Elegant Angel - History

History

Elegant Angel was founded in 1990 by Collins in partnership with pornographic film maker John Stagliano as a subsidiary of Stagliano's Evil Angel Video.

The two labels soon became a pioneer of Gonzo pornography, along with other producers such as Rodney Moore and Ed Powers. Stagliano had pioneered the Gonzo genre in the late 1980s.

In 1996, Collins established Elegant Angel as a separate company, and in 1998 it ended all cooperation with Evil Angel. His departure from Evil Angel has been called "less than amicable", and he and Stagliano are apparently "ex-friend". At the time Collins said that Stagliano "couldn't run a business, and would fail without him". According to Stagliano, "Patrick's a bully", "and he wasn't doing his job properly". "I should have fired him years ago".

On 27 May 1997 Elegant Angel employee Israel Chapa Gonzalez shot dead Glendale police officer Charles A. Lazzaretto and wounded two others at the company's warehouse in Chatsworth.

In 2003 the company attempted to switch from Gonzo to producing "Feature" films. However by early 2004 it was clear the change had proved "unsuccessful and costly", according to General Manager Graham Travis. At the same time the company experienced technical problems with its DVD authoring, and lacked a common brand identity on its DVD covers. During this period the studio did not have a website, or any full-time Public relations liaison. With difficulties mounting in 2004, rumors began to circulate that the company was up for sale.

In order to resolve its problems the studio stopped production for two months. Collins then refocused the company on producing niche-themed pornography, and discontinued some series that had more ambiguous themes and were not selling well. The firms logo and box-cover art was also redesigned and simplified. It hired a new DVD authoring contractor, and launched a new PR campaign. The company then went back to producing as many as eight new titles a month. Production was also halted for a month in early 2004 when the studio joined the moratorium on filming caused by Darren James's HIV infection.

In August 2004 the company opposed calls from Democratic California Assembly member Paul Koretz for the adult industry to use condoms. In response to the HIV outbreak in the industry in March the same year, Koretz had threatened to instigate legislation requiring mandatory condom use. EA head of production Graham Travis responded that there was consumer demand for scenes without condoms, and that forcing condom-use would force some studios out of business.

From June 2006 onwards Elegant started to see a sustained increase in DVD sales, however Travis thought that in the near future sales would take place almost exclusively online.

In 2007 the company started launching a number of paysites. SwallowSquirt.com was launched in April, followed by BigWetAsses.com in June, and PornStarSquirt.com in September.