A new season of “The Naked Director” is available for viewing on Netflix. It is a truth-based portrait of the Japanese porn industry in the 1980s and 1990s. A lot of things stand out in the shoots ‘behind the scenes’. For example, how many people are involved, how the cameraman has to squeeze himself into the most awkward positions for the best perspective and light, how cramped the locations are sometimes (given the amount of people on set), how much stamina the actors have to have to do the awkward positions – sometimes for hours at a time – and … that there is someone who has to hold a paper cup for the male actor to put his fingers in.
What is your profession? Me? I hold the paper cup at porn shoots.
The director of the series shared a message on Twitter to show that the crew on set were all wearing mouth guards.
全裸監督観てAV監督おもろそうだなって思った奴！
— AV監督さもあり (@daikikato072) June 30, 2021
マジでAV作るのは超面白いぞ！ pic.twitter.com/huvUHovHg3
Many people who watched the series – or the photos above – noticed a mysterious detail in the “behind the scenes” shots of the series. The male actor often has his finger in a cup. And there is a special person employed who seems to be responsible for – off-screen – holding the cup in question.
What’s in the cup? And why does the actor have his fingers in it?
This question has been keeping people on Twitter and RedIt busy for ages. Is it cold water to distract the actor enough, so that he can better delay his orgasm? Is it meant to make sopping sounds? These theories seem unlikely, because sounds can always be added later and also if an actor ejaculates too early, the scene can be redone and the cumshot can then be edited to the end. Moreover, explicit shots have to be legally blurred in Japan, so details don’t end up appearing on screen anyway.
Others speculate that it contains fake semen. The porn actor can then quickly throw some extra “sperm” on the actress, making it appear that he is spraying a huge amount on her. This would then be especially useful when – and this is also mandatory in Japan – the actor is wearing a condom. He could then sprinkle the fake seed on her, because otherwise he would have to remove the condom first. That doesn’t seem like a sensible explanation either, because there are also pictures in which the actor has his fingers in a cup during a scene of oral sex (without a condom).
So what is it then?
The answer comes from one of Japan’s most famous porn actors: Shimiken.
Freely translated, he tweeted the following:
When shooting anal, there is lube on the actor’s upper arm. By the way, lube is divided into anal and pussy (to prevent the wrong one from getting into the pussy). In those days, brown paper cups were often used for anal.
In short, the cup contains lubricant, which the actor can apply from time to time. This is especially important since shoots can often last for hours. White cups contain lube for vaginal use, and brown cups for anal use. Sometimes a blob of lube is put on the actor’s shoulder or upper arm so that he can use his hands freely.
While this seems to be a logical explanation, I still wonder why the actor pretty much constantly has his fingers in the cup. Is it to avoid looking for it when he needs it? And why then also during oral sex?
Paper cups at Japanese porn … it remains a little bit mysterious.
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