John Stagliano's Buttman Magazine Comes to an End

VAN NUYS, Calif.—For the past 16 years, Evil Angel founder John Stagliano has made time in his busy schedule to produce not only his own movies but also Buttman Magazine. As Stagliano remarked when he first made digital editions of the print magazine available online in 2009, “I have always taken the time to create Buttman Magazine. It is the best expression of my love of ass.” Now he’s moving on to other modes of expression, with the result that the current issue of Buttman Magazine will be the last. DVD Operations Manager Lissa Baren talked about the transition: “John [Stagliano] chooses all of the layouts for the magazine. … It’s just very labor intensive for him because he’s got to get all the production stills from all the directors and he goes through everything and figures out what he wants to use. … But it was a labor of love—he really, really loved doing it and that’s why even in the last six, seven years, when a lot of the brick-and-mortar bookstores started closing down and we weren’t doing the circulation that we had been doing, he still continued wanting to do it. And it was a good promotional vehicle for Evil Angel in general.” Now, however, Stagliano’s focus is shifting to Evil Angel’s soon-to-launch apparel line as well as some other projects he’s got on top of his Voracious series. “He just couldn’t make enough time to fit everything in,” Baren said, “so he decided that this first issue of this year was going to be the last issue. And he’s very sad about it.” Stagliano may do a one-off issue down the road when he has more free time, but it might be called something else—perhaps Buttman’s Favorites or Buttman’s Special. “It was a fight to get him to put ‘last issue’ on the cover,” Baren said, “but the consumer needs to know. It’s been a staple on the market for the last 16 years.” Immediately, Evil Angel will begin focusing on remainder sales—in large part to free up warehouse space. “We’ve always been huge in the remainder market, so we’d actually print an overage of magazines so that in six months’ time we had remainder product for people who do packs,” Baren said. “We’re doing a big inventory right now. We’re trying to make warehouse space for the Evil Angel apparel line that’s going to be coming into house probably in the next six to eight months.” In April, Baren said, Volume 16, Issue 5 will be offered up as remainder product, and the process of clearing out the magazine warehouse will begin. “We’ll still have a presence online,” she asserts, noting that ButtmanMagazineDigital.com has the issues online. “It currently doesn’t have all of the magazines from Day One, but eventually we hope to get them all up there. … We still want to have the opportunity to give consumers a Buttman magazine in some form.” In the meantime, work continues on the apparel line. “The stuff is really good,” Baren said. “The girls wore all of his line at the show in Vegas—AEE—and they got such good feedback on how gorgeous it is.” Justin Rich will handle apparel sales, Baren said. “But until we clear warehouse space, we’re not going to be able to start production.” Baren also explained that the Buttman’s Choice DVD line is still up and running. “The titles are not as long or as sex-heavy—for example, the Facesitting Tales line,” she said. “We’re still releasing two to four Buttman Choice titles a month amongst our other releases, and we’re up to anywhere from 18 to 24 releases a month because we have so many directors now.” Pictured: The last issue of Buttman Magazine, with a still of Dianna Dee from Joey Silvera’s Studio A 2 on the cover, and John Stagliano at ILS with the Buttman line of clothing (photo by Hew Burney)