AVN Media Network made it official early last week and announced the nominees for this year’s GAYVN Awards. Lucas Entertainment led with 15 nominations, the majority going to its
Inside Israel and
Wall Street. Raging Stallion Studios followed with 14 nominations, mainly for its
Focus/Refocus. “We had an impressive number of pre-nominations this year from across the spectrum,” AVN COO
Janet Gibson says. “The nominating committee was tireless in its efforts to whittle the list down to a manageable size, but…difficult decisions had to be made.” (Full disclosure:
Vince is serving as a GAYVN judge.) Gibson added that two categories were dropped this year and bareback movies would not be eligible for consideration, though they might be added next year. Later in the week, AVN made more news with the addition of four new categories that will be decided by fans: Best Top, Best Bottom, Best Versatile (that about covers it) and Overall Fan Favorite (let the Twitter campaigns begin!). To vote for your man,
click here. The 12th Annual GAYVN Awards will take place on Friday, September 24, at the Castro Theatre in San Francisco. They will be hosted by comedian
Alec Mapa and be presented by NakedSword the same weekend as the Folsom Street Fair. For a complete list of nominees,
click here.…In porn star news, we have an update on former bondage star
Mikey Verdugo. It was just two years ago that
we told you about this Florida police officer who did a movie,
Rope Rituals, for kink director
Tom “Ropes” McGurk under the name
Jeremy Wess back in the mid-’90s. Verdugo went on to appear on as a contestant on HGTV’s
Design Star reality show. When Verdugo’s employer discovered his porn past, he was suspended and eventually dismissed from the police force. Now, Verdugo, 36, has been placed on one-year probation and will be able to keep his police certification. He is also suing over his dismissal and that case will come up in November. Soldier on, stud!…On a more upbeat note, Falcon star
Aden Jaric took to his Twitter to say that he’s moving on and will be shooting a scene for the first time with someone other than his ex,
Jordan Jaric. “I’ll be filming my first video [since] the breakup!” Jaric wrote. “Falcon Studios, of course!” So who’s the lucky bottom (or is that top!?) to appear with adorable Aden? None other than (over)
XXXposed star
Steven Daigle. The scene films this week.…And on a final note, porn party boy
Mason Wyler (
below) got serious last week by announcing on his blog that he is HIV-positive. “I have only myself to blame,” he writes. “I have HIV and it kind of sucks.” Wyler has appeared in numerous films for major studios, including Falcon, Titan and
Jet Set Men, in addition to Web work for
Suite 703 and Next Door Entertainment. Raging Stallion head
Chris Ward jumped in to support the beleaguered star with an offer to work for his studio. “Raging Stallion practices safe sex on all of its video shoots,” Ward says. “HIV status should not be an issue when shooting porn if the actors are using condoms and using common sense. [We] would love to shoot Mason Wyler in an upcoming movie. He is a great actor and I have always wanted to work with him.” Wyler has not responded to the offer or much of the controversy surrounding him after an industry blog war erupted last week. Nuff said.
