On the Set: David Lord Turns ‘The Key’ for Wicked Pictures

This article originally ran in the December 2015 issue of AVN magazine. Click here to see the online edition. David Lord had assembled a large cast for his Wicked Pictures feature directing debut—and the veteran writer/director/camera operator was jazzed about the opportunity. “I’ve shot countless features before—big one, small ones, medium sized—but I’ve never done one for Wicked,” he told AVN. “Me and Wicked have had a great relationship for a long, long time, whether it’s been inter-office, BTS, production, shooting all-sex movies, but I guess it’s finally time for me to step up into the feature realm and here I am. “I love just making movies, making features,” he added. “With features, you can put your own spin on things, you can put a lot of your own emphasis on it, because with all-sex, it’s Girl A, Couch B, Guy C, and you have a little bit of leeway with clothing and stuff, but you don’t have a lot of detail to discover and present, and I’m very much about the details that make a feature great.” So ... what’s The Key about? “Well, it’s kind of Sex in the City meets Bridesmaids,” he offered. “It’s basically about people and their barriers, and Gigi Allens, through her travels, has found this Shangri-La—in the script, it’s called ‘the spa’—and it’s a place that gives people the opportunity to work out their problems, and to not only identify their barriers, but work through them to be the person they want to be. On top of that is just a cool sort-of comedy, and people are going to say it’s guy humor, but I beg to differ. If you have hung out with girls before, a group of girls, you know they are more vulgar and vile and more funny than any group of guys you’ll ever meet. “The whole thing with the key is, the character Gigi has been a person who never really has a home, never has roots anywhere, and she’s traveled the world because she felt she was empty inside; she felt she needed more, and she found it. She found it through this house, this spa, this Shangri-La type thing.” Part of the plot is that to keep the spa going, its patrons must give back. Gigi has chosen four friends to bring to the spa according to Lord she tells them, “You’re gonna come here and experience it if you want to, and if you don’t, don’t, but at the end of six months, one of you is going to be asked to pay this forward, to find four more women in your life that can use this.” When the women get an invitation, inside of it is the key that unlocks the door to this house. “They can go and be themselves and do nothing, do anything; just be themselves, no matter what it is. They can do whatever they want when they want,” Lord explained. Besides Allens, the cast includes Mercedes Carrera, Olivia Austin, Chanel Preston and Morgan Lee. “When I was writing the script, Morgan was one of the characters; I based it on her, and it was funny that I was actually able to get her,” Lord said. Male roles are filled by Steven St. Croix, Brad Armstrong, Eric Masterson and Derrick Pierce. AVN was present for two scenes: Mercedes Carrera with Eric Masterson, and Olivia Austin with Steven St. Croix. “Mercedes is playing Sally, and Sally is a workaholic who just grinds it out 14 hours a day, seven days a week; doesn’t have fun, all business all the time, and her thing is that she finds that she really loves sex,” Lord said. “She hasn’t been laid in two years, and believe it or not, there’s a lot of guys that go through this too, that just get so caught up in their own lives—my attorney is such a workaholic; he barely sees his kids, and I know that female version, there’s tons of them out there, that work so much that they don’t get to enjoy the fruits of their labor, don’t enjoy life, and that’s her thing.” In her scene, Mercedes sits at a desk working with her computer when co-worker Eric comes in to ask a question. He notices that she seems distracted, and that’s her “in” to seduce him right in the workplace. Before long, they’re naked and Eric’s licking her pussy right in her office chair. Soon, the partners trade places and Mercedes chows down on his ample twanger before she takes the seat and straddles him for cowgirl and reverse. Moving to the desk, Eric lays her down sideways for side-saddle action, but she wants more manly contact and turns slightly for mish penetration, and after several minutes, Eric splooges right on her belly. The second scene is a bit more traditional, in that it takes place in a bedroom on a bed. “The plot is, we’re husband and wife and Steven thinks I’ve sort of been a cunt lately—that’s the word in the script but that word is so awful,” Olivia explained. “I come into the bedroom and I’m almost like crying, and I tell him I don’t know the reason why I’ve been acting the way I have been and don’t know why I’m so upset and I think it’s more something with me rather than him, and I want things to change. It’s sort of one of those ‘last straw’ things with relationships; you either figure it out or you move on, and it’s the first time they’ve had that conversation, so it gets kind of deep and intense.” The scene begins with the pair side by side above the covers, but in short order, Steven’s between her legs with her muff at his lips. She basks in that feeling for a while, then returns the favor, all the while losing more pieces of clothing. Pretty soon both partners are naked, and Olivia climbs aboard for cowgirl and reverse until Steven decides he wants to be more active and shifts her on her side for spoon—and viewers will be very happy when the blonde beauty lifts her leg so they can see all the penetration. That goes on for quite a while until Steven just can’t hold himself in any longer and cums directly on her pussy. So ... the only remaining question is, will The Key be a one-shot, or considering the “pay it forward” aspect, a series? “I don’t know that it will,” Lord said cautiously, “but if the fans want another one, who am I to say no?” Pictured above: Eric Masterson and Mercedes Carrera