So… there’s this little play that I’m doing this summer and fall. Maybe you’ve heard of it. Phone Whore. Really. It’s little. It’s just got me in it. I have a director and a tech director and a set builder, but on stage it’s just me in my pajamas. The set pieces can all fit in my 1991 Toyota Corolla, plus two suitcases, a duffle bag, an office-in-a-box, and a pantry-in-a-box.

(Oooh, an office-in-a-box? Sounds snazzy! What is it? Ummm… office and merch supplies thrown in a box. Same thing for pantry-in-a-box: rice, granola, sofrito, tuna fish, peanuts, and a good chef’s knife. In a box. As simple as dick in a box, but easier to explain to customs.)

ANYWAY.

A lot of my life is wrapped up in getting this show on the road, getting it booked into places, getting homestay, making a fantastic poster, and, well, packing my life in a box for five months and putting it on wheels. That in itself is fairly traumatic. But add on top of it, I’m basically committing to saying the same vulnerable, sexy, scary things (one audience member at the Boston opening weekend called it “intense”) for 50 or 60 shows over the next five months.

How can I tell that I’m scared? I find myself second-guessing my decisions, even with the positive feedback, even with the plans in place, even with the Montreal postcards done and sent to print, the first of thousands of cards I’ll be handing out to people this year with my face on them (layered over a fierce pegging narrative, a very readable wall of smut in 20% grayscale).

I keep bugging my director. It’s not too much? I ask. NO, she says, shut up.

I look at posts like this, about how coming out and sharing one’s story as a sex worker is a privilege, and I think, god, what I’m doing is so fucking self-centered and privileged.

And then I feel the weight of the responsibility, because I know that people are going to take me and my play as some kind of representation of the whole, and it’s not, it really isn’t, but that doesn’t matter, because in the larger scheme of things, that’s just the way it’s going to be interpreted. And then I try to sort out unnecessary guilt from necessary good intent, and that’s a bitch, let me tell you.

And then I think, what if people really like it and come out to it? I’m going to have to file taxes in Canada next year, jeezus, I still owe $7000 in back taxes here in my own goddamn country! Or what if people start stalking me because of it? And then I start to get an anxiety attack.

And then inevitably the phone rings. (Warm pork chops or an anxiety attack, the calls always interrupt something good.) (And actually another call came in just now, a 15-minute hand-job. Five bucks for me, yay!) But you know what? As busy as I am, making lists or trying to reach kinksters in Calgary or nailing down a venue in DC–even while on tour, because I’m sticking as close to my required shifts as possible–I need the calls to keep coming in.

For starters I need to keep making money. I don’t know how the tour is going to do. But beyond that, doing the calls calms me right the fuck down. It reminds me where the hell this all comes from, this play, my comedy stuff, the tour. A fifteen-minute titty fuck grounds me in the straightforward (which is not always to say simple) act of getting a stranger off. Audiences and reviewers and the public and, hell, community standards can be prickly little bastards, fickle and treacherous. But my callers only want one thing, and by god, I know beyond doubt that I am good at giving it.

Thanks, guys!

No Comments | In: Cameryn 101, Phone Whore on the road | tags: I'm an Artiste Dammit, Phone Sex, Phone Whore 2010 Tour, Social Issues and Damp Tissues. | #

I’m working on my lines for my one-woman play right now. Well, to be precise, right now I’m procrastinating. Somewhere in the middle of drafting this post I’m working on my lines, and will do so again after I put this bad boy up. Point is, I’m all in the middle of prepping for the world premiere of Phone Whore (read about it here…), and I just want to say…

Thank god there is no script for phone sex, ‘cuz memorizing is HARD.

The play has four seven-minute calls in it, interrupting the title character during an interview with a camera crew. The calls are composites, drawn from archetypes and standard openings and approaches that I’ve gotten pretty familiar with over the past 10 months. The audience hears the phone whore’s side of the calls only, so in theory I could say whatever I want and not be off. But my director likes the flow and the tone of the calls the way I wrote them, with all the pauses and plot points and imagery, and asked that I get as close to the script as possible. What has been challenging for me as a performer is getting as close to the feel of phone sex as possible, without actual input from the other side.

In my head I’m holding on to what I imagine the caller would be saying, to remember when I need to make those abrupt shifts from one track to another. That helps with the lines. But I have to dig deep to reproduce the “surprise” and the “excitement” that the caller would hear, when I already know what’s coming around the corner.

In a real call, I hesitate as a negotiating strategy for getting through the really sensitive stuff. I use non-vocal sounds, reflective responses, and very casual speech to play my part in the two-person improv piece that unfolds. Performative linguists would have a field day analyzing this shit. Scriptwriters, on the other hand, would go bonkers. I mean, I did.

And now I’m trying to put it out there in a way that keeps it fresh for audiences, but reproducibly authentic for myself. Mad props to my director for keeping me on that path. (Yes, Elizabeth, I’m getting back to my lines right now!) And mad props to my callers for staying so insanely unpredictable, so genuinely dedicated to their own turn-ons, that I can’t use a script in my daily work. In real life, I usually have no idea where we’re going. It’s an adventure. Thanks, guys.

No Comments | In: Phone Whore 2010 Tour | tags: performance, phone sex culture, Phone Whore 2010 Tour. | #

Sorry for the light posting this last week or two. I was prepping for my Whore-a-thon fundraiser last Wednesday–we raised over $400, thanks to some dedicated listeners and my pledgemaster’s commitment to the cause, as witnessed by his promise to remove items of clothing for pledges received. Now that’s what I call incentivizing! We have pulled in $1760 in grants, donations, sponsorships, and pledges, which is more than a third of the way there to our $5000 goal by October 15. The campaign continues, so please make your donation today!

I spent the rest of the week calling around various sex and fetish-related internet stores to see about business sponsorships for the 2010 Phone Whore Tour. And let me tell you, that’s a lot of calling! I knew the internet was for porn, but holy spank store, Batman, my spreadsheet is filling up fast. (Hey, my fellow PSOs! I have a special sponsorship deal for you, if you want to get in on some Phone Whore action. Drop me a line and let’s talk.)

OH! In addition to being a cheap fundraiser option, the Whore-a-thon was meant to launch my eponymous radio show in prime fashion, and it did. I’ll be starting up the regular run of Cameryn Moore Phone Whore this coming Wednesday, September 16, with the live show at 4:30 pm EST and a repeat of the show running at 11:30 pm EST. My special guest from the Whore-a-thon, Scarlet, will be co-hosting the first regular show with me this week, and we’re excitedly planning a future in guest appearances and audio collaborations. Call-in is available for the live show only, but you’ll be able to chat with me, Scarlet, and other friends during both runs. Get details at my BlogTalkRadio page!

Do not worry, friends and fans. I will be back in blog-tastic order this coming week, when I stumble around for meaning at the intersection of race, desire, and fear… in short (or long, ba-dump-bump), the issue of the Big Black Cock.

No Comments | In: Phone Whore 2010 Tour, Pimpin' | tags: Cameryn Moore radio, Phone Whore 2010 Tour, PSO radio. | #

Just got word over the weekend that the Phone Whore 2010 tour received its first grant, a $500 seed grant from the New England Leather Alliance. Holy spit-shined boots, Batman, we’re getting legit!

This also means that Phone Whore (”a one-act play with frequent interruptions”) only has $4000 to go to cover entry fees for eight Fringe Festivals in the Canadian Fringe Circuit lottery, and believe me, people, I will be pimping for dollars on a regular basis. I’m even hosting a three-hour online radio event on September 9, with some friends and fans running a PBS-style phone bank in the next room.

In the meantime, if you feel the urge to donate now, go to my donate page and do it. And here’s the wonderful new fine print for my fiscal sponsor. Thank you, NELA and ISWFACE!

The Phone Whore 2010 tour, produced by Little Black Book Productions and co-presented by NELA, is a fiscally sponsored project of ISWFACE, a 501(c)(3) non-profit, tax-exempt organization. Contributions in support of Litttle Black Book Productions’ work are greatly appreciated and may be made to ISWFACE, earmarked for “ISWFACE artist approved project named LBB Productions”. All contributions are fully deductible to the extent allowed by law.

*****************

“But Cameryn, why don’t you just sell those audio stories you keep going on about, and fund the project that way? This makes you sound like a charity.”

First of all, Phone Whore—the play—is a charity. That is, it’s a fiscally sponsored project of a 501(c)(3) organization. One of the perks of operating as a non-profit is getting to be even more shameless about asking for money.

Second, I just moved here to camerynmoore.com (still putting paint on the window trim, kinda thing), and here I have an actual for-profit storefront for my audio raunch. Sex does sell, obviously, and it’s going to be paying my rent, people.

But art (even with sex in it) needs extra support. The Phone Whore 2010 tour is a separate endeavor, and it’s art, and it needs your help to launch. And that’s what this donation drive is about.

No Comments | In: Phone Whore 2010 Tour, Pimpin' | tags: Cameryn Moore radio, Phone Whore 2010 Tour, PSO radio. | #