ACTRESS: Sunny Leone

Sunny Leone

Leone was born Karen Malhotra in Sarnia, Ontario to Sikh Punjabi parents from India. Her father was born in Tibet and raised in Delhi, while her mother (who died in 2008) was from a small town named Nahan in Sirmaur, Himachal Pradesh. As a young girl, she was very athletic and played street hockey with the boys, enjoyed ice skating on a nearby frozen lake and drinking hot chocolate in front of a fire after playing in the snow all day. Though she was raised as a sikh, her parents enrolled her in a Catholic school, as it was felt to be unsafe for her to go to public school. There she had her first kiss at 11, lost her virginity to a basketball player at another school at 16,[9] and discovered that she was bisexual at 18. When she was 13, her family moved to Fort Gratiot, Michigan, then to Lake Forest, California a year later, fulfilling her grandparents' dream that the family be together in one place. She graduated from high school in 1999 and enrolled in college. Before working in the porn industry, she first worked at a German bakery, a Jiffy Lube, and later a tax and retirement firm. While studying to be a pediatric nurse in Orange County, a classmate who was an exotic dancer introduced Leone to John Stevens, an agent who in turn introduced her to Jay Allen, a photographer for Penthouse magazine. When picking a name for her adult career, she has said that Sunny is her real name and Leone was picked by Bob Guccione, former owner of Penthouse magazine. She posed for Penthouse magazine, and was named Penthouse Pet of the Month for the March 2001 issue, followed by a feature in the Holiday 2001 edition of Hustler magazine as a Hustler Honey. She has appeared in other magazines including Cheri, Mystique Magazine, High Society, Swank, AVN Online, Leg World, Club International and Lowrider,[18][19] while her online credits include ModFX Models, Suze Randall, Ken Marcus and Mac & Bumble. Her pictorial credits also include working with stars like Adriana Sage, Jenna Jameson, Jelena Jensen and Aria Giovanni. In 2003, she was declared the Penthouse Pet of the Year and also starred in the video Penthouse Pets in Paradise alongside Tera Patrick and Kyla Cole. In addition to her print work, she had also done pantyhose modeling with Ed Fox and Playtime Videos as well as bondage videos for FM Concepts. In 2005 Adam & Eve appointed her as their West Coast Internet Sales Representative.[ That same year, Leone signed a three-year contract with Vivid Entertainment with which she transitioned into the world of hardcore pornography, stating that she would only do lesbian scenes. Her first movie released was titled Sunny and was released in December 2005. Her next movie, Virtual Vivid Girl Sunny Leone, was the first interactive title for Leone, who was the first Vivid Girl to make such a movie. Taking only four days to film, the movie won her her first AVN Award (Best Interactive DVD). She followed this with Sunny Loves Cher, which featured her first on-screen squirting,and The Female Gardner co-starring Mikayla Mendez and Daisy Marie. Leone's last two movies under her contract with Vivid were It's Sunny in Brazil, which was filmed in Brazil. and The Sunny Experiment also starring Monique Alexander and Brea Lynn. The movies were released in October and December 2007 respectively. In May 2007, upon re-signing her contract with Vivid for another six films, Leone agreed to perform for the first time with men on camera, but exclusively with her fiancé, Matt Erikson.[29] That summer she also received breast augmentation, and shot her first movie under the new contract titled Sunny Loves Matt. The movie led to her to be nominated for three (out of six) AVN awards in 2009 in addition to being a choice for Female Performer of the Year. She followed up her first boy-girl title with The Other Side of Sunny in October 2008, which would be the last time she would perform with Erikson. In January 2008, Leone revealed that she was no longer exclusive to Erikson, and had done scenes with other actors, most notably Tommy Gunn, Charles Dera, James Deen and Voodoo. In August of that same year, she announced the launch of her own studio, Sunlust Pictures, with Daniel Weber as her partner. With her new venture Leone plans to write, direct and create her own brand of adult movies with Vivid Entertainment as her distributor. Her first independent production, The Dark Side of the Sun, was released in March 2009, and was debuted at the Erotic Heritage Museum in Las Vegas. In June 2009, she held a casting call in Las Vegas for her second independent production titled Sunny Slumber Party (released September 2009).