Candida Royalle (3)

Candida Royalle (born Candice Marion Vadala; October 15, 1950 – September 7, 2015) was an American pornographic actress, director, producer, sex educator, and feminist who pioneered couples-oriented, female-centered pornography. Born in Brooklyn to a working-class Catholic family, she was raised by her stepmother after her mother left at 18 months; her father was a jazz drummer. She trained in music, dance, and art, studying at the High School of Art and Design, Parsons School of Design, and City College of New York.

From 1975 to 1980, Royalle performed in 25 adult films, including Hot & Saucy Pizza Girls and Blue Magic (which she co-wrote). Disillusioned by male-centric industry practices, she retired to focus on marriage and feminist principles. In 1984, she co-founded Femme Productions with Lauren Neimi, creating 18 films like Femme (1984), Urban Heat (1984), and Revelations (1993), emphasizing women's desire, emotional context, and healthy sexuality over graphic climaxes. She signed the 1989 Post Porn Modernist Manifesto and received the 1997 Free Speech Coalition Lifetime Achievement Award. Royalle wrote columns for High Society and Cheri, authored How to Tell a Naked Man What to Do (2004), and spoke at institutions like the Smithsonian. A founding member of Feminists for Free Expression and Club 90 (1983), she was inducted into the XRCO and AVN Halls of Fame.

Married to Per Sjöstedt (1980s, separated 1988), Royalle died of ovarian cancer in Mattituck, New York, at 64. Her legacy includes the 2019 documentary Candice and Jane Kamensky's book Candida Royalle and the Sexual Revolution (forthcoming), archiving her work at Harvard's Schlesinger Library.