Femme Productions

Femme Productions is one of the most respected and reputable names in the history of the porn industry. It’s rarely that someone uses the word ‘respected’ to define a porn production company. But, Femme Production was something exceptional. They changed the path of the porn industry and made the field take the exit from the disgraceful highway it was on. Some might say that the industry is shifting back to old ways, but it doesn’t disregard everything Femme did to excel this field.

Candida accepting an award
Candida accepting an award

This post is going to be about Femme Productions, its founder, how it started and exactly what it was able to do for the porn business. Without further ado, let’s start off.

The Founder of Femme Productions

Born in New York in 1950, Candice Marion Vadala was the mind behind the creation of Femme Production. Candida was a highly educated individual and was bound to live a healthy life as a musician and dancer. However, things didn’t work out exactly how she planned. Her musical career wasn’t able to take off and the best she got out of it was a few gigs at the local jazz bars. It didn’t take Candida long to realize that music was a dead end for her and pursuing the career would have her struggling to eat three meals a day. So, Candice made the decision to switch her field and tried out modeling. But, the same thing happened here, although she did get something out of it. A person suggested that she should try the adult filmmaking industry. Offended at first, Candice wasn’t the type of person that would’ve made this decision lightly. After finding out everything about the workplace, she determined that it wasn’t as bad as it seemed at the start and a career as an adult actor might not be too shabby.

Candida with her dvd cover
Candida with her dvd cover

Candida made her first movie in 1975 and spent the next five years making 25 of the best movies of the time. After that, she decided to step back but didn’t want to leave the adult industry. Instead of being the performer, she changed her role to being a director as she was the one directly most of her successful movies. Her ambition was to change the industry which was something that wasn’t easy to do as a performer, so she decided to make her own production company. That is how Femme was born.

Why Was Femme Needed?

The industry was a sinking ship. Porn was basically another way to solidify the superiority of men over women and they were degraded in every way imaginable in the industry. Femme was aimed to change that. Candida Royalle wanted a workplace where the performers were treated as talent and not as a piece of flesh as other developments usually did. Candice didn’t just change the workplace, she changed the way people were shooting porn. Instead of objectifying women, she made videos that were women-oriented and showed both participants at the same level. At the time, her idea was her own vision. Years later, we look back at Femme and Candida as the pioneers of feminist porn.

Creating Femme

The transition from actor to director wasn’t easy for someone like Candice. She spent about four years just writing men magazines and she would still often question the ethical and moral ambiguities of her work. Though, her “soul searching” told her that she could actually make a difference.

Femme was an instant success. Her first two movies were FemmE and Urban Heat. Both did amazing and she would move on to her award-winning movie Christine’s Secret that really put Femme in the spotlight. The movie managed to snag five awards from the East Coast Critics Association. Then came the big fish, Three Daughters. The movie was one of the most expensive porn films of the time and cost $75,000. However, it made much more than that.

After that, the job became pretty easy. Three Daughters earned Femme Productions a good name and proved that they’re good at what they do. With that, they were able to score investments and constantly put out better and better videos. Femme created dozens of videos, and there wasn’t a single one that was unsatisfactory…