Ron Jeremy doesn’t strike you as the sort to be camera shy.

After all, he has performed in more than 1,700 adult movies since 1979, sharing what most people consider to be intimate moments on the screen.

Yet for Jeremy, one of the six stars of The Surreal Life 2, the toughest part of filming the WB reality series was “waking up in the morning having a camera right in your face,” he said.

The porn star shared a Hollywood mansion for 12 days with a diverse array of so-called celebrities that included former televangelist Tammy Faye Bakker Messner, CHiPs veteran Erik Estrada, rapper Vanilla Ice (aka Rob Van Winkle), Real World Vegas roommate Trishelle Canatella and Baywatch beauty Traci Bingham.

Having a camera trained on him in bed, of all places, was the most surreal part of his experience.

“You’re half dead and all of a sudden you open up your eyes and there’s a camera on you,” Jeremy said by phone from his Hollywood home. “That’s tough to get used to. You really are living under a microscope.”

Estrada made it easier by waking him up each morning with cappuccino and a song. “You’ve got to love that guy,” Jeremy said.

Jeremy will be in Dayton on Saturday night to perform his stand-up comedy act and introduce adult-film star Devon at Apollo’s Palace Gentleman’s Supper Club, 5825 N. Dixie Drive, Harrison Twp. The location, for most of last year, had been a Greek-themed supper club.

He’s performed his “shtick” at clubs nearly every weekend for the last several years, becoming one of the top draws on the adult-entertainment circuit. However, Jeremy considers himself more of an emcee than a comic.

“It can’t really be considered comedy, because if they just think I’m going to be up there and keep chucking jokes for a certain time period, they’ll get nervous,” he explained. “If they know that I’m going to be introducing a woman, then they really can enjoy it and laugh and applaud – and they do.”

In addition to adult films, Jeremy has appeared in such Hollywood features as Detroit Rock City, Boondock Saints and Killing Zoe, sometimes under his given name, Ron Jeremy Hyatt.

He attributes his mainstream success, a rarity among porn stars, to “a lot of hustle, a lot of training.”

Jeremy, 50, holds bachelor’s degrees in elementary education and theater, and a master’s in special education. Before a 1978 Playgirl photo revealed his sizable attributes and launched his equally lengthy adult-film career, he was working as a high school special education teacher in New York City and performing off-Broadway theater.

His life story was recounted in the acclaimed 2001 documentary, Porn Star: The Legend of Ron Jeremy.

Jeremy admitted that he was never a big fan of reality television. “It’s similar to porn in that I don’t mind doing it; I don’t like watching it,” he quipped.

He did The Surreal Life 2 for the exposure, so to speak – to find legitimate work as an actor.

“It’s an experience you have to go through, to be in a home for 12 days with no phone, no computer, no TV. Interact with other people. But it’s to get work, and it’s worked.”

Jeremy has since landed roles in a television movie, The L.A. Riot Spectacular, and an episode of an HBO series, Black Tie. Much of the work has come through Warner Bros., which owns the WB Television Network.

“It’s funny,” Jeremy said. “I love to make a joke that a year ago Warner Bros. probably wouldn’t take my phone calls and now they’ll fly me first-class to Las Vegas for the Billboard Awards.”

As for those rude, televised awakenings, Jeremy said that he likes to be savvy of the camera, “so that I can suck in the gut on this angle, try to make myself look extra good on this angle, get a better profile.”

But the pudgy porn star had no control over the cameras on The Surreal Life 2.

“You give that up,” Jeremy said. “You never know where they’re going to be shooting, because you can’t. But my clothes are not off, so it’s OK.

“But I was topless a lot, in the jacuzzi and stuff, and I’m seeing it on TV – I want to cry. They had like five, six cameras all over the damn place. I’m like, see, that’s why I like to have control.”

Story courtesy of: www.daytondailynews.com