or hooker or whatever word you want to use. I kinda think that is true. I kinda think that is my calling. I don’t want to sound all weird and aloof about it, cause it isn't that…

I recognize I am really good at this. I love making guys happy. I really do. It is part narcissism. When I walk in the door, I am turned on that they are turned on by me. First, I am already there, so clearly they want me. So, you walk through and they go (stutters) “Hi”. Who wouldn’t be turned on by that? That’s great attention. I am already sold on this idea that I am here and I get money, sex, and maybe drugs. It’s a whole scenario. It’s exhibition. For me, it is great. At first, I was just going out as an escort and I was being all niceand tellingthem I was an actor and I was going to this and this. Hi. Hi. Hi. And I couldn’t figure out why I wasn’t getting any return calls. And then after a year, I realized. They don’t want to know my life history. They want dark and steamy, not happy-go-lucky. I have to have a persona. So, I tapped into that part of my psycho and developed that part of myself that had been lacking in my life til then. Now, it is integrated into my life. It was a wonderful experience. And my therapist has said to me, you’ve accomplished what it takes people 20 years to accomplish by being an escort. And I got paid to discover this.

HOOK: What about you is not for sale?

WC: My real name.

HOOK: Does anyone know it?

WC: Oh sure. It is funny because not really clients, but fans really need to know that. And this is not an indictment of them or a criticism. It is just the reality that I have had fans online that meet other porn stars and ask what my real first name is. And that seems to be a big deal. There have been a couple fans that when they find it, they are like “Hi, so-and-so.” They have my real name in caps just to show me that they knew my real name. It’s like I get that you know my real name…but whatever.

HOOK: So what’s your real name?

WC: (some random ambulance races by) In a very real way, though, I really feel like I am Will Clark. It’s not just a role that I play. It definitely is very very me, and its even more me than if you called me by my real name. It’s a very complicated personality.

HOOK: Do you feel like that old you is more distant?

WC: No, because the old me is really feeding on the new me. I envisioned Will Clark from the beginning, like Cole Tucker, as some cartoon character. I had very specific ideas of what Will was all about. Who he was. How we talked. How he held his cigarette. What he wore. What he didn’t wear. This. That. I was very clear about that. That was very on the other end of the spectrum for who I was. To be Will everytime I walked through a client’s door helped me. I actually started to look forward to the escort work because I thought it was a great chance to be Will. I get to go play. Over time, those qualities integrate themselves and you find yourself meeting in the middle. The qualities that my old self brings to the table tempers Will’s “Fuck you street hustler” kinda guy. My compassion, my love, and my sensitivity (some would say my over-sensitivity) tempers some of that. Sometimes, I wish I wasn’t like that. I wish I wasn’t caring so deeply. Because things hurt me so deeply sometimes. Because of what people say or do. Disappointments that I have. Will can be like “Fuck you, I don’t care.” It is the real me that is doing the fundraisers, putting on the ‘work hard’ mask and saying ‘You’re coming for Will Clark, but you’re going to get me."

I’m a fabulous host. I can’t be dark and steamy. You can’t write as much as I have, host as many shows as I have hosted, you cannot be out and visible and be dark and steamy or Will’s “fuck you”. It is a character that works in a sexual situation really only when you’ve both agreed that is the role that I am going to turn up the volume on. I really enjoy doing that. But now it is like turning down the volume on the chatty Cathy, I’m turning down the volume on “I Love you” and I am turning up the volume on “Fuck me, you big prick!”, “Yeah, man, yeah.” You turn up the volume on that. I am going to this event tonight, and I am walking in smoking and ‘give me a fucking beer, man’. As Will Clark. Granted this is a safe sex demo, so I will have to open my mouth and speak intelligently about safe sex issues. There is always the fear for me that if I am talking too much or am I writing too much or being self-revelatory, does that decrease the sexual attraction a fan has for me?

I brought this up in a column that I was concerned I am divulging too much information. That I am sucking all the sexuality out of me. Sexuality for our culture doesn’t want to know who you are. You are very mysterious. I wanna project a personality onto you cause then you could be anyone I want for that one night stand. I had a number of fans write back and say that they wanted to know me more as a person. It enhances my sexuality, and then, of course, it enhances it in the way that they want to be my boyfriend. And then, I am like, well, that isn’t going to happen. Thank you. You are all very nice.