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The first three episodes of this gleefully lascivious podcast, in which Vanity Fair writer Lili Anolik and The Rialto Report host Ashley West document the rise and fall of underaged ’80s porn goddess Traci Lords, dropped last week. And while the show calls itself a “real-life noir,” these eps make it seem more like Rashomon for the trenchcoat crowd. The first episode breaks down how Lords had the sort of textbook traumatic upbringing that would lead her to the porn industry and a sex- and coke-fueled existence, all of which nearly toppled the adult-film world (a world she would later vilify in her 2003 tell-all) when it’s discovered she’s only a teenager. However, the following two episodes include interviews from industry players (including her former agent Jim South, male star/ex-boyfriend Tom Byron, and fellow performers Christy Canyon and Ginger Lynn), who not only insist that the Reagan-era porn industry wasn’t as sleazy as Lords made it out to be, but also that Lords was a wise-beyond-her-years manipulator who knew exactly what she was doing. [Craig D. Lindsey]
