Traci Lords (born Nora Louise Kuzma on May 7, 1968), also known as Traci Elizabeth Lords, is an American actress. She first achieved notoriety for her underage appearances in pornographic films and Penthouse magazine (she was 16 years old in her first film), but has now made the transition into more mainstream acting roles. Traci Elizabeth Lords was born Nora Louise Kuzma on May 7, 1968, in Steubenville, Ohio to parents Louis and Patricia Kuzma. She made her stage name by combining the first name of her high school best friend, Traci, and the last name of her favorite actor from Hawaii Five-O, Jack Lord. At twelve she fled from her abusive, alcoholic father to Lawndale, California with her mother and three sisters. Later, while attending Redondo Union High School, she had an abortion and after having a nervous breakdown, ran away from home. While living with her Mom's forty-something ex-boyfriend who posed as her stepfather, she used a friend's birth certificate and a fake driver's license indicating that she was twenty-two years of age to fake her way into the porn industry at the age of fifteen, starting with Jim South's World Modeling Agency. Shortly after, she was modelling for widely distributed adult magazines, most notably Penthouse, in the same September 1984 issue that exposed Miss America 1984, Vanessa Williams. She quickly became one of the most popular starlets in town, and by now ventured into Adult movies. Lords's youthful appearence and enthusiastic sexual performances propelled her to stardom and is considered by many to be one of the first porn queens. By the time she was 18, she'd appeared in 100 adult films. (According to Lords' autobiography, however, approx. 80 of those films were comprised from leftover and re-edited footage from the original 20 films that were shot.) But in 1986, federal authorities discovered she was underage while making movies and they arrested her, as well as the owners of her movie agency and X-citement Video, Inc. See United States v. X-Citement Video. |
