A former Japanese porn star has revealed how she used to cry on set once the cameras stopped rolling.
Emiri Okazaki, from Tokyo, began working in adult films aged 21 after realising she was unlikely to ever achieve her dream of becoming a famous model and television actress.
Speaking in an interview with YouTube star Kei on his Asian Boss channel, Emiri revealed how she was paid up to $6,000 (£4,400) per shoot and would film as many as 28 movies a month.
However the lucrative career also proved disastrous for her personal relationships. Her mother cut her off for six months after she found out she was working in porn and her boyfriend’s mother was so ashamed she tried to tear the couple apart.
Career change: Emiri Okazaki, from Tokyo, began working in adult films aged 21 after realising she was unlikely to ever achieve her dream of becoming a famous model and television actress
Strain: However the lucrative career also proved disastrous for her personal relationships
Word of advice: Emiri warned that many of her porn star friends regretted their career choice
Emiri, now 27, also spoke of the emotional toll of the work, admitting she ‘cried’ when the cameras stopped rolling because she felt so overwhelmed.
Speaking about the end of her first shoot, she said: ‘It’s hard to explain but it’s like multiple emotions hit me at once and I cried. There are actually a lot of girls who cried while filming.
‘In my case I imagined it wasn’t the real me but an actress playing her part in a film. So I didn’t cry while filming but once everything was done and I came back home I just suddenly started crying. I had such mixed emotions. I wasn’t even sure why I was crying.’
Emiri, who quit the industry and now has her own beauty business, revealed she worked alongside actresses from a variety of backgrounds, including those from wealthy families who had graduated from ‘well-known universities’.
First time: Emiri described what it was like finishing her first porn shoot aged 21 in 2011
Confessions: Emiri revealed she went home and cried after her first adult film shoot
‘They say a small part of why they do it is to earn pocket money but the main reason why they do it is because they’re curious,’ she explained.
Emiri’s own career began with modelling as a teenager before she transitioned into acting. However it became increasingly difficult to find roles.
‘I felt like I wasn’t getting anywhere [at the age of 21],’ she said. ‘I felt like I was failing. I felt like the older I got the more my career would go downhill.’
She shot her first adult film in 2011.
A typical shoot would either be spread over two 12-hour days, or would be shot in a single 21-hour session, Emiri explained. On the day of a shoot she would be picked up by her agent and taken for a meeting with the director to reconfirm ‘what the girl can or cannot do’.
Lucrative: Emiri described how actresses could earn up to $100,000 ( for just one film
Hectic schedule: A popular porn actress could be booked for as many as 28 shoots per month
While the type of contract and number of shoots varied, a popular porn actress can expect to be booked for as many as 28 shoots per month. This combined with ‘handshaking events’ means women can sometimes find themselves without any days off.
Emiri described how she initially felt ‘guilty’ about her decision to enter porn.
‘I felt somewhat guilty, even though I knew I wasn’t doing anything wrong,’ she said. ‘But I felt bad for my parents, even though I knew it was wholly my decision. I still felt like apologising.’
Her mother was so ashamed of her daughter’s decision she blocked her calls and refused to see her for six months.
Emiri continued: ‘These family issues really took a toll on me mentally. I was more stressed and worried about my mum than my work.
Threats: Her then-boyfriend was so irate when he was told he threatened to ‘kill her’
‘Eventually my mom called. She said “I will never understand your career or ever support you. But you are my daughter and that will never change. So from now on… I don’t want to hear about your work”. From then on we started bonding and hanging out again.’
The job also caused problems with her then-boyfriend, who threatened to ‘kill her’ when she told him.
School porn, female pervert – where the girl would be the one molesting the guy – S&M, rape. There’s a series called “Oh, I’m stuck”. Like there’s a girl who’s stuck in an elevator door and can’t move
‘No joke he threatened to first kill me and then kill himself afterwards,’ she said. ‘There were times when he had a knife pointed directly at me.’
Meanwhile her current partner’s mother urged him to break up with her when she found out about her career.
There are two main types of contracts for female porn stars, Emiri explained. The first option is an annual contract of one film a month, earning the actress between $10,000 (£7,400) and $100,000 (£78,000) per title. The second is a ‘pay-per-shoot’ contract in which the actress is paid depending on the work required on a given film.
‘This would be $2,000 (£1,500) to $6,000 (£4,400) per shoot,’ Emiri continued. ‘It’s almost like it becomes a day job. They might ask you just to show your breasts. That might cost $150 (£110) or $200 (£150).’
However while she initially enjoyed success in the industry, she noticed her popularity start to wane.
Variety: Emiri estimated there were a ‘few thousand’ different genres of porn
‘We were making quite a lot of sales at the beginning but it’s not like you have videos coming out all the time… so the numbers dropped.
‘You realise this even if you don’t look at the figures because suddenly people don’t want to work with you. The money that you make decreases while the type of porn you do gets more extreme.’
Emiri estimated there were a ‘few thousand’ different genres of porn.
She said: ‘School porn, female pervert – where the girl would be the one molesting the guy – S&M, rape. There’s a series called “Oh, I’m stuck”. Like there’s a girl who’s stuck in an elevator door and can’t move.
‘There’s another series that’s called “stop time”. So it would be like bang, bang, bang, bang, and then time suddenly stops, and you have to be quiet… I guess because the Japanese are really perverted.’
Change in career: Emiri now owns her own beauty company and is a restaurant hostess
She added that having sex on camera and having sex in real life are ‘completely different’.
‘First of all, with the cameras running, I have to think about how I look on camera,’ she explained. ‘People think porn stars are genuinely good at sex. But I think that’s false.
‘Rather, they’re better at presentation, not at sex. The same goes for porn actors.’
The star decided to quit the industry in 2016 after she felt she had reached the level of success she had set out to achieve.
She described how friends and family who had once looked down on her decision began to reach out to her and she began to build a career as a public speaker.
Asked what advice she would give to other women looking to go into porn, she added: ‘This might sound really obvious but the younger you are, the less you think about the consequences. So I think it’s better to think it over. I have seen so many friends regret doing it.’