Interview with retired Japanese porn star Kaho Shibuya about new book

Kaho Shibuya was a big name in porn during her time as a performer and she’s also a rare example of someone who has managed to retain her fame since retiring from adult video in 2018 by carving out a successful second career.

She also takes no prisoners, prepared to spill the beans on the dark side of Japanese porn, and sue a production company for leaking her old videos.

Now active as a cosplayer, Twitch streamer, and author, Shibuya speaks English fluently, which has helped her a lot to keep an international profile.

She recently sat down with Tokyo Weekender for an interview about her work, specifically her new English-language book, The Japanese Porn Industry Unmasked: An Insider’s Guide, which just shot to the top of our to-read list.

The official blurb for the tell-all memoir, which came in March from Bento Books, is as follows:

Kaho Shibuya became a sports reporter covering professional baseball after graduating from college, but found the field of sports journalism to be a male-dominated world that was unwelcoming to women. Looking for other work that would satisfy her insatiable curiosity and provide her with a novel experience, she responded to an ad recruiting “adult toy reviewers.” This turned out to be her first step toward becoming an adult film actress, a career through which she would appear in some 750 adult film releases until her retirement in 2018.

In this book, she reports on all aspects of the Japanese adult film industry from an actress’s perspective, from how young women are recruited to what happens after they retire. Shibuya touches on topics that are extremely serious (the issue of coerced appearances in Japanese porn, how touts and talent agencies take advantage of young women’s dreams of becoming popular entertainers), illuminate peculiarities of how the porn industry has developed in Japan (the three categories of adult film actresses, how and how much actresses are paid), and are highly amusing (why convenience stores near porn studios immediately sell out of the “Morning Banana” yogurt drink, the use of pubic wigs).

We see through Shibuya’s eyes why the porn industry proved to be an environment subjecting her to less prejudice and sexism than did her mainstream job, as well as the many ways in which the industry remains in need of further reform despite recent efforts toward cleaning itself up. Also discussed is how the internet is forcing change on the industry in other ways, and how it is trying to adapt in a world of freely available, often illegally procured, adult entertainment content.

It’s great that Shibuya is tackling the thorny issue of coercion, which is a serious problem in the industry and led to a new law that has had major repercussions for how productions are made. But it’s clear that JAV can also be rewarding, liberating, and enabling for certain performers.

“Working in the sex industry actually helped me accept my body,” she says in the interview. “Being a big-chested woman was difficult in my job as a reporter. I would get in trouble for ‘being sexy’ even if I wasn’t trying to show it. As a JAV model, there’s something freeing about showing off your entire body on purpose.”

Shibuya, who graduated from the prestigious Aoyama Gakuin University, wants to educate the public about the good and the bad. Opting for a more matter-of-fact than sensational tone, the memoir even includes a translated performer contract.

Does she regret becoming a JAV performer? Apparently not, though she did have bad experiences (including harassment and unwanted advances from co-stars) and feel exploited at times.

But one fascinating detail that the interview reveals is the irony that Shibuya had less sex overall compared to her life before joining the industry. Sure, she was having a lot for the cameras, but it seems not when they weren’t rolling!