Ex-Miramax Head Routinely Booked Porn Actresses to Film "Scenes"
An adult film actress is accusing Richard Nanula — a former Miramax chairman, Walt Disney Co. CFO, and Starwood Hotels & Resorts Worldwide chief executive — of pretending to be an amateur porn actor who booked her for an oral sex "scene" in order to circumvent prostitution accusations.
Nanula resigned from Miramax and another company, Colony Capital, in July, after images of him having sex with another porn star, Samantha Saint, were published on TheDirty.com.
The Los Angeles Times expanded on the story this weekend with a lengthy (and worth-the-read) essay on Nanula's rise — as a business executive — and fall — as details of his sex life became public.
Porn actress Sarah Shevon told the LA Times that she recognized Nanula from the TheDirty.com photos as "Mr. Rich," a man who claimed to be an amateur porn actor and booked her for a "scene."
According to Shevon, a fellow actress — Trinity St. Clair — had first asked her to do a "private," off-screen paying job, with a man in Malibu in 2011. Saying she saw it as an act of prostitution, Shevon declined. A year later, her agent, Mark Spiegler, approached her with the same offer, adding that a video of the act would be posted on St. Clair's website.
Shevon says she acquiesced and gave the man oral sex on camera, but says she is unsure if the footage was ever posted online.
Saint, the woman pictured having sex with Nanula in July, told AVN that she had asked her attorney to make sure the film was posted on St. Clair's website so that she could not be accused of prostitution. It was footage from that shoot that was eventually published on TheDirty.com.
Those photographs have since been removed without explanation; according to the LA Times, TheDirty.com has not responded to their inquiries. However, TheWrap.com has an archived image here.
According to the LA Times, these "shoots" were common occurrences. Spiegler told the newspaper that St. Clair requested at least two more women to film similar scenes with Nanula.
Spiegler said he had second thoughts — porn films are typically not shot at night, or in Malibu — and requested a sit-down with the actor. Spiegler now identifies Nanula as the well-dressed, sophisticated man he met at Cafe Habana Malibu in June 2012. Spiegler said he asked to review the man's medical tests to confirm that he had no sexually transmitted diseases, and was surprised to see that the results came from a private physician and not one of several San Fernando Valley clinics typically used by porn actors.
Spiegler subsequently canceled the shoots. "He didn't seem like a professional porn person," the agent said.
Most parties involved believe Nanula filmed the scenes as a way to defend potential prostitution claims. "The thinking would seem to be, 'OK, there is a camera there, it's a shoot,'" XBiz editor Dan Miller told the LAT. "But everybody knows this footage isn't going anywhere."
In a 2005 divorce filing, Nanula's wife accused him of spending tens of thousands of dollars on prostitutes, and Nanula was previously treated for a sex addiction. He is also being sued by a former temporary paralegal at Colony, who claims Nanula sexually harassed her.