- Born
- Died
- Birth nameJanet Lynn Channin
- Laura Cannon was a beautiful and capable actress who was a welcome and enticing presence in a handful of lowdown raunchy X-rated New York City hardcore features made throughout the early to mid-1970's.
Laura was born Janet Lynn Channin on April 6, 1947 in Evanston, Illinois. She was of Jewish descent and first began acting in grade school theater productions. The younger sister of two older brothers, Laura and her family moved to La Jolla, California when she was a little girl. Following graduation from La Jolla High School in 1965, Cannon went to New York City to attend the NYU Tisch Graduate Acting School, which she eventually graduated from in 1971. Laura got work as an extra in assorted movies shot in New York City and began her career in the adult entertainment industry as a nude model for various men's magazines (she's featured on the cover of the November, 1972 issue of Frolic). After making an important contact with actress turned agent Linda Boyce, Cannon started acting in soft-core sex movies for noted East Coast adult filmmaker Leonard Kirtman in the late 1960's before graduating to more explicit hardcore fare in the early 1970's. Cannon was especially memorable as an amorous art college student in Joseph W. Sarno's crude yet still arousing and enjoyable The Young, Erotic Fanny Hill (1971). She was excellent and heart-breaking as brassy but forlorn and troubled prostitute Dusty Cole in Andy Milligan's sensationally sordid Fleshpot on 42nd Street (1972) and gave a very strong and convincing performance as deranged Vietnam veteran serial rapist/killer Harry Reems' unfortunate second victim in the notoriously nasty porn roughie Forced Entry (1973), which was one of six movies she acted in along with "Forced Entry" director Shaun Costello. In the wake of quitting the adult film industry circa 1974, Laura continued to live in New York City for a number of years before eventually returning to La Jolla, California. Cannon died at age 63 on June 17, 2010.- IMDb Mini Biography By: woodyanders & Ashley West - The Rialto Report - A noteworthy presence in many New York soft and hardcore adult features in the early 1970s, Laura Cannon (her most commonly used pseudonym) was reportedly born in Evanston, Illinois, in 1948 (as per a contemporary reference in Playboy magazine). Her earliest documented screen work emerges around 1970, when she made a handful of soft-core features for producer Leonard Kirtman. It is very likely she also appeared in silent, small-gauge pornographic "loops" at the same time, some of which reemerge in theatrically exhibited compilation films. Her two most conspicuous roles occurred late in her brief career, which ended in 1972 or early 1973 (although some of her work was released as late as 1974): she appears as a rape victim in Shaun Costello's Forced Entry (shot c. 1972 / released 1973), and has her only noteworthy star turn in Andy Milligan's non-explicit grindhouse drama Fleshpot on 42nd Street (rel. 1973). Actress Tina Russell refers to Cannon several times (under the pseudonym "Lisa Daniels") in her memoir Porno Star.- IMDb Mini Biography By: mjb324
- Was the first hardcore porno star to appear in "Playboy" magazine.
- Attended New York University's Tisch Graduate Acting School, alongside Billy Crystal, Christopher Guest, and Michael McKean.
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