PLANET OF THE EROTIC APES

by Lou Vockell

Note: since the publication of this article, PLANET OF THE EROTIC APES has seen two title changes: WORLD OF THE EROTIC APE and most recently BABES IN KONGLAND.

So what’s not to like about a movie that starts with a pretty girl, getting’ her freak on with a hairy ape? Answer? Nothing! At least that’s my opinion. Of course I may be a bit prejudice since I, Lou Vockell, have actually made a b-movie that starts out that way.

See I’ve always believed that while big, Hollywood motion pictures were sort of comparable to a special trip to a big fancy restaurant. It’s something that’s fun to do once in a while, but done on a frequent basis is a leading cause of gout and bankruptcy.

On the other hand, low budget b-movies are a “staple item” in ones contemporary pop culture diet. Kind of like the bologna-on-white-bread with mayo we eat everyday for lunch. They’re inexpensive, fun to make, easy to digest and dammit THEY TASTE GOOD!

More specifically speaking, I’m referring to a tasty little menu item called PLANET OF THE EROTIC APE (you’ll find I’m very fond of “food metaphors”, especially since I’m too old to credibly use any that involve sex). Before we’re finished, I’m sure you’ll find this b-movie meets all the aforementioned criteria for being a bologna sandwich. What? I mean a pop culture staple.

This movie was produced inexpensively, and that’s the charitable, near euphemistic description of the budget. This show was dirt friggin’ cheap! This movie was produced for what an average teenager gets for a weekly allowance!

Here’s the short list of the things we didn’t pay for.

We didn’t pay for the costumes.

We didn’t pay for the film (a huge savings).

We didn’t pay a cent for the use of two of the three locations used in the movie.

We didn’t pay for a writer, director, camera person, audio person, producer, electrical technicians or “craft services”.

We didn’t have to pay an assistant director. Since their only discernable purpose is to scream hysterically at the slightest provocation, and be rude to the actors, I thought, “Gee why should I pay someone else to have all the fun! I can do this myself!”

And best of all, since this film was a non union enterprise, we didn’t have to pay a lot of Teamsters to sit around and do absolutely nothing!

We didn’t even pay for the wrap party condoms. Thank God for product positioning!

What DID we pay for? Most of the production budget was allocated for the services of several local actresses and lots of liquor.

Ok! I admit it! The “actresses” were actually a bevy of beauties from one of our fine, local gentlemen’s pleasure establishments. Yea STRIPPERS! I’ve found that when the time comes to doff the duds and perform unspeakable acts of perversion in front of a movie camera, it’s a lot easier to persuade a stripper to cooperate then an actress. Even if you tell them it’s a character role and a real test of their method acting skills, most actresses no matter how desperate for experience, will not get naked and jiggy with an ape. Even if you get them really drunk, actresses will puke and pass out before they’ll subject themselves to the rigorous sexual demands of on camera “ape jigging”.

On the other hand strippers, even with the application of the slightest amount of alcohol, will jump right into the fray and do just about anything you ask of them. Most of the time they’ll even come up with some new and delightfully degenerate things you didn’t even think of! We’ll be addressing this phenomenon in more detail later.

With all those strippers and liquor in evidence I guess it goes without saying PLANET OF THE EROTIC APE was a fun movie to make. But that’s only part of the interesting and amusing behind-the-scenes events.

Most of the erotic parts of the movie were shot at a local, upscale “no-tell-motel” in Northern Kentucky. This is a place where high price hookers take their executive clients (male and female) for a good old roll in the hay. I guess this is also where the same executives bring their girlfriends (as opposed to their wives or their hookers for that matter) for one of their “business trips” out of town. Granted this particular meeting place of only a couple miles out of town, but that still makes it, technically, an “out of town” business trip.

Other then it’s proximity to a lot of upper management types with lots of disposable income to blow, or spend on being blown, this particular motel’s claim to fame is it’s “fantasy suites”. You can choose a room with an exotic tropical motif or a desert “Lawrence of Arabia” style. Practically any fantasy scenario you choose to heighten the erotic pleasure of cheating on your spouse or significant other can be found here.

Considering the amount of illicit activity that goes on openly at this motel, you might find it odd that when we asked for permission to shoot our movie in one of their luxuriously appointed “cheat suites”, the owners of the motel TURNED US DOWN! They didn’t have any problem with infidelity, prostitution, the threat of sexually transmitted disease, or for that matter the sheer aesthetic insult of the site of sleazy corporate executives draggin’ around a bunch of sad, cheap looking hoochie mamas. But they would have no part of us discreetly shooting film of a couple hot looking babes performing perverted, but none the less tasteful acts of hot monkey sex. The Philistines!

A lesser filmmaker might have decided at this point to fold up his tent and try to find a different location. But this motel has a room that is decorated like the inside of a prehistoric cave dwelling. Right down to the hieroglyphic drawings on the wall. The place was perfect and we were going to shoot there.

So I donned a business suit, the ladies decked themselves out in their best “hillbilly hooker” finery. The lot of us boldly walked up to the registration desk and expressed our desire to rent the “cave room”. Not to shoot a low budget exploitation movie (that was verboten), but to engage in a modest two day long sex orgy. With the swipe of a credit card we were graciously granted admission to the room of our choice and even offered room service and the use of a Jacuzzi at no additional charge!

Having accomplished the task of actually acquiring access to the location, we were then faced with the task of smuggling the production crew and equipment passed the security cameras in the hallway and into the cave room.

There was no real “security personnel” other then possibly the housekeepers, and they could easily be bribed with a bottle of cheap liquor and an empty compliment (That’s a lovely scent darling. What do you call it…ammonia? Here’s a bottle of booze! Now go away!).

The video security monitors were positioned behind the front check-in desk and as nearly as we could tell were rarely even glanced at by the staff. However, if we were in progress of smuggling our stuff into the location, and an employee saw what was going on out of the corner of their eye, we were busted! We figured the safest way to safely get by the security cams was to provide a diversion! So we asked the ladies to head back to the front check-in desk and provide a distraction so we could sneak in unnoticed.

A couple hours later the ladies returned assuring us that the necessary diversion had been accomplished to cover the arrival of crew and equipment. We didn’t ask them exactly what they did to divert the attention of the staff. Frankly, we think they just went to the bar and drank for a couple hours at our expense. But we were all in successfully, and we didn’t feel it appropriate to ask the ladies to kiss and tell.

If the ladies hadn’t already been drinking, they sure did start the minute they got back to the room, which will be from this point forward be referred to as “the set”. They explained it was necessary for them to imbibe a quantity of liquor in order for them to prepare to perform. This, don their costumes and admire their own shapely asses in the mirror (and any available reflective surface).

When producing a low budget movie one expects unexpected events to throw a monkey wrench into the works.

Ordinarily the first order of business on a film set is the lighting. When I asked the guy in charge of this phase of the operation to get started, he politely informed me that if he actually turned on our several thousand watts of light, he would probably blow a fuse and sink the entire motel into a black out. Hence we would have to shoot with available light. He then reasoned that since he no longer had a job to do, he’d join the girls and start swilling booze. At least he didn’t also join them in removing their clothes.

Before we began shooting practically everybody had gotten loaded, except me! I’d sure picked a crappy time to stop drinking. Oh well, somebody had to be sober enough to get the job done, and since I’m was the only sober soul of the group who had actually looked at the script, the job fell to me.

Finally the camera rolled.

Over the course of the next two days we all laughed, cried, hoped, wished, dreamed, performed sexual acts of unspeakable perversion, watched other people perform sexual acts of unspeakable perversion, belched, farted and threw up. Until, in the end, we had enough raw footage to cut into a movie. We also had a lot of garbage, fast food leftovers, beer cans and empty bottles of liquor. The strippers stuck around to help me clean the room before check out. I like to think it’s because they’re all real troopers, but it’s probably only because I told them no one was going to get paid ‘til after all our crap was cleaned up.

Given all the weirdness, you might find it hard to believe that making a b-movie is fun. But it WAS FUN! For everyone involved. I believe it’s the fun we have making our movies that telegraphs through the screen and makes our films entertaining. The big payoff at the end of a production is when someone finds your work entertaining. So if it takes weirdness during the course of production to make it possible for someone to have fun watching our movies, THEN LET IT NEVER BECOME TOO WEIRD FOR ME!

How does this all make it possible to invoke the food metaphor of a b-movie being, “…easy to digest…” and “…dammit…taste good”? To explain that fact, we’ll have to tell you the plot.

PLANET OF THE EROTIC APE is a good humored, sexy parody of the original movie PLANET OF THE APES. It’s the story of a mad scientist-tv repairman named George Taylor. George has invented a device designed to capture intergalactic television signals, and project them into an ordinary television set.

The problem is, what he’s really invented is a devise that transports him to a planet in an uncharted part of the galaxy, that is populated and controlled by beautiful lesbians. We know this planet is in an uncharted part of the galaxy, because if this world were already on the map, George wouldn’t be the only human man there, now would he?

No spoilers here, but I think you can see how a movie about a planet full of horny, beautiful lesbians would be, “…easy to digest…” and “dammit…taste good”!

So if you’re one of those people who enjoys large quantities of T & A, mixed with a mouth watering topping of humor (a little sarcasm for spice) and bologna-on-white-bread with mayo, PLANET OF THE EROTIC APE is sure to satisfy your b-movie appetite. Not to mention deliver a few good old cheap thrills for desert.

Of course, there are people who don’t like bologna. They probably also wouldn’t like a movie that opens with a pretty girl getting her freak on with a hairy ape.

But if they don’t, then why would they be reading THIS webzine?