Jesse Jane, an adult film star who also appeared in “Entourage” (2005) and “Starsky & Hutch” (2004), was reportedly found dead Wednesday in Moore, Oklahoma, alongside her boyfriend Brett Hasenmueller. Jane, whose real name was Cindy Howell, was 43 years old.
Lt. Francisco Franco of the Moore Police Department told The New York Times officers had discovered the couple during a welfare check at 11 a.m. at their home. He believes they died of a drug overdose; medical examiners have yet to determine their causes of death.
Jane graduated with honors from Moore High School in 1998 and modeled for local retailers before landing a Hooters advertisement. She was made regional training coordinator before becoming a Hawaiian Tropic model and entering the adult film industry.
Jane’s uncredited acting debut was “Bikini Girl” opposite David Hasselhoff and Pamela Anderson in 2003’s “Baywatch: Hawaiian Wedding.” The Fort Worth, Texas native went on to have a prolific adult film career — and lead the highest-budget movie series in its history.
The first “Pirates” (2005) entry reportedly cost $1 million and was the most expensive adult movie ever made at the time. “Pirates II: Scagnetti’s Revenge” (2007) saw Jane reprise her role as first officer for a group of sailors and dethrone the original with an $8 million budget.
“I got into porn right at the perfect time, when porn stars mattered,” she told GQ in 2018. “They were big, glamorous. You walked into a room, you turned heads. Everybody knew who you were because they actually had to buy your products or DVDs, everything.”
Jane added that “the internet killed the business” by prioritizing “shock value.”
The introduction of high-definition cameras, meanwhile, reportedly spurred Jane to get her breasts “redone” — as the new equipment made her original implants look unnatural. Jane was already broadening her horizons, however, as an actor and entrepreneur.
The adult film star managed to cross over from porn to Hollywood with parts in “Starsky & Hutch” opposite Ben Stiller, “Middle Men” with Giovanni Ribisi and HBO’s “Entourage.” Jane retired from porn in 2007 but later resourcefully created her own line of sex toys.
The native Texan reportedly returned to Oklahoma at that time, as her family had settled there when she was a teenager, and told CNBC in 2009 that she had treated porn “like a job” — which allowed her to buy a house, pay her bills and feed her son.
The investigation into Jane and Hasenmueller’s deaths is ongoing.
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