The past eighty plus days have been something unique and life changing for the world. We took some time at XCritic to look at the state of the industry and all that is happening. There are so many dark things occurring and many stories swirling of experiences and people that hopefully will forever change the landscape of adult in ways that are positive for everyone. It was during these protests of 2020 that we decided the best way to add something positive to what is going on was by showcasing a starlet who is pure joy, wonder and brilliance to the fans in the XXX world. Then, we had to make sure we put her on display like they have never seen before. I was lucky enough to meet this beautiful woman’s partner about a year ago to have the same kind of conversation and interview. Which this go-around had to be a phone call due the pandemic that was still tormenting the planet and country as we sat down miles apart to converse. For many years, this beautiful woman spent her time on the fetish side of porn. Dazzling the senses of fans in so many ways during those years that were not as big or popular as they are with fans today. She spent so much time being bound, spanked and working with legends of the industry before she even had her first “romantic” kiss in front of a camera. Her career has spanned almost two decades and what has blossomed within this superstar is a career that has literally gone in reverse. That is who this iconic model is. A true diamond forged out of leather, stainless steel and the most slippery rubber you have ever felt. She has become an actress who is anything but plain. A woman who loves every scene that she is in because what you are seeing is not a performance, oh no. What you behold every time is a true sexual encounter. It is that reality, that passion that made me wish to find out the story of the one and only Dee Williams. 

Dee Williams: (As we begin, Dee and I speak a tad about Syren De Mer, her girlfriend and just how much we love her exuberance. Then, among the joyful laughs and smiles, I soon learn that her charm knows no bounds. She begins our conversation with…) I just smoked some pot, so yes, let’s get the “adulting” out of the way first, so we can get to the fun. 

Don Juan: (As I giggle, yes giggle at this beautiful blond, who has a wit and persona that comes through the telephone in a way that you just can not describe. It is a beautiful woman, a confident woman and nothing is better when it comes to an interview.) I know, the funniest thing ever and you will love this because when I first spoke with Syren I got to first speak with her and you are talking to a man with Italian blood in his veins as well. Her rambunctiousness and gumption are something so wonderful. I told her, “you are just as blunt as a spoon aren’t you?” Syren said, “Yes, I am.” 

Dee Williams: She is and honestly, if she did not have such a pure heart underneath all of that, I think she might get in trouble with that “rambunctiousness” as you call it.

(We stop and laugh, as what makes this conversation so funny is that Syren De Mer is Dee’s girlfriend. I am not joking. Both women are incredibly passionate lovers, friends, companions and so much more. Their passion for the elegance of nudity, provocative art and sex are massive as can be. Most fans, and people in general I should say, see these two women who have so much passion on screen, and they think something right away that vulgarity is the first instinctual thought that pops into their heads. Oh, no. I was a person who made that mistake with Syren when I interviewed her. She described herself as the aggressive one in the relationship. The “gear head” and Dee was the woman of eloquence who loved to cook and display that proper wonder and charm that is a woman through and through. Dee and I spoke a few minutes before we recorded about how she gets this so much with her fans. That many of them only see the woman of kink and not the sensual woman who has an equal love for beauty. How they both deal with it is a wonder of women that I do not think is written about enough with iconic adult entertainers like they both are.) 

Don Juan: That is so funny. We began to talk in length about her photography, her passion for art and beauty. A love of Playboy and what goes into creating something that has so much depth behind it like the pictures of Playboy do, especially the ones taken many years ago. I told her, “you remind me of one of the photographers I have always worked with, right down to her candid beauty.” We had a nice little laugh about that. Now, to begin talking about you darlin’ I simply must say, you are having one hell of a year in the industry here. 

Dee Williams: Oh yeah, that is until COVID-19 got here but yes, it has been something, well, let's talk about this. I entered “mainstream” porn, I guess that is the way that I would say it, only two or three years ago, coming over from the bondage side of things. I was not at all sure how or if I was going to be accepted in any way, shape or form. It has really pleased me how my career has developed on the “mainstream" side of porn and the roles that I am getting offered and the things that I get to do, I love all of it. 

Don Juan: It is something wonderful to have the veteran performers in this business and this is something that I see you do with each film. You are paving the way for people to see outside and inside the business to engage their fans and have fun with it. I think you are blazzing a trail on how to perform by having so much fun. I think that not a lot of starlets get to show that on screen and have that joy as they make a scene in today’s world. It does not matter if it is porn, or an infomercial. You show men and women of this business that you can create something that you will remember forever and that is important. I am a keen believer in making lasting memories in anything people call a “job” let alone a profession where you invoke so much of the human spirit. 

Dee Williams: Yes, you only get so many days in this life to walk this earth, and life is just too short to be doing dregery. Find something that you love and really pursue that passion or project. For me, I feel so lucky that “project” for me was porn and that there is a real place for me here. I feel that I am in porn during a time when there is a real need for women of a certain age to step in, and particularly with these girl/girl scenes to drive the sex. It is fabulous to me and I love everything about it. 

Don Juan: Darlin’ you are a woman who creates something that fans and industry personnel alike love. It is something that they have a respect and admiration for at a level that I think is matched by very few performers these days. I have been looking forward to this interview for a long time. My main reason being, well I have a couple of reasons. First, I love sitting down with the intelligent women of this industry. It is something I really enjoy doing and that is showing a side that people do not see within this world of sexuality and fantasy. The other big reason I have been dying to sit you down was that when I began to get to know Syren, I have been dying to know something.

About four or five years ago, when I began to get into the writing side of the business I met a beautiful young woman who was a performer, and she was a fetish performer in Florida, who still performs to this day. Long story short, before I met this love of my life, I was a little, how would you say, blind or unresponsive to the wonders of fetish and BDSM. Another long story short, we both shed a tear because getting to understand the wonders of those things, it is something that I do not think the mind fully grasps until you experience it yourself and those tears we shed were of our past loves who introduced us to such wonders. What a powerful thought and emotion that is. It was amazing that as we spoke, I thought of this love of my life, who I am still friends with today. Being you are a veteran of BDSM and fetish, I would love to hear your perspective and your stories if you would share them, of where that passion of yours comes from? 

Dee Williams: Well, BDSM is super interesting. In particular to people who have mostly had a “vanilla” outlook on things and I do not say “vanilla” disparagingly. (Now, what is so amazing about this pause that occurred is that when Dee spoke that very word, my mind went to this moment of transcribing, or writing down what words are being spoken on the voice recorder. Vanilla is a term that is used mainly as a person whose flavor for sex has only seen one shade but that shade has many, many layers of taste. What Dee speaks of is taking things from a white, “clean” side of sex and sexuality and taking it to a dark, rich and “kinky” place within sexuality that takes a lot more mind power than it does actual charisma.) 

I love “basic” sex. I think that it is wonderful and it is connective. It is just absolutely fabulous, and we do not have to get out all the whips and chains to indulge in it. With that said, I also believe that the way that my brain was wired. The way that I came from the factory, I was fascinated with power exchange. That type of kinkiness and role-play was almost, well, let’s start here. Even before I knew what sex was, as a basic concept, I had a deep fascination with power exchange in general and taking on these roles and that sort of thing. I think that I was kinky from the get-go. So, that question is fascinating to me. I feel like the last fifteen years for me, especially with the advancement of the internet. We are truly at a “renaissance” in terms of who identifies with BDSM and the kinky stuff and how they relate to it. Years ago, we used to have almost two entirely separate camps. Which, for the first part of my career was brilliant. There was a long time when bondage guys bought bondage porn and “vanilla” guys bought “vanilla” porn and there the two shall meet. Which for me, because I am bendy, because I am stretchy, I think that is what inclined me to first discover bondage before anything else. That is basically where I started out for many, many years, making my living. How most of my days looked was that I would show up on set. We would discuss what is happening. I would get tied up. Use a vibrator to make me cum. They would cut me a check and I would go home. 

(Yes, this is Dee Williams from start to finish. Nothing is improvised, nothing is faked. For every person that steps foot in this business in one way or another, they have an idea of what they think a “porn star” is like. Anyone who says otherwise is only fooling themselves. Dee is the woman that you honestly picture a performer being and having that type of humor, character and personality that a pursuit of your own sexuality would create. That is Dee Williams all right.)

It is and was the best of both worlds when you come right down to it and has been very fulfilling to me to see people more like you who didn’t really have the context for BDSM. Sex to them was a very mystical, powerful thing that involved taking a penis and putting it into a vagina ninety-eight percent of the time and while I love that just as much, there is so much more that my brain considers sex and intimacy with these really powerful connections. These are all things that people can get through fetish and BDSM. You can have these real deep, meaningful, personal interactions with people, where nobody takes their pants off at all. Maybe even that nobody orgasms, because that is not exactly the point. So, in that way to me, fetish and BDSM they almost transcend what a lot of people think of as sex. Thankfully, in this new millennium, the fact that so many people are broadening their concepts of what sex is, from just penis and vagina. The fact that it seems to be becoming a movement where people say, “oh, I can have this sort of intimacy and connection, in ways that are just beyond purely procreative.” I think as a very queer person, as a very kinky person, I love seeing other people catch on to that. Because if you can break the mold of what you think sex should be, then you get to make sex be whatever the people in the room want it to be. Then, sex becomes that much more freeing. It becomes playtime for adults. That is the vibe that I like to have with my sex.

Don Juan: You know, the way that I came to discover all of this myself, I like to consider myself a hopeless romantic. So, as I got into my thirties I met this beautiful young woman and what was so amazing about her was that I love a woman with a brain. I also love a woman with command. Long story short, she was really into bondage and getting bound with rope with both those above traits as well. She had a passion for everything that came with being tied up. We had this little exchange of what the over wanted to learn their side of sex and passion. I thought that I was going to be the cool kid in school and have an easy time showing a beautiful woman the wonders of soft romance and I would breeze through bondage and satisfy her needs. In the end it was me who was clamoring for the wonders of aftercare, the might of endorphins and where your mind ends up. She outsmarted me and I think that is the most beautiful of things when you can relate in all those ways with your partner. No, it is as if, like I mentioned before, that I wasted the first thirty years of my life. I see a woman like you. A woman of intelligence, a woman of science and more, I simply love to be able to pick the brain of a person like you and hear the stories of where those same things that changed my life started within your own mind. I think for the rest of my days, that fascination will be what leads me from here on out. 

Dee Williams: Yes, it is almost like the yin to the yang to the story that you just told me. For me, like I said, I started out kinky. With my first boyfriend ever I was doing BDSM. With the very first guy that I had sex with not even one week later I went out and I bought a bunch of scarves so that he could tie me up with them. (If there is one thing I can point out that I do with most interviews, Dee and I share many laughs like this throughout. What truly makes Dee one of the people that I feel I connected with in the most massive ways, is the way she describes those little things that I find matter most. BDSM I think is more than just finding someone who turns you on, or can make you think certain ways. It is about a level of mutual humor, embarrassment and quirkiness. That is the only way I can describe the community. We are all nerds deep down, who are not afraid to tell the kind of jokes she just did. It may sound strange for some readers but that is the wonder of this community and the way that Dee hits these punchlines, it is more than rib tickling. It is that kind of wonder I think that only comes when you open your mind to something new sexually and meet other people who have done the same.) 

Trust me, I think those scarves were used a lot better than most would have put them to use. So around the same time frame you were telling your story, when I was in my thirties, I had basically the opposite epiphany. Which was that romantic, quite sex can truly be just as intense as sex with heavy leather and bull whips. It really can. It is just that both parties have to be tuned into that. You have to have both people on that same wavelength where no one can just phone it in there. You know, with BDSM sex, you bring out the bull whips, you bring out the intensity. You bring out the tools and the tools are the intensity and you can not avoid the intensity. With passionate “vanilla” sex, those people have to be tuned into one another to have that intensity that brings on passion and stay focused on that sort of thing. So, I think there are similarities on both sides. It is all about how you get to that magical place inside your head. It is all about that basic connection. 

Don Juan: Oh yes! Truth be told, when I fell in love with this beautiful woman, I discovered that the truest of connections, no matter if it is physical, emotional, come from someone who challenges you. I like to think that this love that I have always had for a woman who is powerful comes from something that was always there, and was waiting to be discovered. Either that, or that is the true wonder of love. That comes in so many variations and transforms many times throughout someone’s life. Getting to understand that, I think that is what a relationship truly is. Some people I think never discover what that is even in themselves. I think that fetish is truly an evolution of where your sexuality can go and it comes from tapping into that other side of love, just like you compared it to the yin and yang. 

Dee Williams: Yeah, I would agree with that. You know, one of the beautiful things about fetish and it is just what we talked about. It is so multifaceted and exploring yourself and finding out what it is that you tune in with when it comes to all those things. well you know, just like how you tune into powerful women, with intelligent women, with women who really want to kind of be on the capital letter side of the slash. More a woman who is driving the sex. Gaining interest in BDSM, part of it is figuring out if it is a particular tool that you like. Are there particular things that you want to add to sex whether it be clothing, things you want to implement into the sex like rope or is it more of a power dynamic thing? Where you want to have certain ways that you interact with your partner, whether it is that you want to seek out dominant women, aggressive women, or aggressive people I guess I should say, in order to put you into that more receptive mind set. Or, whether it is the opposite. It is nice to be able to try on these different roles in your head. At least for me, it helps me break out of that mold of what it is about a relationship that I have with someone. Like what is it that draws me to this particular soul? For me,it makes sex very exploratory and keeps it from being routine in a bad way. 

Don Juan: Yes, and just like you said, I think that is the beauty part of it. I really appreciate you sharing that with us as I had to ask one of the most amazing women within this industry. I love that you got to be a part of the fetish side of the industry when it was something separate from the quote unquote “the main” industry. I love the evolution of where sexuality is going these days, I really do. OK, so I am going to jump all over the place with these questions here. We will go with some personal stuff, mixed with the fun and professional. Now, this is one I loved researching about you. So, I am a car guy. So, your lady love, she told me that you have a little bit of a passion for automobiles as well? Is this true?

Dee Williams: Oh, well, I…………love riding in the passenger seat of a fast car man! I don’t have the kind of drive that Syren does. Well, I grew up with a dad who is a gear head. (So, the backstory of this conversation can be read in Syren De Mer’s interview. Both women grew up with fathers who were gear heads, I did as well. Both women share such candid passions that not many performers do. In a world where a model must maintain mystery, both women are an open book to fans in ways that you rarely and I mean rarely see in the modern adult film world.) 

We are talking my father was a gear head both professionally and recreationally. He loved having a nice care around. He was also a skilled mechanic. What he would do when I was a kid was, he would buy a car, fix it up, and then resell it for a profit. He loved the cars that he could take to a higher end of restoration and that was his hobby. He would buy someone’s “nice” car or sometimes even if they were a little “junked out” and we are talking something like an Alpha Romeo. He would put in the work to take it back up to spec, and then he would turn around and sell it for a profit. Then he would move onto the next one. So, we kind of had a series of nice cars growing up. We also had a car that we could drive. It was a station wagon but his cars that he fixed up, there were very high end. Cars that became those cars you drive on a Sunday afternoon kind of thing. Turns out that I have been drawn in my life repeatedly to partners who have really nice cars. I would not be the sort of person to spend the time and the money and the effort to get a car like Syren’s. Which I think is absolutely fabulous. She absolutely babies “Vixen” and she buys auto parts like I buy lingerie. She is just as excited about it, you would not believe what you would see. Now, I know it is a little bit of money but you are not going to believe the thing that I got for Vixen this week. To me, that is one of the most appealing things about Syren. She is just the girliest girl who ever girled and at the same time is big time into her classic cars. 

Don Juan: This is amazing. See, my old man, he is, well, let’s just say this is how I know you are preaching the truth woman. My father, he was a big gear-head. He was the top GM mechanic in the entire state of Colorado. 

Dee Williams: Oh, no shit! 

Don Juan: Oh yes, and he was a Camaro guy. As you can probably atone to, the Camaro lovers, they are a rare breed of character. Was your old man the same as mine, where you would get into that car and it was fucking spotless and beautiful as can be. Something that was more spotless than most people’s kitchen floors after they were done Spring cleaning. 

Dee Williams: Yes, absolutely. You would get in the car, he would take you for a drive and it is not that you are going from point A to point B, no, that is not the point of the whole thing just to get there. It is all about the time you spend inside the car during the trip. Yes, I remember getting out on my side as a kid. I would shut my door, go about my merry way, and he would come back around to my side and open the door again and peer down and any little scraps of anything that were on my seats and nowhere on that floor board that was bad. It is all about the pride in your possession. He would put in a lot of work when he made these beautiful cars and I kind of wish that I had that in me. I am not quite that kind of person but it is beautiful to see someone who takes that much pride in the work that they have put in. 

Don Juan: Yes! I remember when Syren was telling me about her dad and the gear heads of the world they are such an interesting breed. When Syren and I got to that point in the interview about cars, BOOM, it instantly went into a two-hour conversation. 

Dee Williams: So very true, you have to pick your time and places when you bring up the Camaro with her because that is what you are going to be talking about for a while. 

Don Juan: I told her that when I get to see her at this upcoming AVN we may never leave the lounge area because we will be too damn busy talking shop, literally. Now, are we talking that you had an old man like Syren’s and mine that showed you how to change the oil, change the tires, take out the spark plugs and put in new ones? 

Dee Williams: No, would you like to hear a tragic story? 

Don Juan: Why, yes I would. 

Dee Williams: I have that brain, I would have loved to have been that person. I grew up in Texas,in the seventies and eighties and that simply was not done. No, I’m sorry, no. Literally I would have loved to have learned. You know, when you are four, five or six and mom needs the kids watched for a little, sure, that is fine, have the kids come out here. Just set me up with a hammer and a nail. That was easy but then when I got to be eight, nine, ten around that age when a dad would be taking his son out and showing him how to change the oil and that sort of thing. It was just that his brain was not ready to give into this new genderless world. So, I would be out there asking my dad, “please, show me how to change the oil.” He would look at me and say, “you go inside and have your mother teach you how to make biscuits.” Unfortunately I missed out on all of that. Then, I also had a younger brother, who is just the sweetest soul in the whole wide world. He is a mechanical engineer, and he is great at it. I think that he would have rather been the artist in the family. I think I would have rather been the engineer. 

Don Juan: Oh, the best of the wonderful things known as sibling rivalry so to speak. 

Dee Williams: Yes, my poor brother. They had my brother when I was two and half, three and in all two and half year old brains, I really liked being an only child and I somehow was convinced that if I just threw the right amount of tantrums, they would send him back. (What is so marvelous about this woman, besides her charming sense of humor was how now she is the best of both worlds. A woman who grew up in a land of conservative thought, who does not bash that way of life, who has those true core values that come with it. Dee is an example of one of the most unique minds, one that I would be willing to bet, if there was a way to do such things, could hang word for word, thought for thought with the greatest minds in human history. That is the true wonder of this woman.) 

Don Juan: Bless your heart. Darlin’ I would love to shift gears, and we talk about your performances. First things first, I must tell you, getting to see you perform is something that has so much reality in it. I love it. Where I think that we got to see something that is the evolution of Dee Williams is that scene you starred in for Girlsway with Eli and Casey behind the camera and Aidra Fox as your scene partner. I say this to you as a man who believes sexuality unlocks so much in the human spirit. I think it helps each person in their own way to unlock a new portion of the brain and new portion of their being. With you and this scene, I am dying to know what it was like shooting it. To tell you the truth, I think it is the best combination of you: the actor, the performer, the model, the woman with depth and veteran prowess in front of the camera. The sex was powerful yes but the evolution of you as an actor, we see that come out massively here. Tell us about this day if you will.

Dee Williams: Right! Well, the script was basically two matching suites, go! I mean one of the things that is both wonderful and frustrating about porn is that it is rare and it is maybe two times a month that I get something that is considered a script. More often than not I get a treatment. I kind of get a paragraph of what we are going for. Sometimes it is written. More often than not it is just the director saying, “hey, here is the idea.” then go! Ninety-five percent of the blah-blah is just words that I came up with in my brain and hopefully I came up with them for they left by now in most times I think about a scene and how in should play out. One of the things I like about porn and I love acting, I don’t really know anyone who doesn’t like acting if there is nothing hanging over your head. We all like playing pretend. I have a good childhood friend who is a successful Hollywood actor and while I think she has done a fabulous job, that is not something that I think that I could have done. With porno and one of the things that I think about myself, is that I do not know if I am a very good actress. I am a pretty good over-actress. I don’t know how subtle I am with a lot of things but I can “blah, blah, blah” and then bam you are taking your clothes off and that is what I am basically being asked to do ninety percent of the time. So, there really wasn’t a script, more like a treatment. 

So, in this scene, there were just the two matching suites, which basically writes itself. Aidra, she is just a dream to work with. She is so professional and has so much wonderful sexuality underneath. She has a very quiet demeanor. Then underneath all of that, there is just this well of sexuality. In a way, that is really appealing to me because I feel like I also have this deep well of sexuality underneath it all. The two of us interacting together when we both got down to business, it was, ...profound is the word that I guess I want to use. It was a profound experience. As far as the actual role itself and the actual shooting experience all together, it went shockingly quick. There are some days when everyone is just firing on all cylinders. The cameras were exactly where they wanted to be, first try the lighting was perfect, our lines came out perfectly. So, sometimes that fifteen minute role that you see, with the dialogue role before you get down to the sex, sometimes that is four and half hours of shooting. I want to say that we got that fifteen minute roll complete in about fifteen minutes. It was just one of those days when everything was just clicking for everybody. All of that was just great and Aidra, the one thing I love about this younger generation of porn actresses is that they interact with their sexuality and the duality of their masculine/feminine parts of their souls and that sort of thing. They interact with it then a very different way than I was raised. To me, in a much healthier way in particularly and remember, I have been in this industry for quite a while. When I first started, with everything like the cat fighting and the foxy boxing, spanking and that sort of thing. You had a lot of girls who were girl/girl performers who were “gay for pay.” They were not into women, they were not into pussy. They were faking it for the camera, they were doing it because there was less STI risk and there was a slightly higher cache I guess? It was very frustrating to work with someone who does not like women. Then, living in a society where we didn’t really give “bi-sexual” a place at the table. You were allowed as a woman to like women and that was the identity that you had, if you were a lesbian, sure fine. Me personally, I could never put myself in a box that small. I to this day can not identify with that. To me, if a woman is a lesbian you should not be hitting on her. If she wants a dude she will go find one. Now, if she calls herself a lesbian, guys should back off from her at the bar. Now, getting back to how I see and feel things, I would say that I am more than a WLW, a woman who loves women. I am Bi and I am queer. 

Now, getting back to Aidra, I feel that she is a lot of those same things. Her passion for women is true passion and man, it is nice to, well, I think that before that we had been on set together, but we had never had sex like that before. So, once it finally got down to starting to shoot the stills and having those first tastes of each other, it just gives you the tingles and all the hairs on your body start to stand up when you realize that “this is going to be good.” Kudos to the cameras that captured that, as it is not always easy. There are times when I will feel like it is a great, passionate day on set and the camera does not reflect that quite as much, but I think that Casey and Eli are real good at taking their shots, setting everything up and just letting the scene progress. They do it without over directing. Their direction comes beforehand. We have a lot of discussion about what they want to see and what the flavor of the scene is. Then, they just mostly let us go and that leads to some great, powerful scenes. That scene with Aidra was great, that Mother’s Day scene that they just had come out, there was a lot of passion in that room and the hardest thing to do, well this is one of the hardest things to do in porn. When you know that you are sitting on a good scene because we shot this well before the quarantine. I think we shot that early February maybe late February something like that but anyway, we had been sitting on that for ages. It is so hard because I want everybody to see it because it was so good for me and that Aidra scene was the same way but I do think that they turned around and got that one to you guys just as soon as they could. 

Fans, that is all we could put on your plate for the midway point of 2020. Stay tuned for part two as we talk with Dee about the other sides of her passion, character and love. We get to hear the tales of love from a woman who gets whips and chains instead of flowers and candy on Valentines Day. Stay tuned...

Special thanks to Phillip and Adult Time for the stills to go along with this interview.

Photography: Mo Reese @MOXXX for Adult Time.

Check out the full vignette reviews for the scenes that Dee describes in our interview:

Mother's Day Blues

Role Models: Dress for Success