She was once billed as the world’s hottest porn star. Today, she’s back on screen, but bears little resemblance to her porn alter-ego, Jenna Presley, who starred in hundreds of skin flicks before she saw the light.
Brittni Ruiz was an 18-year-old college student working as a topless dancer in Mexico when a producer asked if she’d like to do “romance” movies.
Although she suspected they were adult films, she was lured by the prospect of making big money and was soon earning about $900 for each film, shooting three scenes a day.
A year later, in 2006, she came in second on porn icon Jenna Jameson’s Playboy TV reality show Jenna’s American Sex Star, and in 2010, Maxim magazine dubbed her one of the world’s top 12 female porn stars.
Now known as Brittni De La Mora, the 29-year-old shares her story in Aspirations, a short film produced by Saanich social-justice advocate Joel James Conway that premières at Parkside Hotel & Spa tonight.
The event is a fundraiser for the Fortress Foundation, which aims to end gender-based violence, sexual exploitation and human trafficking.
“I never get tired of telling my story because every opportunity I get to share it is another opportunity to glorify God,” said De La Mora, a born-again Christian who lives in San Diego.
It was just a matter of time before the industry wore her down. De La Mora, who suffered from anorexia in her teens, battled depression and addiction to alcohol and drugs, including cocaine, pills, heroin and meth.
She became suicidal and first tried to leave the industry in 2009 while withdrawing from heroin. She began attending church with her grandparents.
De La Mora soon drifted back into porn, however, and was traumatized further after witnessing her boyfriend being stabbed to death by a motorcycle gang.
She entered into an abusive relationship with a pimp and accepted some more lucrative gigs to pay the bills before realizing she had hit rock bottom.
It was after meeting Rachel Colllins, a member of XXXChurch, an anti-porn organization that pickets porn-movie sets and conventions, that De La Mora finally left the industry in 2012 to devote herself to God.
When she informed the director of what would be the final film she was scheduled to shoot in Las Vegas, he reacted with disbelief.
XXXChurch was founded online in 2002 by Craig Gross, a southern California pastor concerned about widespread addiction to pornography, to help porn addicts and to encourage industry workers to leave.
While an adult-industry convention might seem an unlikely place to save souls, De La Mora admits she was intrigued when she first encountered members at Exxxotica Expo in New Jersey.
“My first thought was: ‘Are these people legitimate Christians, because how can Jesus love a porn star?’ ” she said, recalling the Jesus Loves Porn Stars literature and Bibles they handed out.
“They were so loving and friendly and welcoming. They actually just handed out the Book of John, but they put their own cool cover on it to make it relatable.”
De La Mora’s exit from her treacherous existence was more unsettling than she anticipated, however. She had to change her phone number and delete her Twitter account with 80,000 followers. She remembers being distressed that none of her industry friends and co-workers supported her. De La Mora started going to San Diego’s Cornerstone Church three years ago and recently married Richard De La Mora, a pastor with whom she now ministers to young adults.
“My big goal now is just to let people know there is a God who loves them no matter what they’ve done,” she said. “It’s not about judgment or control, and we are not profiting from this.”
She can’t escape the fact, however, that her exploits as Jenna Presley will be immortalized on the Internet. It’s something she has learned to accept, along with the inevitable media reminders.
“I’ve made decisions that have repercussions that will last a lifetime, and when I have children old enough to go out into the world, I have to explain that their mom was a porn star,” she said.
“People will always talk. I’ve seen the ‘Jenna’s gone from nude to prude’ stories. I just know what I am called to God. Nothing stops me from doing what I know God wants me to do now.”
Accepting Conway’s invitation to make Aspirations, which integrates an interview with her and parallels her story with that of an impressionable aboriginal hip-hop dancer played by Mary Galloway, is part of that. “I feel like what he’s doing is a great thing, with potential to make a tremendous difference,” she said, referring to the first instalment of Shift, the foundation’s 12-part web series designed to inspire positive life choices.
The film, made with support from law-enforcement agencies and volunteers, was partially funded by civil-forfeiture funds from B.C.’s Office to Combat Trafficking in Persons. The screening in Parkside’s 29-seat movie theatre will be accompanied by live music, a cocktail reception and an interactive “on-set” re-enactment of a dramatic scene.
De La Mora hopes the film will help young men and women think twice when they’re attracted by the potential fame, excitement and quick bucks that the dark side of pop culture might offer.
“I realize money can give you some sort of freedom in regards to paying bills, but I would never go back,” she said. “The money was nice, but the things I had to do to get that money [were] horrific.”
For more information, go to fortress-foundation.com.