Behold, the big, gay odyssey of Shawn Loftis.
A graduate of Florida International University, where he studied international relations with a focus on the Middle East, and the Master of Public Administration Program at the University of Miami, Loftis — like so many of us — began acting in hard-core porn because of his boyfriend.
"He was lazy and he didn't want a real job," explains the barrel-chested performer now better known to masturbators worldwide as Collin O'Neal. "I told him: 'OK, you can do porn, but only if I do it too.'"
But you could say the travel-crazy Loftis did it his way. He started his own Collin O'Neal Productions, for which he visits various countries — some of them decidedly unsexy — gives some historical context to the site, guides viewers around important landmarks, and then goes back to his hotel room and humps some men. He's currently offering ten-day tours of exotic locales to wealthy fans. Just pay his airfare and give him $2,500 on top. His website's slogan: "It's not just the sex!"
Did we mention Loftis is a CNN-sanctioned "citizen correspondent" for the news network's website, where he has filed video reports from a flooded South Beach — where he lives — or interviewing Americans in Egypt about the dead post-revolution tourism scene there. We Skyped him in Cairo, which he was touring with his "papi."
New Times: What are some of the strangest places you've filmed your World of Men porn series?
Loftis: Cuba, Lebanon... I filmed in Serbia. That was a pain in the butt. [Editor's note: Hee-hee.] Serbians don't like Americans, and it feels like Communist Russia. Serbians are hot, though. They're all huge and tall. If you know anything about the history of Serbia, the role that they've played for hundreds of years is as mercenaries for battle, so they're all six-foot-plus and buff.
Filming gay sex in developing countries sounds kind of dangerous.
I won't film in Saudi Arabia or places like that. When I was filming in Lebanon, I was doing some B-roll at a famous monument — I didn't have the models pick up their shirts or anything like that — when the secret police came up and questioned us about what we were doing. The only thing that saved us was one of the officers dug into my camera bag and pulled out Viagra. Then he suddenly became my best friend.
That sounds like the beginning to a porn.
[Laughing] It does. At the time, though, I wasn't feeling very sexy at the prospect of going to Lebanese jail.
Let's play fuck-marry-kill. Fidel Castro, Kim Jong-il, Hosni Mubarak.
Oh God, and I can't choose kill-kill-kill? OK, well, Kim Jong-il — kill. Castro — marry. And rewind a few years and Mubarak — fuck.
As a newsman, whose style would you compare yours to?
Anderson Cooper. He's slick and smooth, and he travels all over the world.
There are rumors —
I think he's in the closet.
Where's the locale for your next porn?
I just went to Kuwait, and they have some hot guys there. Obviously they're taking steroids, because they're huge. They have beards and mustaches and chiseled faces.
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