Ron Jeremy

His father, Arnold (born 1918), was a physicist and professor at Queens College, CUNY, and his mother a book editor who had served in the O.S.S. during World War II, as she spoke fluent German and French.

He graduated from Benjamin N. Cardozo High School.

After high school, Jeremy attended Queen's College, CUNY, where he majored in theater and education as an undergraduate and completed a master's degree.

Jeremy left the teaching profession (he called it his "ace in the hole") to pursue a legitimate acting career on Broadway.

He said that he learned then what it was like to be broke, making no money as an actor who "starved Off-Broadway".

He soon found work posing for Playgirl after his then-girlfriend submitted his photo to the magazine.

He utilized this opportunity as a springboard into the adult film industry, which he viewed as a reliable means of supporting himself.

Ronald Jeremy Hyatt (born March 12, 1953) is an American writer and former pornographic actor.

Nicknamed "The Hedgehog", Jeremy was ranked by AVN at No. 1 in their "50 Top Porn Stars of All Time" list.

Jeremy had the nickname "The Hedgehog" bestowed upon him by fellow porn actor William Margold in 1979 after a situation on the set of the porn film Olympic Fever.

Jeremy flew in from New York to shoot the movie.

Expecting warm California weather, he wore only a T-shirt and shorts and brought no additional clothing.

During the long motorcycle ride to the set, located near Lake Arrowhead, in the California mountains, the weather deteriorated to blizzard conditions, which chilled him to the point of near hypothermia.

Upon arriving at the set, Jeremy was immediately whisked away to thaw out in a hot shower.

When he finished, his skin had taken on a pinkish hue from the temperature extremes, and all the many hairs on his body were standing on end.

Margold's comment upon seeing Jeremy at that moment was "You are a hedgehog, my friend. A walking, talking hedgehog."

Contrary to popular belief, the nickname had nothing to do with his weight, as he was quite physically fit at the time.

Jeremy is listed in the Guinness Book of World Records for "Most Appearances in Adult Films"; his entry on the Internet Adult Film Database lists more than 2,000 films in which he has performed, and an additional 285 films which he directed.

By way of comparison, John Holmes, the next highest-ranked male star on the AVN Top 50 porn stars, has 384 acting credits listed on the IAFD.

One joke that made the rounds within the industry at the time was "the kinkier acts some actresses would not perform were bestiality, sadomasochism, and sex with Jeremy" because he had an atypical appearance for a porn star.

Outside the adult film industry, Jeremy worked as a "special consultant" for the 1986 film 9½ Weeks.

He appears in the 1996 horror film They Bite in a role making a film-within-a-film (Invasion of the Fishfuckers) – another horror film, both in the same vein as Humanoids from the Deep.

He also served as a consultant on the 1997 film Boogie Nights—which chronicled the emergence of the fictional porn star Dirk Diggler (Mark Wahlberg, loosely based on the life of porn star John Holmes, who had been a co-worker of Jeremy's)—and the movie The Chase, in which he has a small cameo as a news cameraman.

He played the monster "Blisterface" in ABC's children's show Bone Chillers.

He also appeared in the 1999 film The Boondock Saints, played a bartender in 2002's Spun and acted in 2003's Zombiegeddon.

He was an extra in Ghostbusters, played a male strip-club announcer in Detroit Rock City, and had a cameo in Killing Zoe and in the porn spoof, Orgazmo.

In addition, he appeared in several productions released by Troma Entertainment, such as Terror Firmer, Citizen Toxie: The Toxic Avenger IV, Poultrygeist and Tales from the Crapper.

Jeremy has also made a number of non-pornographic media appearances, and director Scott J. Gill filmed a documentary about him and his legacy, Porn Star: The Legend of Ron Jeremy, which was released on November 30, 2001 worldwide and on home media and digital download on March 25, 2003.

Jeremy has been accused of sexual assault more than a dozen times over the years.

He was the subject of a feature-length biographical documentary, Porn Star: The Legend of Ron Jeremy, released in 2001 and widely distributed on DVD by mainstream retailers.

In that same year he is briefly seen in the heavy metal band Fear Factory's DVD Digital Connectivity.

In 2003, Jeremy appeared as himself in, and lent his name to, the comedy film Being Ron Jeremy, a parody of Being John Malkovich.

Jeremy is a frequent interviewee in documentaries about the porn industry, or related subjects such as Fuck: A Fuckumentary.

In 2006, Jeremy began a series of debates on pornography opposing Pastor Craig Gross, founder of anti-pornography website XXXchurch.com, visiting various U.S. and Canada college campuses as part of the "Porn Debate Tour".

He was featured in the music video "The Plot to Bomb the Panhandle" by A Day to Remember in 2007 from their CD entitled For Those Who Have Heart.

In June 2020, Jeremy was charged with four counts of rape and sexual assault involving four women, and in August 2020, he was charged with another 20 counts of either rape or sexual assault over a span of 16 years from 2004 to 2020 that involved 12 women and a 15-year-old girl.

Upon further investigation he was indicted on 30 sexual-assault counts involving 21 victims, and as a result he was jailed while awaiting trial.

In January 2023, he was found by the court to be mentally unfit to stand trial due to "incurable neurocognitive decline".

On November 19th 2023, Judge rules that adult film star Ron Jeremy can be released to his private residence.

Ronald Jeremy Hyatt was born in Queens, New York City, to a middle-class Jewish family from Russia and Poland.