Brightest Young Things

All Words: Jeff Jetton

All Photos: The Cobrasnake

It's porn week here at brightestyoungthings.xxx and you've got burning questions.

Who to better speak with than Nina Hartley? Yes, THE Nina Hartley. And she's got the scoop on all of the swinger clubs in D.C.  Wait what? Apparently there's a big scene in the area.  Who knew?

BYT: How many years have you been in the business?

NINA HARTLEY: I made my first movie in 1984, and I made my [most recent] movie about a week ago—my next movie is in a couple weeks.

BYT: How long do you want to be in films?

NINA HARTLEY: I knew I was alive the frst time I went on stage as a stripper, I knew that sex work was my gig, so I will never 'retire' retire, but as I get older I'll stay more dressed as she'll get naked, because eventually i'ts all about the 25-year-old girl anyways.

NINA HARTLEY: And I like naked 25-year-old women, so I'm down for that. After a while, though, I dont know how much being naked myself, and having sex will be interesting to me anymore unless I really like the guy, but I'm always interested in young women, women in general. I'll do girl/girl forever, and I'll do the occasional boy/girl, but after a certain age... I mean, I don't have an 'age'.  I have a couple of girlfriends that got out after age thirty. They didn't want to be seen as 'old' pornstars.

BYT: I see, I can understand that.

NINA HARTLEY: Porn, for them, was something to be done in your twenties, it wasn't to be done for longer than that—and I knew that I was in this for the duration when I started. So my sexuality evolves, I still like being on camera, I still like having sex, but the way I like to have it has changed. I no longer need to be in the spandex miniskirts, that's for the women who are in their twenties. That's just for women who have that body.

NINA HARTLEY: There's something really nice about the 18 to 25-year-old female body. It's lush, it's supple, it's beautiful, it's smooth, it's lovely. And I'll never not like touching that. And people will never not like seeing that. But it won't necessarily always be about me being naked. I often have fantasies of myself in a fabulous conductors outfit, and the lovely young lady in some stockings, shoes, and makeup but everything else naked, and she's my cello—because its all about the beautiful young girl.

BYT: Such is life...

NINA HARTLEY: Darn heck, and you're certainly young and good-looking, I thought you would still get women in the young and beautiful phase.

BYT: No Comment.

NINA HARTLEY: Don't Lie, Don't Lie. Even if it's only one at a time, I'm sure they're all extremely eager to be with you. If I was twenty or more years younger, then I would probably be flirting more heavily with you, but you and I can go hunting for the young ones together.

Nina Hartley: Where do you live?

BYT: We're based out of Washington D.C.

NINA HARTLEY: I do like DC, they have a really evolved alt sex/fetish/kinky community; theres a lot of swingers in the DC/MD/VA area.

BYT: How do you know this?

NINA HARTLEY: I've been a swinger for thirty years. When I was in my twenties going to swinger parties I was always the youngest one there, by fifteen years at least. Now the swing world is big enough where people in their twenties can find their way in, but at the time I was the only one I knew. Usually it was a play pen for the forty and older set.

BYT: Have you been to any swinger parties in D.C.?

NINA HARTLEY: Not for many many years; I'm more into the kink/polyamory scene now.

BYT: When you were there do you ever run into any senators or politicians?

NINA HARTLEY: No, but years ago there was a swinger who was a also a very well known republican consultant—and when it got out, he had to quit. So swinging knows no ideological boundaries, there are republicans, independents, libertarians, the democrats, and undecideds who swing.

BYT: And Scientologists?

NINA HARTLEY: No, because Scientology frowns upon promiscuity. Now, I've seen plenty of people leave a swing party at five in the morning on a sunday morning to go take their kids to church, but people who are truly believers of their faith tradition are not gonna be swingers because pretty much every faith tradition in this country promotes monogamy as the only respectable and moral relationship model. Monogamy works great if you're monogamous, but if you're like me and you're not monogamous, then it doesn't work. As long as your partner doesnt disrupt your life, what do you care what they do when they're not with you? If you show up to my doorstep happy, wanting what I have, rock on! What you do when you're not here, I don't need to know, because you show up happy, thats what I care about. So if you get the blowjob on the way home from work and show up happy, and in time for dinner, I don't see the harm in that, I really don't. Then again, I'm weird.

BYT: Couldn't agree more. So, who'd you vote for? Ron Paul?

NINA HARTLEY: No No, God never, oh never. I voted Democrat. Voting is the lesser of three evils. Ron Paul is a libertarian that is against reproductive choice. HUH? That just doesn't compute in my brain. We're being waved at, I think it's time to wrap up.

BYT: Okay, I guess just say: Fuck Ron Paul!

NINA HARTLEY: (laughs hysterically) I'm not going to say that!

You can follow Nina on Twitter:

http://twitter.com/ninaland

And you can see about political scandals here:

http://www.zimbio.com/America's+50+Most+Scandalous+Political+Scandals

Previously in BYT interviews:

• 5/18: INTERVIEW: Jasmine Solano
• 5/18: Interview: Richard Linklater
• 5/17: Interview: Penguin Prison
• 5/16: Interview: Brian Regan
• 5/15: Richard Davies (Cardinal) Interviewed by Archie Moore
• 5/11: Interview: Horse Feathers' Justin Ringle
• 5/10: Reflections on a Conversation with Mickey Avalon
• 5/9: Inside the STYLELINER
• 5/8: The Politics of Mastodon
• 5/4: Preview: Mucca Pazza @ The Kennedy Center's "Look Both Ways" Festival