Dave sneaks a peak at an agreeable XXX team-up between maestro Gary Graver and star Jerry Butler.

Despite their prolific nature, it took a good few years for Gary Graver to collaborate with actor Jerry Butler. As discussed previously, 10 ½ Weeks (1986) was an excellent vehicle for the star from New York, who Bill Margold lovingly referred to as “James Dean meets Peter Pan”. It’s PEEPING TOM, though, that maxes out Butler’s screen time on a Graver picture, showcasing his dexterity in blending drama with comedy and, of course, sex.

Born in Brooklyn, Butler was a talented hockey player whose quest to be a star took him on a tour of the best acting schools in New York. According to April Hall’s stunning 2014 interview on The Rialto Report, the pressure from gay men in positions of power caused Butler to become disillusioned with the mainstream business (he was sporadically on long-running soap One Life To Live), so, after answering a magazine ad in 1981, a XXX career was born [1].

Taken under the wing of Schlock Pit favourite Chuck Vincent – whom he credits as being a genuine father figure – Butler quickly established himself as one of the most sought after performers in the business. Alas, by the start of the ‘90s, his career was in tatters. Convinced an AIDS diagnosis was incoming, Butler penned a savage memoir that dished the dirt on every facet of the skin trade. Raw Talent, named after his eerily autobiographical feature from ’84, got the jiggle thesp blacklisted. Friendships fizzled too – notably the now disgraced Ron Jeremy, who Butler quite rightly outed as a creep.

Butler is in virtually every moment of Peeping Tom, starring as William Burke: the wealthy head of an investment firm yet a man swiftly losing touch with reality. Not that he minds too much: every social occasion seems to take him on a voyeuristic journey into a private sexual experience. Prying upon several acts of intimacy and spurred on by the human incarnation of his conscience (a virginally dressed Kimberly Carson), the risk versus reward of these salacious flights of fancy prove tough for Burke to refuse.

Ranking somewhere in the middle of the dozen adult features that Graver directed in 1986, Peeping Tom has the advantage of being shot on 35mm, sporting the look of a Golden Age production and debuting theatrically [2]. Joey Silvera and Shanna McCullough kick things off in style on an artfully minimalistic set, and a vocal Nina Hartley’s scene with Buck Adams stands out as memorable. It’s not all just wall to wall sex: woven between is a dive into the psychology of Burke’s scopophilia obsession. It does, admittedly, lead to a weirdly predictable sequence that finds him perving on his own mother (Honey Wilder), but nevertheless, the intention was honourable.

Peeping Tom was penned by Stephen Sayadian, who also wrote Crazy With the Heat (1986), a superior Calvista joint that Graver shot back-to-back with this. Both films marked another chapter in the remarkable life of the Chicagoan. Having worked for Hustler just out of his teens, Sayadian got into designing one sheets (Brian De Palma’s Dressed to Kill (1980) among them) before partnering with Jerry Stahl on a handful of innovative pornos, including the acclaimed Café Flesh (1982). However, his roots lie in experimental theatre and absurdist comedy; genes all too apparent in his writing. Sayadian was also a close friend of Ray Manzarek – who, in a delightful coincidence, collaborated on an unproduced script with Gary Graver [3].

USA ● 1986 ● Adult, Comedy ● 86mins

Jerry Butler, Kimberly Carson, Nina Hartley, Nick Random, Honey Wilder, Joey Silvera, Kristara Barrington, Shanna McCullough ● Dir. Gary Graver (as ‘Robert McCallum’) ● Wri. Stephen Sayadian

[1] Jerry Butler: Young, Wild, and Wonderful by April Hall, The Rialto Report, 8^th June 2014
[2] Peeping Tom opened in October ’86 at Cinema 16 in Waterloo, Iowa. The venue still operates as an adult cinema today.
[3] So says Veronica Hart.