Jamie Morton Stares Down His Father’s Sexual Fantasies

All children are embarrassed by their dads; Jamie Morton is building a career on that mortification. The 29-year-old Brit is the host of the wildly popular podcast, My Dad Wrote a Porno, in which he and his two best friends, Alice Levine and James Cooper, read from Belinda Blinked, an unsettling series of erotic novels self-published by Morton’s father under the pseudonym Rocky Flintstone. The books tell the tale of a shapely director of sales for a pots and pans company named Belinda Blumenthal. Belinda isn’t afraid to go the extra mile to sell a sautoir — and Morton and crew aren’t afraid to discuss all the dirty details of the series, which is so terribly written it makes Cinemax’s late night selection sound like Shakespeare.

The sheer schadenfreude of it all makes for pure podcasting gold. But the 50 million plus subscribers are drawn to more than the laughs: As Morton cringes his way through the book (each episode is dedicated to a single chapter; each season, to one book in the six-book opus) and as Levine and Cooper butt in to mock the work, it’s impossible not to enjoy the trio’s energy — or come to appreciate the lovable lunatic who wrote the smut in the first place. Morton isn’t a fan of his father’s writing, but he is a fan of his father.

On the cusp of season three, which should be releasing any day now, Fatherly spoke to Morton about the show’s success, how he came to accept this new side of his father, and the sheer awkwardness of reading his father’s lines about slime-spewing cock-transplants out to the world.

Congratulations on the show’s success. Did you ever expect your dad’s smut to become such a hit?

Thank you! Not in our wildest dreams. Honestly, we kind of did the podcast initially as kind of a joke. I was getting so sick of telling people that my dad had written this porno book. And we were like let’s just record something and see if we can pander to our friends that way. For it to grow as quickly and as hugely as it has is amazing. But it’s taken us by surprise for sure.

You three have such fun with the podcast. And the fact that you come in blank every time so the audience can really enjoy the misery with you. Well, not misery.…

Oh it is misery, believe me.

Fair enough. What was your reaction when your dad first told you about Belinda Blinked?

I genuinely couldn’t believe it. And I guess I’m still in a bit of shock today about it. You never expect your dad to start writing erotica. It’s just never anything you plan is going to happen to you. Especially once he retires. I thought he’d just go on holiday. But the fact that he started writing porn just really shocked me. And then just how bad it was shocked me even more. It was like my god you really can’t write or spell and grammar is a foreign concept. So it was just layer-upon-layer of the kinds of things I was discovering about my dad.

I never thought that my dad’s pornography would’ve brought us closer together, but it kind of has.

Did he ever say why he wanted to write erotica?

He’d heard of Fifty Shades of Gray – which he calls 50 Colours of Gray because that’s how much research he did into it — and he just heard that E.L. James had earned a shit ton of money from these books and he was like I can do that, anyone can write about sex, right? Turns out he really, really can’t.

Now, was there ever any hint that your dad wanted to write erotica?

I mean, my dad’s always been mad and kind of an attention seeker in a really fun way. He’s like the life and soul of any party. He loves a drink, he busts his harmonica out at all the family gatherings. So he’s always been a bit gregarious and crazy, but I never thought he would do this. Well, I guess, it makes sense kind of? I mean, if he was like a really straight-laced sort of dad with a tie on and started writing porn, that would be worse.

What was his occupation?

He’s done a million jobs. I think you can probably tell this with his writing, but he doesn’t have much of an attention span. He gets bored. And that was true with his vocations as well. He’s been a builder, worked in a garage, he used to be in sales when I was a little kid and I think he sold tires for a while. So he’s had a range of jobs throughout the years. I guess he’s now pulling on all of the experiences in writing the book

That sales experience is certainly in there.

I mean, well clearly. His past is nothing if not good inspiration.

I mean, if he was like a really straight-laced sort of dad with a tie on and started writing porn, that would be worse.

You’ve gone through two seasons so far of Belinda Blinked. What are some of the passages of have really made you cringe?

How long have we got? I mean, the entire bloody thing. A personal favorite is when he describes the Duchess’s nipples as like “the three-inch rivets that held the fateful Titanic together.” That was a particular how does your brain work?-moment for me, one that made me go you’re not the man I thought you were.

Another one is that there’s an entire character arc where this guy who has a tiny penis basically gets a cock transplant and then his semen turns blue. And we were just like what the actual hell? Where does that even come from in someone’s mind? That was a moment for me when I asked is my dad okay? That was really the craziest thing I read. Some of the things he writes are rooted in some sort of reality, but that just went off the rails.

Many people would keep something like their father’s erotica hidden. You decided to jump in and share it.

If I’d been just really weird about it and just hadn’t written about it, I would’ve missed out on the podcast but also, on a more personal level, I would’ve shut down something about my dad that meant a lot to him.

Is your dad okay with the podcast and the gentle mocking that takes place?

Before we started, I told him we wanted to do the show. And I explained to him what it was, and played he and my family a recording. Everyone thought it was great and I have to say that, now, my dad is the biggest fan of the podcast. He loves it. And I think that he just loves that his books are reaching an audience. The really funny thing about Belinda Blinked is that people criticize it — and obviously we do too because it is truly, terribly written — but they love my dad. And he’s such an endearing character that it’s never cruel. We never wanted the podcast to be us ripping it to shreds in a really nasty way. We wanted it to celebrate him and share his weird mind.

He sounds like a guy with a good sense of humor.

He’s got such a great sense of humor. He’s always taking the piss out of himself as much as anyone and all of this has really shown a different side of my dad to me. He’s just a really good sport.

How does your mom feel about all this?

She just lets him do his thing. I was a bit concerned at the beginning. Like does mom know that you’re writing this? I think obviously she’d prefer that he didn’t write porn. But she’s so busy doing her own stuff that she just lets him get on with it. And I think now that the podcast has done so well and captured an audience and that me and my dad are working together, she knows that all comes from his writing. So I think in a kind of strange way she’s proud of him.

It’s harder for guys of a certain age to find things to bond over with their dads. Has Belinda Blinked, in a weird way, helped you become closer?

We’re so used to seeing our parents as sort of vessels and not people in their own right. And I think this has really lifted the lid on my dad and kind of made me realize that he’s a really creative guy with lots of things he wants to do and say. I’ve got three sisters, so there were four kids to feed between he and my mum and I think they really struggled as most families do to make ends meet. And the fact that he, in his retirement, has just followed his own course a bit has been so amazing. I mean, we wrote a book together last year. So to get to work with your dad on something that’s so creative and different is really fun. I never thought that my dad’s pornography would’ve brought us closer together, but it kind of has. (laughs)