How being an adult film performer allowed Tasha Reign to own her bisexuality
CAROLINE SAVOIE | Contributing Writer
CaroSavoIsWriting@gmail.com
Tasha Reign subverts expectations. From the idea that women only enter the sex work industry out of desperation to the assumption that adult film stars can’t be change-makers, Reign’s journey through the industry proves otherwise.
Reign, a 34-year-old bisexual woman with nearly 15 years in the industry, has invested her adult life in being a sex worker. In her new book From Princess to Porn Star, she details her experience from adolescence through adulthood, giving the public a peek into something that’s even more personal than porn.
“To be seen in this way, I feel really vulnerable and validated at the same time,” she said. “People have reached out to say they have similar experiences, and that ability to relate with people on this level has made me so grateful. My story is a very common experience of women in general, and it should be talked about.”
While her bisexuality lay dormant for years, Reign said her career in porn allowed her to explore and express that side of herself authentically.
Reign said she was always curious about sex, even in elementary and middle school, as she learned what pleasure felt like in her own body. But even as a child growing up in Laguna Beach, shame-based messages around sex and lesbianism permeated her growing brain.
“I got in devastating trouble with a girl named Annie because her parents caught us humping pillows,” she wrote. “I had learned how to from a girl next door.
They were furious, mostly because we were both girls: lesbians, they thought. They screamed and shouted at us about how wrong what we were doing was.”
Since that incident, Reign said she was on edge thinking of herself as a lesbian, thinking about “how awful that would make me.” She said she didn’t personally know any gay women while growing up, save for her two neighbors across the street, whom her mother called “dykes.”
“I really didn’t have a healthy outlook on what being gay would look like for me. I just knew it was something I couldn’t be, and that it was wrong. Like many other bisexual girls, I didn’t have anyone that represented me in media to identify with.”
The first time Reign filmed with another woman was for Penthouse, a Los Angeles-based adult magazine in 2010. She said it was her first experience filming with another person, as she’d only created solo content before that point.
“I couldn’t have been happier — or more nervous,” she wrote. “I was always bisexual, so for me this idea was not only an aspiration but a turn-on.”
As a college student, Reign continued to shoot scenes with women, and she found herself attracted to them: “Shooting lesbian content was less intense than boy-girl scenes,” she said. “For the most part, sex with women was softer, more intimate. I found myself just wrapped in the beauty and the prettiness of it all.”
Reign said that while she wasn’t ready to identify with bisexuality until her late 20s, she never felt the need to “come out” to her family.
“After you start doing porn, nothing really surprises people anymore,” she laughed. “I never felt like I needed to explain my sexuality.”
Before she was a Playboy Playmate, women’s activist, author and mother, Reign started her career in sex work as a professional stripper in 2008, dancing at a club called the Silver Reign. “When coming up with my stage name, I asked my mom what names she liked,” Reign wrote. “I brought up ‘Tasha,’ and we both thought it seemed fitting.”
She said when it came to her last name, the term “Reign” was both nostalgic and powerful, and thus a star was born. With 1.1 million followers on Instagram, Reign is one of the most well-known adult film stars of the modern era, with a very dedicated fanbase.
Reign said she’d always had a strong desire to entertain. She was athletic and a businesswoman, and aspired to be as sexually free as the adult film stars she watched in high school.
“The same way men idolize football players, I idolized Tera Patrick, Stormy Daniels, Carmen Electra, Jenna Jameson, Pamela Anderson and so many other powerful and beautiful women,” she wrote. “What appealed to me most was the glamour, beauty and femininity that Jenna seemed to exude on film.”
She said she was always looking for a way to get in at Playboy, and she scoured Craigslist looking for her avenue to the mansion. When she answered a modeling ad for the magazine at 19, she soon realized modeling was not the gig. Thus, she became an escort while enrolled as a gender studies major at UCLA.
“During the week, I’d hear my fellow women’s studies majors attacking Hugh Hefner as a symbol of the patriarchy,” the book reads. “On the weekends, I was part of the crowd of bikini-clad women vying for Hef’s attention. I was a women’s studies major gone wild.”
She said she enrolled in a course called Sociology of Sex Work, and she learned about the industry in class while simultaneously escorting, stripping and attending Playboy Mansion parties.
“I felt like I was a deep-diving journalist who was living and experiencing the topic that she was writing about,” she wrote.
During her time at UCLA, Reign was featured in Playboy’s 2010 “Girls of the Pac-10” issue and was chosen as the magazine’s “Cyber Girl of the Week.” She was a centerfold model in the April 2011 issue of Penthouse, and the next month she was the Penthouse Pet of the Month.
In her book, Reign recounts a plethora of fond memories of experiences she’s had on set, from getting to film with some of her idols to settling into her sexuality. She doesn’t shy away from the other side of that time, though, as she recalls memories of sexual assaults and manipulative agents.
“Writing about those events brought my trauma back to the surface,” she said. “I don’t want anyone to see me as a victim, but these stories need to be told.”
Reign was assaulted on several occasions, and once the #MeToo movement gained traction online, she felt empowered to speak up on behalf of herself and other women in the industry. She recounted one assault that happened on set in 2017, and as a result of her lawsuit against Wicked Pictures, the production company mandated sexual harassment training. She said Wicked Pictures is now “the gold standard in adult entertainment.”
“No one should have their human rights taken away because of their chosen career path,” she wrote. “Therefore, I decided to run for chairperson of the Adult Performer Advocacy Committee.”
Reign won the seat, and her main goal was for all pornography workers to receive training, from actors and assistants to producers and directors. She said she advocated for adequate resources and regulations around physical and mental health, consent and harassment.
Reign said she would also like to see the industry raise the minimum age of adult film performers from 18 to 21 years old.
“It’s a lifetime decision, getting into porn, and that decision isn’t one to make lightly” she said. “I would honestly say people should wait until they’re 25 before committing to sex work. If you still want to do it then, make sure to do your research — a lot of it — and have fun.”
Reign said the industry has become a safer space through the advocacy of performers being more open about their experiences.
With her bachelor’s degree in gender studies from UCLA and a master’s degree in journalism from USC, Reign has conducted countless lectures across college campuses regarding sexual health, women’s rights, LGBTQ issues, the porn industry and understanding consent. She’s also been a columnist for OC Weekly, Huffington Post and Mel Magazine.
In 2020, Reign launched an initiative to counter Congress’s invalidation of people working in the adult entertainment industry who were deprived of small business loans during the COVID-19 outbreak.
As of her book release, Reign has starred in more than 500 adult films for marquee producers, and she currently runs an OnlyFans account, a platform she says has increased the safety of performers across the world.
Reign became a mother in 2022, and she said the overwhelming hustle of motherhood made her consider leaving the industry. Despite her toying with the idea of ending her film career in her book, Reign said her alone time has been increasing as her child gets older, and she’s not leaving the industry any time soon.
Reign lives on a mountainside in Topanga Canyon, Calif. with her son, five chickens, three dogs, two potbellied pigs and a bearded dragon. She’s in the process of opening a “hyper feminine boutique” called Fairytale Cottage Topanga that sells women’s and kids clothing, home decor and antique jewelry. Reign also spends each day on a tennis court with country club women who have become her friends.
“I was really surprised when my tennis club actually bought my book and read it,” she said. “I wasn’t sure how it would go over, but now I feel incredibly accepted by all of these conservative women in their seventies. My stories have power to bring women together, and that’s really all I wanted.”
Reign said her book, From Princess to Porn Star, began as her graduate school thesis. Now, it is available on Audible (with Reign’s narration), on Amazon, and at Barnes & Noble.