Michael Lucas (born Andrei Lvovich Treivas, in 1972) is an American businessman, performer, founder, and CEO of Lucas Entertainment, Manhattan's largest gay adult film company.
The New Republic dubbed Lucas "Gay Porn's Neocon Kingpin". He contends that his film Michael Lucas' La Dolce Vita is the most expensive gay porn film ever made, with a budget of $250,000 and multiple celebrity cameos. In 2009, Lucas was inducted into the GayVN Hall of Fame, noted for "his stature as an A-list director and performer".
In 2009, Lucas released what he called his most important film, Men of Israel, which media called a "landmark" film as the first major porn video with an all-Israeli and all-Jewish cast.
Lucas is particularly well known for his activism and outspokenness. Lucas is frequently also controversial; for example, during the 2023 Gaza war, Lucas' studio was the target of a boycott which he claimed was antisemitic in nature, after he posted a picture of an Israeli missile signed, on his request, "From Michael Lucas to Gaza". On August 10, 2010, popular LGBTQ magazine Queerty called him out for "a regular display of Islamophobia".
Background
Lucas was born in Moscow, Russia, to Lev Bregman, an engineer, and Elena Treivas, a Russian literature teacher. He was raised in a secular Jewish family. In 1994 he obtained a degree in law from the Kutafin Moscow State Law University. After graduation, Lucas briefly owned and operated a travel agency in Russia until 1995.
In 1995, Lucas left for Munich, Germany, on a tourist visa. Without an official work permit, he worked and starred in heterosexual porn. He then worked as a nude model and in gay porn for French adult film producer Jean-Daniel Cadinot in Paris. Lucas moved to New York City in 1997, where he worked at the Gaiety Theater. After a few adult industry jobs in California, he was offered a one-year contract by Falcon Entertainment whose producers had seen him in a French Cadinot film. Lucas won a U.S. green card through the lottery system. With money saved from his work at Falcon, Lucas founded his own gay porn company in New York, rather than Los Angeles where most American porn companies are headquartered, in 1998.
In 2001, Lucas brought his Russian family to the United States. On November 12, 2004, Lucas was sworn in as an American citizen. In October 2008 it was announced that Lucas had married his boyfriend of eight years, Richard Winger. A press release stated that the couple wanted to marry to make a statement about same-sex marriage rights. In 2014 Lucas announced he and Winger divorced.
Career Actor Lucas began his career in a German heterosexual pornographic film. While in France, he worked under the influential French director Jean-Daniel Cadinot, appearing as "Ramzes Kairoff" in two gay pornographic films, both released in 1996. Using the name "Michel Lucas," he worked as a Falcon Exclusive, performing as a top in five films released in 1997 and 1998.List of videos at the online store with Michel Lucas in the cast. Adult images. Retrieved from www.falconstudios.com on September 3, 2006 Lucas went on to perform for his owned-and-operated gay adult studio, Lucas Entertainment, where he currently stars in scenes and films.
Director He directed his first project, Back in the Saddle, in 1998, and also performed in the film. With co-director Tony DiMarco, Lucas won Best Director at the 2007 GayVN Awards for Michael Lucas' La Dolce Vita. DiMarco and Lucas also won a 2008 XBIZ Award for Best GLBT Director, and Lucas received an award for Best Publicity Stunt for "Michael Lucas Found Dead".
The Banana Guide called his productions the most polished, big-budget gay porn films ever made and cited Lucas' love for the subject and high technical aptitude.Review of Lucas Entertainment , The Banana Guide, June 2009.
Since the founding of Lucas Entertainment, Lucas has gone on to direct over 400 adult films for his studio.
Lucas Entertainment
In 1998, Lucas founded his own production company, Lucas Entertainment. He based the company in New York City.Mao, Tien (June 21, 2006),Michael Lucas, CEO Lucas Entertainment . Retrieved December 18, 2006, from www.gothamist.com In 2004, Lucas Distribution, Inc., his adult video distribution company, began operations. Lucas directs, produces and stars in his own films under the Lucas Entertainment banner. His studio has garnered many GayVN Awards and Adult Erotic Gay Video Awards ("Grabbys") nominations and wins.
In the summer of 2005 Lucas released Michael Lucas' Dangerous Liaisons; the film featured celebrity cameos from RuPaul, Boy George, Graham Norton, Bruce Vilanch, Lady Bunny, Amanda Lepore, and Michael Musto.
The company received 24 nominations for the 2009 GayVN Awards, including best picture for Return to Fire Island. That May, Lucas filmed the first gay porn film using all Israeli models, billing it as a sexual journey to promote Israeli culture."Sensitive Gay Porn Technology Smuggled to Israel ". Ryan Tate, Gawker. May 8, 2009. The company launched its Men of Israel website to promote the film, which announced its release for July 22.
Lucas was included in a 2009 New York magazine feature about people who made it to the top, despite arriving in the city with very little.Waking Up to New York , New York Magazine, April 10, 2009.
Michael Lucas' La Dolce Vita
In 2006, the studio released Michael Lucas' La Dolce Vita Parts 1 & 2, a gay pornographic remake of the 1960 Fellini classic La Dolce Vita.List of credits at the tlavideo online video store, retrieved from www.tlavideo.com January 9, 2007 The film won a record fourteen awards at the 2007 GayVN Awards, winning in every category in which it was nominated.
In February 2007, International Media Films, Inc., which owns the rights to Fellini's La Dolce Vita, filed suit against Lucas (as Andrei Treivas Bregman), Lucas Entertainment, Inc., and Lucas Distribution, Inc. for trademark and copyright infringement. The lawsuit seeks to collect unspecified damages and to stop sales of Michael Lucas' La Dolce Vita Parts 1 & 2.
Lucas won the lawsuit in April 2010 in a summary judgment by Judge John George Koeltl, who dismissed IMF's claims of copyright infringement, since many porn films have parodied mainstream films.
Documentary filmmaker Lucas has also worked as a documentarian. In 2012, he released his first documentary film about the thriving Israeli LGBT community. Titled Undressing Israel: Gay Men in the Promised Land, the film includes footage of Tel Aviv's vibrant nightlife, a same-sex wedding, and candid interviews with a diverse range of local Israeli gays and lesbians, including a gay MP, an openly gay Army trainer, a drag queen, a transvestite, a young Arab-Israeli journalist, and same-sex parents raising their children and a number of artists and activists. In 2014, Lucas released his second documentary, Campaign of Hate: Russia and Gay Propaganda, which investigates the current anti-gay climate in Russian politics and society.
Writer, speaker and activist
In the 2000s, Lucas attracted attention for his views on politics and culture through a series of columns, speaking events and his increasing activism. He is a vocal opponent of drug use and an advocate for safe sex, both in the porn industry and the gay community at large. In August 2004, The Advocate published an interview by Harvey Fierstein with Lucas about his full-page public service announcements in several national publications warning of the dangers of unprotected sex.
Increasingly Lucas gained attention for his politics, and in particular his views on Israel and Muslims. In March 2008 he was profiled in The New Republic as "Gay porn's neocon kingpin". The article explored his background and a controversy over his writings on Islam that surrounded a lecture he gave at Stanford University.
In an interview with Michael Musto in April 2009, Lucas remarked that his stifled upbringing in Soviet Russia influenced how vocal he is about his opinions.The Naked Truth about Michael Lucas , Michael Musto, The Village Voice, April 21, 2009
Lucas wrote about the need for LGBT people to reassess conservatives in August 2010, citing Ann Coulter as an example of a gay-friendly conservative leader.It Takes a Coulter , Michael Lucas, The Advocate, August 24, 2010. Retrieved July 18, 2011
Columnist On April 20, 2007, The New York Blade began to publish regular opinion columns by Lucas, who had previously had a number of comments published in the Blade's opinion section. In October 2009, Lucas wrote a column for The Advocate decrying the group Queers Undermining Israeli Terrorism.Queers for Palestine?, Michael Lucas, The Advocate, October 5, 2009. In March 2010 Lucas began writing a column for The Advocate. His columns have focused on Israel,Europe's Trouble with Israel , Michael Lucas, The Advocate Russia's confronting homosexuality, and the Park51 controversy.The Monument to Muslim Terrorism . In 2011 he started writing a column for Huffington Post. As of 2024, Lucas has also contributed opinion writing to The Jerusalem Post.
Islam His writings on Islam have been controversial. In a 2007 New York Blade column, Lucas expressed support for artist Charles Merrill's burning of a Koran that was estimated at $60,000. He has condemned Islam and accused it of creating negative attitudes that lead to the persecution of homosexuals and discrimination of women.
As a columnist for The Advocate, Lucas continued to explore Islamic topics. In a heavily debated column,Should We Be Defending Islam, Despite Its Homophobia?, Joseph Erbentraut, Edge Boston, October 5, 2010. Retrieved July 27, 2011 he called the Cordoba House, a proposed Islamic community center and mosque controversially located near the World Trade Center site, a 'monument to Muslim terrorism' and an example of "political Islam's ascendancy."The Monument to Muslim Terrorism , Michael Lucas, The Advocate, August 9, 2010. Retrieved July 27, 2011 After the 2011 Egyptian revolution he wrote that the Muslim Brotherhood would fill a power vacuum, asserting that it would be a problem for the discreet Egyptian gay community that has lived with relatively little government persecution.Democracy in Egypt a Myth? , Michael Lucas, The Advocate, January 31, 2011. Retrieved July 27, 2011
University lectures In April 2005, Lucas was invited to speak before a Calhoun College Master's Tea at Yale University. The speech was organized with the assistance of gaYalies, a campus group for gay and bisexual men. He spoke about his life history and his views on pornography. In February 2006 he participated in a symposium on adult entertainment that was sponsored by the Yale Journal of Law and Feminism, which later published Lucas' discussion in its Spring issue.
The Speakers Bureau at Stanford University invited Lucas to speak in Cubberley Auditorium on February 14, 2008, about the role the adult entertainment industry plays in AIDS prevention., Kelly Fong, February 14, 2008, The Stanford Daily. The appearance sparked debate about his political columns for the New York Blade, particularly his assertions that "the Qur'an is today's Mein Kampf" and that its teachings inspire Muslims to kill gay people.
Lucas, who grew up in the Soviet Union and experienced its antisemitism and homophobia, was on a panel at The New School on the state of gay rights and acceptability in Eastern Europe.Coming Out in the Developing World: Exploring Eastern Europe's Hidden Closets , New School press release, April 19, 2011.
Activism