Yellow police tape flutters in the wind. A dead body decomposes under a white sheet in the hot sun.
Standing over it, surrounded by cops, is Blake Blossom.
It’s just after 1 p.m., and we’re in Castaic, California, on the set of “Wanted,” a steamy new thriller from Digital Playground and director Ricky Greenwood.
Written by Kelly Kay and Lotta B. Essen, based on a story by Greenwood, “Wanted” follows a pair of lovestruck psychos as they embark on a killing spree together across the southwestern United States — imagine “Bonnie and Clyde” or “Natural Born Killers,” but with a lot more sex.
Blossom plays federal agent Vanessa, who teams up with local law enforcement to bring the deadly duo to justice, and possibly to climax.
"I get called into the investigation because the local sheriff isn’t too bright, and the sexual tension builds from there," explains Blossom, who says she likes heavily scripted storylines where a lot of animosity leads to sex.
She is joined by a cast that includes Isaiah Maxwell, Tommy Pistol, Rusty Nails and Abel Godshark — as well as a classic 1960s red Mustang that’s just sitting there waiting for someone to gun the engine.
The wind keeps kicking up, blowing Blossom’s long, blonde hair into her face and creating a rustling sound on her microphone. This complicates things for Greenwood, 1st AD Billy Visual, and sound mixer Stoni Rockwood as they try to capture dialogue.
“My fucking hair was all over the place that time,” says Blossom.
Rockwood takes the opportunity to adjust the mic on Maxwell’s uniform.
“Why are your lips looking like Ashy Larry’s?” Rockwood teases Maxwell, who drops the serious sheriff shtick, lowers his aviator sunglasses, and grins.
Good-natured ribbing is par for the course on Greenwood’s set.
Most of his team have been working together in the trenches for years, and they tend to describe the unit as a big family — loving and occasionally dysfunctional.
"We bicker a lot, but we have fun together," affirms PA David, who arrived on set at 9 a.m. after working until roughly midnight the night before.
In addition to Greenwood, his 13-person crew and his very well-behaved dog — a German shepherd named Ripley that he adopted last November as a rescue — there’s also still photographer Mad Creativity, caterer Brent and set medic Cindy.
Cindy is equipped with antivenom, just in case someone gets bitten by one of the rattlesnakes or tarantulas known to inhabit the area.
“They don’t usually have a set medic on these,” confides Cindy. She’s been working in the entertainment industry for 20 years and has the vibe of a battle-tested crew member who has seen it all, but this is only her second time working with Greenwood and his crew.
Also on set is talent liaison Kasey Warner, program manager for nonprofit organization PASS, which safeguards the health and safety of adult performers.
Warner describes the set of “Wanted” as “porno summer camp.”
“That’s what I love about this industry,” she says. “We don’t take ourselves too seriously, but we take ourselves seriously when we need to.”
By way of example, Warner credits the adult industry for being able to get back up and running so much faster than mainstream Hollywood productions during the COVID-19 pandemic because the industry understood how to test people and the importance of testing.
Blossom restarts the scene, in which she tells the local law officers that the case falls under her jurisdiction. The latest victim of the so-called “Roadside Slasher” — at this point, no one yet knows there are actually two killers — has been found on a reservation in the New Mexico desert, considered federal land.
A crew member notes that sheriff’s departments usually have “deputies” instead of “officers.” Maybe they should tweak that line if they do another take?
Greenwood is known to do numerous takes of the same scene, but also to be mindful of the talent’s time despite this propensity.
“His shoots tend to be a little longer because he’s very detail-oriented,” David tells me. “I think that’s where part of the magic comes from.”
Finding out where the magic comes from happens to be my mission on this sunny Tuesday.
As an industry newcomer, this is my first adult set visit, so I had no idea what to expect when I pulled up to the location in what could generously be described as the middle of nowhere, and found the gate closed. Abandoning my trusty Volkswagen, I did what any enterprising journalist determined not to botch his first assignment would do: I hopped the fence.
My first lesson: "Quiet on the set."
Walking up a long dirt road, I began yelling, “Hello? Helllooooo??”
In the distance, I heard a mildly frustrated shout in a French-Canadian accent: "Cut!"
Yes, I had stumbled upon my first porn set and immediately ruined a take.
Fortunately, Greenwood was in a forgiving mood and took pity on the industry newcomer, telling me not to worry about it.
Everyone went right back to their marks.
Now, as a loud plane flies overhead, I realize that my gaffe was just one of many potential glitches.
“Cut,” yells Greenwood. “Let’s cut for the plane!”
They do another take, this one interrupted by gunshots echoing in the distance — a neighbor’s backyard target practice.
And another, as Greenwood changes angles, moving from Blossom to Maxwell.
Every few minutes, in between takes, clouds of vape smoke suddenly appear between the actors, only to vanish just as quickly. For some performers, the acting scenes make them more nervous than the sex scenes.
“Sex comes naturally for me," says Victor Ray, who plays Jack, one of the two murderous lovebirds. “My goal is to work with real directors like Ricky and do things I can be proud of and look forward to."
Ray, who moved from Florida to Los Angeles two years ago, says he can imagine himself in Greenwood’s shoes one day, calling the shots from behind the camera. For now, though, he’s happy to focus on acting.
“I trust Ricky’s vision,” he says. “He has confidence in me, so I have confidence in him. Plus, he gives me freedom as an actor and leaves room for ad-libbing. I prefer to get a feel for the words rather than memorize them, as no one wants a zombie out there.”
Blossom says she, too, has been so inspired watching Greenwood work that she’d like to direct one day.
Husband-and-wife team set designers Andy Appleton and Kylie Ireland agree that Greenwood is the real deal.
“Ricky is one of the better directors out there,” says Appleton. “He’s not pretentious. He has a style all his own that’s unique and different, and I like that he’s not known for one genre. He doesn’t allow himself to be pigeonholed.”
Greenwood says it’s fun to tell different kinds of stories.
"I have friends who work on mainstream movies, and they make one movie every five years because it takes so much time,” he says. “I like that I’m always working on my next movie because it allows me to make six or seven features a year and tell more stories.”
Greenwood credits the evolution of his personal style to multiple influences and people. He always loved the “very cinematic” adult movies of the 1970s, and cites “Behind the Green Door” (1972) as one of his favorites. Once he started in adult, he learned a lot from the people he worked with.
"Robby D was my mentor when I came into the business," he recalls. "He was the one who picked me up at the airport, and whenever I had questions, I would ask him, so he helped me a lot. I was a huge fan of his work. James Avalon was my first camera guy. He also helped me a lot when I started. Jacky St. James, Matt Holder, David Lord… all of these people helped me. And then camera-wise and production-wise, people like Shaun Rivera and Kylie Ireland.
"All of these people are the best in their field, so they helped me a lot to develop my look and my style," Greenwood affirms.
For "Wanted,” which is a bit more grounded than Greenwood productions like the big-budget sci-fi movie “Project X,” Appleton and Ireland were tasked with building a 1960s motel room in a warehouse.
The duo typically sources from local prop houses, though they’ve also bought props from Facebook Marketplace in the past.
At one point, a debate breaks out as to whether Blossom really needs her gun if it’s just going to be in her purse and not on camera, though she’ll know it’s not in there from the weight. The crew breaks into a spontaneous rendition of the Aerosmith song “Janie’s Got a Gun,” but with “Pilly” — as in, wardrobe assistant Pilly Visual — substituted in place of “Janie.”
The prop guns “tend to walk away a lot,” sighs Ireland. She notes that an actual armorer will be on set on Friday to oversee the movie’s big shootout scene.
In the hair and makeup trailer, I chat with Charlotte Sins, who plays Angel, a mechanic who’s tougher than she looks and may be more involved in the case than she’s letting on.
Sins started out selling her panties and nude photos online while in college, and has now been in the industry for nine years. When I tell her that I’m a newbie, she is quick to point out that this isn’t like your average porn shoot, which would typically feature a much smaller crew of perhaps two to five people.
"Wanted," by contrast, is as big as it gets in terms of cast, crew, budget and locations. Most adult features don’t shoot on location at all, let alone utilize multiple locations, but before Castaic, the production shot in a Canoga Park warehouse, and will move to Lancaster later in the week. Even the catering is top-notch, as I discover when I am treated to a delicious burger during the crew’s 4 p.m. lunch break.
"This is like a ‘real’ movie," explains Sins. “But with sex in it.”
She says she also appreciates the helpful notes she receives from Greenwood during rehearsals, and having a director who takes the time to collaborate with her.
Speaking of collaborations, Sins didn’t roll out of bed camera-ready. As we chat, hair and makeup artist Azzy is applying a curling iron and Kryolan setting spray to Sins’ long black hair.
Azzy says she got her start in the business while working at a makeup store, when a customer asked if she could do tattoo cover-up. It turned out to be for a Vixen Media Group shoot, and she’s been much happier ever since.
“Can we do my eyeliner a little darker to make me look more manic?” Sins asks Azzy. “And can you bronze me to make the freckles on my nose pop a little bit?”
Azzy goes about creating her masterpiece with Sins as her canvas.
“There, you look sun-kissed,” she tells Sins before the two debate whether Sins should wear her hair in pigtails to combat the effect of the wind.
While Sins does her paperwork for the shoot, Kylie Rocket pops into the trailer for a quick chat, but is soon interrupted when Billy Visual suddenly bursts in.
“Kylie, you need to stop messing around!”
The trailer goes silent for a moment before Visual starts laughing. He’s messing with her.
“Oh my God, Billy!” scolds Rocket. “I’m so gullible, too. You’ll get my ass with that.”
At the next setup, DP Matt Holder flags the potential problem of having a tangled mass of ugly grey pipes in the background of a scene, so everyone moves 30 yards down the road so that the pipes are outside the frame.
Today, Holder is shooting with the RED Raptor camera, though sometimes, he and Greenwood will use the RED Komodo.
“We’re using an old Cooke lens today, too,” says Greenwood.
Holder and Godshark have both been working with Greenwood for nearly a decade, and Godshark can still remember when Greenwood used to bring homemade pasta sauce to set in place of catering.
As Greenwood instructs Maxwell to be a bit more suspicious of the two hitchhikers making out in his backseat, the crew discusses the numerous continuity issues to keep track of:
What position was someone’s hat or belt? Were they wearing their gun on their hip or holding it? Could the camera see that toothpick in Maxwell’s mouth?
A bit of a "method" actor, Maxwell will often begin talking like his character even before the camera starts rolling. That’s just one trick he’s picked up along the way to what he terms “the later stage” of his career.
“I’m not a novice anymore,” says Maxwell, who shoots 20-25 studio scenes and 10-15 content scenes each month.
Though he remains in high demand, he has no idea if he’ll still be active five years from now. He says he’s prepared for whatever comes, however, and credits the porn biz with helping him go "from a small-picture mindset to a big-picture mindset, and grow as a person."
Blossom calls the sex scene she filmed with Maxwell the day before, in which he rescues her from a gas station explosion, “one of the wildest, craziest, most passionate scenes in recent memory.”
By late afternoon, I realize that nearly the entire crew is wearing long sleeves, having come prepared for the elements since it gets cold in the desert once the sun goes down. I rush to my car to grab my hoodie.
I return in time to watch Greenwood shoot some pick-up shots, like Rocket looking behind her in the car to watch Blossom and Maxwell walk away through the rear window. Later, she gets out of the car to change her panties, doing a little dance for Ray, who relishes their ability to fool the cops.
By 4 p.m., we’re starting to lose the light, one element that is beyond even perfectionist Greenwood’s control.
“On a movie like this, you’re racing the sun,” the director says. “We’re doing it in March, so it’s not there long. That’s what frustrates me — when we’re losing time on something and the sun is going down, and I know we still have two scenes to do outside and the last one won’t work because of the light."
On a feature like “Wanted,” there’s typically one sex scene filmed each day. Usually, it’s the last scene of the day, shot in the late afternoon or at night.
I ask Greenwood if I should stick around to see the “real” magic — but alas, a good magician never reveals his tricks. Greenwood tells me it’s going to be a closed set; for the safety and well-being of the performers, the only people there will be people who need to be there.
The day has still been a stunning success, as far as I’m concerned.
For one thing, I got to meet Greenwood and his merry band of sexy misfits.
For another, no one needed the anti-venom.
"Wanted" is streaming on DigitalPlayground.
