A few weeks ago, I noticed Lily Cade mentioning on Twitter that she was in Jersey and I suggested she stop by and chat with us. Unfortunately, she was already on her way home and couldn’t make it, but a week or so later on August 23rd (I remember it like it was yesterday) I got a DM from Lily herself stating that she’d be in Philly and would love to do an interview with us about her “next life.” Beyond excited, I ran to my boss (waited for him the next morning), and demanded this interview get approved (asked very politely for him to please please please let me do this interview) and the very next day I got the pleasure of sitting down and talking with Lily Cade at HotMovies headquarters for 2 beautiful hours. What follows is all the glory that occurred.
A few of us from the office happened to be at a digital marketing summit the day Lily and I scheduled our interview, so I ran back to the office to meet up with my hero and I can’t begin to describe how friendly and fantastic she was! After putting her bags in the conference room we took a quick tour of the office and Lily stopped to talk to everyone there. I noticed right then that this was the kind of woman who enjoyed making connections with those she spoke to and I knew I was in for a treat. Technically this is an interview, but I can’t stress enough how much this felt like two friends talking. I hope you enjoy the conversation and much as I did!
Lily Cade: Generally speaking, I don’t have any secrets. If you Google “lesbian ass eating” what you’ll find is my tongue in the asshole of a whole bunch of asses.
Authentic Lesbian: That’s awesome! Can we do that right now!?
She pulls up a picture of her and Samantha Ryan in Lesbian Ass Worship from Filly Films.
AL: I love your ass in that one. That’s really something to be proud of man!
LC: Yeah, that was a good one. So, you see it’s like, what do I have to hide or shy away from? And I like to throw this out there because of two things. One is, I’ll do this but I won’t kiss anybody’s ass. I’m not going to hide it; I’m going to do what I do. And the other is like, what on earth do I have to have airs about? This is me.
AL: Yeah, you’re right. You can’t be afraid of who you are and you can’t be afraid of how other people react to who you are. You have to feel comfortable with who you are.
LC: It’s intense, you know, like my life is intense. I used to be 24/7 all the time in-character. I dial back now in public because I don’t always want to be visible as sex. Sometimes I just want to look around this town and view things in a different way, and I’m much more sensitive now than I used to be in different ways. I’m much more aware of like, okay, this is making people uncomfortable. I used to just not care and say whatever and it was like, fucking deal with it. (laughs) But I’m a little bit politer now, you know. When people invite me to their homes I try to obey the rules and be a respectful guest. I know who I am, I don’t have to flaunt it.
AL: I’m learning that too. For me it was always like, I know who I am and I’m going to throw it in your face hoping you feel uncomfortable. It was thrown in my face my whole life that I am making all the wrong decisions, even down to who I am, so now that I’m comfortable in it, I’m going to mash your face in it as often as I can.
LC: (laughs) Right, it was like, fuck you, I’m gonna fuck your girl, your mom. If I wanna take out my tits here they are, I don’t give a fuck about you or anybody else. I was just in it. But now, it isn’t about that.
AL: You get a little older and you realize you don’t have to make everybody uncomfortable. You don’t have to be the aggressive and abrasive one first. It took a while.
LC: 30s change you. It’s weird. (laughs)
AL: I’m 30 on the dot. My lightbulb just started flickering. It’s not actually on yet, but it’s flickering.
LC: 30 was such a huge change for me in so many ways. Right around Heartbreaker, I made that right after I turned 30, that movie is really all about it. It has a lot of different themes in it, but yeah.
AL: I have to go back and watch it through that lens, with that in mind. I love that movie. Officer Cade is my favorite, but Heartbreaker was such a dynamic character.
LC: Well Officer Cade is having such a good time (laughs). She’s so full of shit but she doesn’t know it. She ruins lives, but nobody tells her and it’s great. People don’t exactly like her (laughs) but like, as long as they’re not the target of it she’s awesome.
AL: (laughs) You’re right, there are never any consequences for Cade. She’s the shit. I love her. But Heartbreaker made me think and feel. I paid more attention to her character development because you gave us a character with layers. It’s not a party with her, or just about sex with her. You have to think about what’s she’s going through with the torment and everything she’s been through.
LC: Heartbreaker is not happy. She’s real, and that’s an honesty that you don’t see in porn. You’ll see all types of bad sexual scenarios played out in fantasy but nobody is like, not having a nice time. What does is look like to be a hardcore sex addict? What’s the loneliness behind that type of behavior? I am like the female of a species that is all men. I am such a hard male archetype (laughs), I mean, I just live like this. It’s somewhat of a joke, right? The reflection of a Hollywood male lifestyle is funny. Ron Jeremy once told me that I fucked more women than him (laughs). When you think about that and about how long he’s been around, that’s crazy. Even the guy with the 8,000 girls-fucked list (Shimiken… read his story!), there’s something behind that. There’s a torture to it.
AL: As viewers, we don’t think about it from that perspective but you’re right, there is a torture to it. But for us it’s completely fantasy. We don’t live that life. What’s that like?
LC: People always think “fuck yeah, bitches all the time,” but it’s more to it than that. I said something to someone on set about a girl once and he looked at me and said, “Girls have names?” That hurt me to my heart. That put a lot of things in perspective and I came to an understanding. I had a moment on a dance floor, kind of early on, where I’m fingering this girl and I said, “Hey baby, what’s your name?” She says “we worked together,” so I’m like “oh yeah, that jail scene.” She goes, “no, it wasn’t,” and I’m still inside the girl, I don’t know what else to do. Turns out it was an orgy scene where we didn’t interact so that kind of made it okay.
AL: (laughs) What happened?
LC: I think I said something to her like “it’s okay, I fuck a lot of girls,” but after that I was careful about introducing myself. Recently I went to a pool party and I got a girl confused with her sister because now that’s she’s older they look more alike. I had a whole conversation with another girl about a time we met in a parking lot but that wasn’t the same girl. And there was a 3rd girl that recognized me and said we worked together, but I was honest and told her I didn’t remember. I said, “I hope you don’t take this as an insult but you’re prettier now than you were when you were shooting.” She said it was a compliment and took it well, so that one was an okay interaction, but when I’m getting to the point where I just can’t tell them apart I came to understand what that meant.
AL: How does that make you feel?
LC: It is what it is. I don’t know if I would have chosen that aspect if you said, “hey man, this is part of the cost.” But it’s just the cost. It doesn’t mean that I don’t still have good interactions. It’s like, a lot of the women I had sex with because they worked with me. I mean, I had this grand mission in mind on some level, but in the moment, it was because we were getting paid. I didn’t care what girl it was. I just made the connection with the girl that I was going to get and went from there.
AL: It’s the whole gift and curse thing.
LC: You’re right. And by the time I hit 30 I was just like wait. I’ve fucked more women than anyone else maybe in life, the list doesn’t matter anymore. No one else cares. And it’s like who else would?
AL: That’s true, I understand what you’re saying. I can’t stand when I see lesbian-themed movies that are obviously made for everyone except lesbians. There are some really good studios out there, but it was time for someone to grab the industry by the balls and show real lesbian sex for lesbians. It isn’t always slow and sexy, the strap game can get downright ruthless, and you not only did that, you did it with consistency. To some degree that’s what you came to be known for.
LC: But a lot of time you get those scenes where the girls seem so detached because they’re more concerned with the camera and making sure it’s seeing what’s happening. To some degree that’s okay because people want to see it, but there’s a difference between performing for the camera and not performing sex acts at all. Lots of times they’re just trying to give the image of a sex act. That’s why you get girls giving head 3 inches away from a clit. That’s what I got. Women weren’t paying attention to my body at all.
AL: Really?
LC: Why do you think half the time I don’t even get naked? I’m a porn star and I don’t even get naked, and nobody cares. I don’t even get the fake dick! Or what, you’re going to give me the most half-assed handjob that you can? I’m not disgusting, but I feel disgusting when someone is begrudgingly doing things to my body. So, I got into just being that strap-on gold star lesbian that can get off to cramming a fake dick down a girl’s throat. Maybe there’s a touch of whatever wrong there, but…
AL: I understand that. It’s not something I ever thought about or probably would have ever thought about. Even the fact that you’re not naked in lots of movies, especially Officer Cade flicks.
LC: Yeah there are some scenes out there where you can see me overcoming it. And lots of those are fantastic. I mean, I’ve had amazing sex on camera and I don’t regret it. I enjoyed it. Some of those women were awesome, but most of the women over the course of my career that I’ve worked with were just not interested. And it’s obvious once they get to my body. And I mean, I enjoy having sex with them in that context, on camera or whatever, and pleasuring them, but when it wasn’t reciprocated, it was like they didn’t enjoy it.
AL: That does make you think about the emotional toll that would take. It’s like you said, you know there’s nothing wrong with you. And if it comes down to doing the job, you’re doing your job well, so why can’t they do their job to the same level?
LC: They would get the guy off, so like, why can’t you do it for me without contempt (laughs).
AL: Right.
LC: I mean, it does happen to men too where the girls don’t seem interested. Once I was shooting one of my friends getting a handjob from this girl, and there was just no chemistry at all. It was terrible (laughs), but I loved it because it was compelling to see my friend received just as bad of a sexual experience as me.
AL: It’s one of those classic “I’m not the only one” moments.
LC: Yeah I was definitely like, okay, it happens to men too, this is cool. (laughs) In his mind it was like, well at least I get something. It was a piece of art. The memory of it is very compelling emotionally.
AL: Have you ever just stopped a scene midway through and said “look, just do your damn job?”
LC: (laughs) Yes. I won’t go into specifics, I think the girl is still around, but there was one scene where I needed head to make it work because it was a romantic scene. I couldn’t just pull out a strap and put her through the different positions, so I’m saying shit like, “oh yeah, baby, use your tongue on it,” and she just doesn’t. I say it a little louder and I grabbed her by the head, but she resisted me, so I pull her up and I’m like, “Look, I need oral sex in this movie.” She says okay and we get back to it, but at that point it was like, I’m not enjoying this either. But I mean this is your job. Do you think you get to come here and do nothing? And I think that some people see the way I am and the way I have sex and think I’m the pusher, the aggressive one. But there are expectations when you’re having sex in front of a camera, and if someone would come to me beforehand and say, “I don’t want to go down on you,” then okay, but that’s never the case. It’s like I’m expected to pound away on some chick for 45 minutes and then that’s it, that’s sex with Lily.
AL: I swear, watching your performances I never would have guessed how difficult it might be to make authentic lesbian porn when you’re working with mostly straight women.
LC: Not all of the girls are like that. I don’t want to tarnish the good ones. I mean, the girls that are successful, many of them are awesome, but I wasn’t getting many of them. Most of the girls I got were new. Mona Wales once said to me, “Lily Cade, everybody fucks you on the way up or on the way down. I might as well get it out of the way now while I’m on the way up.” (laughs) Mona is awesome, really kickass. Not conventionally attractive so to speak, and that’s not an insult, but she’s so fucking cool! She’s been in my movies (Lesbian Toe Suckers and Lesbian Cheaters) and we worked on other things together (Evil Lesbian Stepmother and Perversion and Punishment 7). She’s smart, she has a real energy, and humanity is there instead of just a body.
AL: I like that about Mona too. That’s something you both share in common. There’s something about the energy in your scenes that makes everything jump off the screen. That’s why, before you said anything today, I wouldn’t have been able to imagine anyone being hesitant or reluctant in scenes with you because the scenes seem like you pull out the best in everyone. If anything, I thought women would want their first girl-girl scene to be with you because it’s probably going to be great.
LC: Lots of girls did. Some were intimidated and didn’t want to do anything with me. Some of it was how the image would come across to the rest of the industry, some of it was whatever else, but I didn’t really press the issue, especially towards the end of it. I just didn’t care. There are so many scenes where I’m fully dressed. Officer Cade barely ever gets undressed because Officer Cade is just this bullshit man. But yeah, I’m a porn star and again, I’m not naked at all.
AL: But that stuff does so well! I won’t keep harping on OC but that’s my bitch man. She gets me, or at least the fantasy me. (laughs)
LC: She’s so at the apex of the LA story, that Archer character, but Rick Sanchez from Rick and Morty is where it ends (laughs). Like that archetype, you don’t want to be that. Usually that person is male, but here I am, and it’s nonstop. Officer Cade is on the upside of that, where she’s still enjoying it because she doesn’t have that self doubt.
AL: She never gets told no, and I love how after you give her what she wants she’ll still write your ass a ticket. (laughs)
LC: There’s a weird dynamic with cops and the whole power and abusing it thing. I thought about being a cop once. I was actually signed up to take the exam for the LAPD and then Prop8 happened, and so we were out marching in the streets. Everybody was so upset. LA voted against it and we felt like this is our city, how could you do this to us? It was supposed to be a vigil but it ended up being angry people reaching their limits, stomping cars, and I remember holding back a bus just because (laughs). It’s like people trying to go to work and I’m like, well whatever man we’re mad right now (laughs). Eventually tear gas was brought out and everyone just bailed. The 2nd day was more organized with structured routes and stuff, but I started yelling “left on Sunset,” and everyone chimes in, we take the left, and there are the cops with riot horses and everything! I was so close I could smell them, and I could see the looks in the cops’ eyes and it was just like “yeah, cross this fucking line, give us a reason.” It was so obvious that’s what they wanted and I could recognize that. That thing, that aggression is something we all have in us. I mean, you’ve seen mine (laughs), but right there I was like that isn’t for me. I don’t need a license to let that out. I don’t need that outlet. I even saw them beat the fuck out of this dude who actually did cross the line and was standing on cars and shit.
AL: Well it is the LAPD, there’s more than a history there.
LC: There’s a history with all of them, but I don’t give a fuck about the system so I definitely would have been corrupt (laughs), and the real-world version of Officer Cade is not funny, not cute. But anyway, there’s the relationship that I have with it.
AL: Getting that aggression out, was that part of why you started making porn?
LC: I did porn for a lot of reasons. It was the path of least resistance and then it was like who was I to say no (laughs). I felt like I had to. It was a destiny on some levels. I did it to be a better artist. I wasn’t ready out of film school, I didn’t have any money to make things. With porn I was able to make things that spoke to me and not give a fuck about what I said. The creative freedom I really liked. And some girls understood what I was trying to do and where I was coming from. Ela Darling, Nina Hartley, and so many others, man those girls were my rock. I just wanted to make something from a lesbian perspective where I could emotionally connect with someone to get a point across that is genuine. That’s hard to do.
AL: You succeeded in my book.
LC: It was a good job but eventually it takes a toll. Depravity just started running down man, and I rolled with it because I became that character, the porn star, in real life. I just wanted what I wanted. It was almost like being a wrestler (laughs), you can’t always come out of character and it becomes expected of you to interact with people and behave a certain way all the time. That’s exactly what happened to me. It was sex all the time because that’s what I was on and off the camera.
AL: How do you pull yourself out of that?
LC: The last two years haven’t been the greatest years of my life. I had to go through some suffering to realize it was really time to step back and maybe do something else.
AL: Is that what the farewell America tour (my phrase, not hers) is all about?
LC: Well my current project is a novel I’m writing. I get a lot done with that through Patreon, and I can write that anywhere. The thing about LA is that it’s a major city that’s so expensive and busy all the time it makes it impossible to do something like write which is self-reflective. Writing this is just about me and my creative process, so I don’t need to be around all the people and connections and distractions right now. I just need to do the work so I’m going to wander around for awhile and write.
AL: That’s how Alice Walker ended up with Color Purple. She went out to the country, sat down in front of a window, and ended up with so much more than the love triangle story she started with.
LC: Yeah you know, I love cities, I love to party, I love sex, I love hookups, but I also love being mature and stepping out of boundaries and being real. The city of Los Angeles is such a plastic oasis. We have trucked-in water which is wrecking up the area, no native-anything, but plenty of palm trees (laughs), just nothing about it is real and so I didn’t have to be a person. I could just say I’m this character, this sex, this is me, the woman with the fake dick fucking 50 chicks a week, that’s it. And that can be awesome but that time is gone for me. I love that I experienced it, I had fun, I’m just growing. It’s not like I’m retiring from sex.
AL: That was my next question because it sounds like you’re saying the porn life is behind you now.
LC: I just want to get in touch with other ways of life. I spent 10 solid years working in pornography, in LA. There aren’t even any seasons in LA (laughs). It’s time for a change. There were times I’d be on Tinder dates and just fuck the girl sometimes out of boredom, but just like whatever, this is what I do. I want to go away from that. And I mean, you’re never going to see that Tinder date I don’t feel like being on, but it was exactly the same. I sunk into the character and I did my job.
AL: Wow, it must be difficult to perform when you’re feeling like that, right?
LC: At the time when I was in the thick of it that was the only way to sustain it and produce that performance and maintain that level of success. I pushed certain levers up to 11 on the 10-scale and when you push something to 11, something else loses points. So by the time I reached level 17 I loved it, but it was Pickle Rick (season 3, episode 3 of Rick and Morty). It was a workaround for me not wanting to live like other people, not wanting to deal with life stuff. I had great intentions. I wanted to change porn.
AL: You did.
LC: In some ways, but it certainly reached a point where it became sex-addictive behavior towards the end, like all the stuff after Heartbreaker. I saw it coming, I knew it was coming, I felt it coming, but that’s just what I was. I stayed past the point where it was profitable, past the point where I was invested, it was just me and what I did.
AL: Did you feel trapped?
LC: Oh yeah, for sure. It wasn’t like the job or the industry though, it was me. I didn’t want to figure out what else to do or how to do anything else and I loved it. I loved it so much.
AL: I can imagine it would be hard to step back because of the way your work and personal lives blended together.
LC: That persona ate me and I just became male talent. In Evil Lesbian Stepmother you can start to see me crack. Plus the budgets went down so much and to really get into getting a point across and showing all that energy you have to put everything into it and I felt like I wasn’t even working with good enough equipment.
AL: Damn, you’re really an artist in your philosophy and the way you approach the whole thing. That’s really cool.
LC: That’s all I care about. More than myself, more than anything else, and that’s fine. I wanted to make an artistic statement. Even when I started to see the writing on the wall and hear people around the industry talk about the money drying up, I was fine. I was happy, I didn’t need much to hang out where I like to hang out, I was cool with having 4 roommates, and then eventually it did hit me. The girls coming into the industry changed too and I didn’t know them. The energy was different. Even in trade shoots it started to be wam-bam-thank you-ma’am in motel rooms and I’m like, umm what? The focus was just completely different. It wasn’t even about the sex anymore, it was more like an extension of an escorting career and that’s not what I wanted to connect with.
AL: It sounds like you’re being used in a sense, I guess similar to what the guys go through.
LC: You’ve seen Hot Girls Wanted? I didn’t go through any of that or anything like that…
AL: I hated that, because in my opinion it wasn’t a full representation of the industry and people watched it and just ran with it, like they usually do.
LC: As an industry, that’s our fault and we deserve it 100%.
AL: Really!?
LC: Yeah, because why work with people like that then.
AL: But those girls aren’t presenting themselves like that when they walk into casting. I mean, don’t they seem like they want to be there?
LC: I’ll put it like this, some agents are trash agents and we know which ones they are. I’ve heard about agents screaming at girls because they won’t take it up the ass yet, or do IR yet, and they just end up being pushed in certain directions. The girls that really want to be the top stars might thrive in that, but that’s not everybody. Agents are supposed to protect you but lots of times they’re the ones pushing you to do whatever they think you should do to make the most money. They’re middlemen.
AL: Do you see the evolution of cam content as taking that middleman out of it? Would that be a good thing?
LC: The porn valley porn will always be there, but self-made digital content is a way that people can get straight to their audience. I have my own website and it’s paid my rent for many years, but it’s not and will never again be a source of porn stardom. What sells is talent and buzz. It’s not like Instagram where pretty girls get endorsement contracts. Porn is set up to prevent the girls from creating a name outside of sex as much as possible. The girls are interchangeable parts.
AL: I’ve heard that from stars doing different interviews before. It’s harder to become a household name.
LC: Yeah, I mean Nina Hartley, Sasha Grey, Andriana Chechik, those are porn stars.
AL: That’s a good starter list right there.
LC: It is. I’ve been called the last lesbian porn star (laughs), but now what I’m doing is traveling around working on farms. I have skills with horses so I plan to put those to use. I feel like I need to take on labor that doesn’t distract my mind.
AL: I understand that. It’s not like you have to be a certain character or connect with as many people throughout the day and give 100% of yourself all the time.
LC: I had to give 400% because I was doing all the work. Having to act and perform, direct, edit, explain my script to the actresses. Everything!
AL: Well it’ll be cool to dial it back a little so you can give 100% in a different way.
LC: Yeah, that’s the plan. I mean, I was making porn from a creative space. I wanted to make a documentary with it, but once it became just porn and I pushed the limits I just had to find another creative outlet.
AL: So you’re going to travel around Europe, work with horses, and maybe shoot some trade stuff?
LC: Yeah, that’s my plan. My last porn scene is definitely still ahead of me, but I’m going to step away and clear my head and become me. I’m going to see what these European bitches are all about (laughs), but I’m not going to put my persona or character on full display.
AL: Well Lily, it has been such an honor and pleasure talking with you! Thank you so much for stopping by! I can’t believe it’s been 2 hours (laughs), but it’s been a real pleasure. I felt like I was catching up with a friend. All of us here wish you the best.
LC: Of course, and thank you and HotMovies for having me. You guys have always been cool.
Then we went to Starbucks and I had to take this picture because when is the next time I’ll be in Starbucks with a living legend!? Make sure you check out more Lily Cade‘s movies and don’t forget to follow me on Twitter @authenticlezz1 for the latest and greatest!
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