by Fred Topel

“Working is vacation for me”
– Ashley Bell

Ashley Bell literally bent over backwards to entertain us in The Last Exorcism. The film marked her major movie debut in a leading role, and quite an impressive debut it was as a small down girl possessed by a demon. Even though it was called The Last Exorcism, they’ve made a sequel and Bell is back.

Bell also gets to step up her physical work in the film The Day. The post-apocalyptic thriller casts bell as Mary, the toughest most fierce survivor in the wasteland. It may have become a cliché to see a woman kick butt in an action movie, but Bell makes it primal and vicious. The film premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2011, where WWE Studios picked it up and is now distributing it.

Of course, that’s all acting. In real life she’s a total sweetheart. She even dresses up to meet reporters and look good on camera, even though her biggest roles have been stripped down and natural. Bell is a trained actor with a background from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts and Cambridge University, so she shared with us all her tricks and secrets in a sit down interview that could have gone on forever.

Read our exclusive interview with Ashley Bell on SuicideGirls.com.

by Damon Martin

For every Geoff Johns and Jim Lee in the comic book industry there are a thousand writers and artists just hoping to climb, scratch or claw their way onto the radars of a major publisher like DC or Marvel. The role of independent comics however has served as a rich creative breeding ground where there is no corporate bottom line to meet or concerns that stories are too graphic or gritty to land on the page. With that freedom also comes the kind of passion that is lost in the more mainstream comic world, since, as most independent comic book writers and artists will tell you, no one is making millions from self-publication.

Michael Easton is a life-long comic book fan and writer, who worked for DC/Vertigo when he co-penned the graphic novel The Green Woman with award winning author Peter Straub. As much as Easton loved working on that book, there is a certain freedom that comes with a self-published work like his 2008 graphic novel, Soul Stealer, which is a 500-plus page gothic story following an immortal warrior named Kalan, with wonderful art provided by Christopher Shy.

The freedom allowed Easton to tell the story in his own words, without worry that a publisher would tell him something was too graphic or that he needed to cut pages. He told his story to a very specific audience, but those that read it stuck by him, and that’s one reason why independent comics will always hold a special place in the industry.

“You end up having a lot of late night phone calls with Shanghai when you’re going through the printing process. You end up talking at 3 o’clock in the morning about how you want your color bleeds going. But we set this up because it was going to be a freedom issue. Nobody was going to let us do a 550-page, large format, hardcover comic book, but that’s where I think the independent business is going,” Easton said when speaking at San Diego Comic-Con. “Digital comics are great, but if you offer people something extra, you offer the large format, you put in sketches, you put in outtakes, you put in an audio track, posters, things like what were doing, I think you’ll get a collector audience.”

Those late nights also included writing sessions till all hours as he listened to Radiohead and Jeff Buckley for inspiration. The end result paid off because the collectors picked up on Soul Stealer and it has become a cult classic among comic book enthusiasts. Easton admits his book wouldn’t have been the same if he’d had to conform to certain standards required by many major publishers.

“Some of the comic companies now are having very specific regulations about what you can and can’t do. And with Chris, I mean he’s the ultimate graphic artist…you want somebody who’s going to bleed on the page with you. The horror has to be horrific, and the violence has to be violent, and the beautiful, passionate sexual element has to be there too. You can’t always do that when you’re worrying about some kind of censorship issue and things like that. We don’t have that, we have complete freedom,” said Easton. “We did the book exactly like how we wanted to do it.”

Part of the reason Easton is able to do the things he’s able to in his books is because writing is his passion but it doesn’t always pay his bills. During the daytime hours, Easton has been an actor for most of his adult life, working on several television shows including soap operas like General Hospital and One Life to Live. Not needing to bow down to the almighty dollar has given Easton the flexibility to tell his stories the way he wants to. It’s also allowed him to keep his stories personal. He’s never has to sell to the highest bidder because he had to make rent.

“I’m very fortunate to have a day job. This allows me to do everything the way I want to do it. We’ve had film companies come to us, and in another life I would have optioned this thing off a long time ago, but having the day job has allowed me the financial independence to say I’m waiting for the right people to look at this. Waiting until Christopher Nolan sees this or Ridley Scott or James Cameron, we really want to be turned down by all of those people before we would go somewhere else,” Easton commented. “You only get one shot. It really is a passion, and it’s a passion to take something like this to another level.”

With Soul Stealer now available in a special one-shot hard cover edition, Easton is moving onto his next story called Credence, about a New York City cop which he has described as “Californication meets The Bad Lieutenant.” Long-term, Easton would love to see his newest creation land on television alongside shows like Breaking Bad or Sons of Anarchy – the kind of edgy shows that push the envelope and have developed loyal and deeply involved fans.

“We’ve done about 135-pages, it’s going to be a long graphic novel…the story stops when it needs to stop. It’s got a real great, edgy feel. Everyone right now is talking about movies, but I love what’s going on with TV right now. Breaking Bad, Mad Men, Game of Thrones, Justified, Californication. and Weeds. I think it’s the most interesting storytelling,” Easton said. “I think if Shakespeare wrote today he would have written The Sopranos, he would be David Chase. He would tell the story the way he wanted to. So where Soul Stealer was this big epic film, Credence is going in the other direction. Let’s do a gritty little movie. I live in New York, so it has that ‘70s kind of French Connection feel to it.”

Easton hopes to debut Credence this October at the New York Comic Con, and if there’s one thing to say about this particular independent comic book maker – he’s definitely going to do it his own way.

For more on Michael Easton’s work visit: michaeleaston.com/

by Fanny Merkin a.k.a. Andrew Shaffer

The following is an exclusive excerpt from Fanny Merkin’s parody novel, Fifty Shames of Earl Grey. At this point in the story, the rich, sexy tycoon, Earl Grey, has just led college student Anna Steal into his “Room of Doom”…

The first thing I notice is the smell: Nag Champa incense and dirty laundry. The room is illuminated only by black light, but I can see enough to tell this is the kind of closet R. Kelly wouldn’t mind being trapped in. The room is tiny compared to the rest of Earl Grey’s apartment. There’s barely enough room for the waterbed. Whips, chains, ropes, riding crops, paddles, and iron shackles are hung up on the walls next to black-light posters — really trippy black-light posters. Room of Doom? More like the “Dorm Room of Doom.”

I feel Earl’s hand on my left shoulder. He’s breathing into my ear. “Welcome to my world, Anna.”

“Do you bring all your dates here?”

“I don’t know if I’d call them ‘dates,’” he says. “They are, more accurately, LARPers. ‘LARP’ stands for ‘live-action role playing.’”

“If they’re not dates, then what are they? Volunteers? Where do you meet them?”

Earl picks up an impossibly large, rounded red die off the nightstand and rolls it around in his hand. “There are women who LARP professionally,” he says. “They’re all over Craigslist.”

I laugh at the thought of him trolling for women on Craigslist. Surely someone as good looking and rich as Earl Grey doesn’t need to resort to picking up girls on the Internet! “You’re kidding,” I say.

He shakes his head. “I know, it just seems so dirty to meet women on Craigslist.”

“Dirty and gross,” I say.

“It’s just one of my fifty shames, Anna,” he says, lowering his head. “You don’t know the depths of my perversion.”

I’ve already seen him at what I figured was the depth of his shame, buying a Nickelback CD. Do I want to know how deep his perversions go? “And you use these . . . things on them? You torture them?” I ask, motioning to his toys.

“If the game calls for it.”

“And who decides that?” I ask.

“I do, with a little help from my trusty D-sixty-nine,” he says, rolling the die on the nightstand. “This is a sixty-nine-sided die, Anna. As the Dungeon Master, I use it to guide the action.”

The die rolls to a stop. “So you want me to role play with you?” I ask.

“Eventually,” he says, grinning.

“What do I get out of the whole deal? I don’t know if pretending I’m an elf being whipped is really my thing.”

“I see you as more of a faery than as an elf, but we can get into specifics later. What I get out of our arrangement is you, submitting to my every whim,” he says. “And what you get is Earl Grey.”

Wow. Somebody thinks highly of themselves.

“But we can ease our way into our LARPing characters with time. I don’t know what you’re doing to me, Anna: I don’t feel the need to pretend you’re a captive orc princess in order to get off. All I know is that I need you right now — any way I can get you.”

Oh my. Earl reaches a hand out to me. I take it in mine, and he leads me to the waterbed…

Continue reading the story in Fifty Shames of Earl Grey, available in bookstores everywhere! To locate a copy near you or find one online, visit 50shames.com.

Fanny Merkin lives in a Beverly Hills mansion purchased using the embarrassingly large advance she received for Fifty Shames of Earl Grey. She is a former Walmart employee who writes under the pseudonym, “Andrew Shaffer,” for publications as diverse as Mental Floss, Maxim and SuicideGirls. Andrew Shaffer is the author of Great Philosophers Who Failed at Love. He reviews romance, erotica, and women’s fiction for RT Book Reviews magazine.

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by A.J. Focht

This weekend is your last chance to see The Avengers in theaters. Disney is rereleasing the film for one weekend only. Avengers was playing on 142 screens last week. It is unknown how many more theaters will be picking the movie back up for the holiday weekend. Rumors of Disney releasing The Avengers with extra footage before the summer’s end surfaced months ago. It is unclear as of now if this weekend’s release will have that extra footage or not. Either way, it looks like Disney is determined to close the $40 million dollar gap to take the second highest grossing box-office record from Titanic.

ABC has officially ordered a S.H.I.E.L.D. pilot. Joss Whedon is co-writing it with his brother Jed Whedon, and Maurissa Tancharoen. All three are executive producers on the project. While Jed and Maurissa will be the show runners, Joss assures us that he will show up now and then to take credit for everything.

Rumors that Ben Affleck was being considered to direct the Justice League movie have been floating around for a while. He’s not alone on that list though as a handful of directors have been rumored for consideration. The list includes: The Watchowskis, Brett Ratner, Zack Snyder, Ruben Fleischer, and McG. There are also one or two more names in consideration that haven’t been released yet.

Sony has officially announced the Metal Gear Solid movie – again. The announcement was made at the Metal Gear Solid Anniversary event in Tokyo. Spider-Man producer Avi Arad is behind the project. Little more is known other than that the movie is currently in development.

Sony isn’t just working on videogame based movies, they are also working on a movie about the videogame console wars. Sony has registered a bunch of domains relating to the movie. The current rumor is that it will be like a Social Network for the gaming world.

If Morgan Freeman wasn’t already the voice you heard in your head as you played God over your LEGOs, he probably will be now. LEGO: The Piece of Resistance is a LEGO film that will star Morgan Freman, Elizabeth Banks, and Chris Pratt. Freeman will be playing a character named ‘Vitruvius’ who is described as ‘Gandalf meets Mr. Magoo’.

A few weeks ago David Duchovny gave an interview saying he wanted to make a third X-Files film, and now a third movie might indeed be underway. Gillian Anderson answered questions about it at the Toronto Fan Expo and said that things were looking pretty good, after having met with series creator Chris Carter. It looks like FOX is the only holdout now.

by Daniel Robert Epstein

“I like being someone else for just three months.”
– Jessica Biel

Jessica Biel actually flashed a little bit of stomach because she was showing off her vampire hunter belt. I thought it was so cool that innocent little Mary Camden was showing skin to a roomful of comic book fans there to interview her for Trinity.

In the third Blade film she plays Abigail Whistler, the illegitimate daughter of Kris Kristofferson’’s character Abraham Whistler. She is a vampire hunter that works with a team called the Nightstalkers that includes Hannibal King [Ryan Reynolds] and SuicideGirls’ favorite Patton Oswalt.

Read our interview with Jessica Biel on SuicideGirls.com.

by Daniel Robert Epstein

“This was just a part that I thought I could sink my teeth into.”
– Don Cheadle

Don Cheadle is a very well known and brilliant supporting actor, who has appeared in such films as Out of Sight, Boogie Nights and Devil in a Blue Dress, but he has yet to have that lead role that will truly launch him, until now. Cheadle is now starring in Hotel Rwanda, the true life story of Paul Rusesabagina who rescued and housed thousands of refugees during the Rwandan Genocide of 1994.

Read our interview with Don Cheadle on SuicideGirls.com.

by Nicole Powers

“Ignorance is bliss…If I hadn’t taken the red pill, this would be so easy.”
– Lee Camp

Unless you’re the kind of rabid right winger who gets up at 7 AM on a Saturday to watch Fox & Friends, which I’m assuming you’re not if you’re reading this, Lee Camp is probably the best comedian you’ve never seen on TV. And there’s a good reason for that. Back in February 2008, when the Faux News Channel made the glorious mistake of interviewing him live on air, he took the opportunity to present a monologue on the nature of the network – calling it a “parade of propaganda” and a “festival of ignorance.” The purported “news” show reacted by cutting away to an anchor in another part of the studio, who was surrounded by four foxy female models dressed in miniaturized Lieutenant Uhura outfits, who previewed an upcoming segment on Captain Kirk’s sex appeal – which underscored Camp’s point rather nicely (no disrespect to William Shatner or his undeniable animal magnetism intended).

In the intervening four years, as the economic climate degenerated Camp’s political awareness increased, and though a few doors closed for him, many tent flaps unexpectedly opened up – thanks to the birth of Occupy Wall Street. Camp’s philosophy was naturally aligned with that of the founders of the movement, and the comedian has supported and promoted it since its inception, through street performances at numerous encampments and via his popular Moment of Clarity videos (which can now be seen on SG). Camp recently published a collection of his finest Moment of Clarity revolutionary rants in book form, and has just released a second riotously funny comedy album on Stand Up Records called Pepper Spray The Tear Away, which is essential listening for anyone who gets nostalgic for the scent of capsicum.

SuicideGirls caught up with Camp in New York City to talk politics, the upcoming presidential election, Occupy, apathy – and how to save the Doritos munching masses from themselves.

Read our exclusive interview with Lee Camp on SuicideGirls.com.