Rural Kentuckian, adult entertainer Lane V. Rogers adds UK Wildcat to résumé
When googling the name “Lane V. Rogers,” an abundance of media and information swarms the page. Twitter, Instagram, Youtube, Twitch, Onlyfans, and more.
Click on a google image, and you’ll see the most precious human. Sweet face, greek god build, and that astrological Leo tattoo? Phenomenal.
Lane V Rogers, aka Mr. Blake Mitchell, is a man with many hats. He’s like one of those rabbit vibrators that can do it all. He’s been “in the biz” for about eight years, but where did this jack-of-all-trades, gorgeous specimen come from, and how did he gain such a large following in just a few years?
Although his parents argue over which hospital he was born in, Rogers was born in August of 1994 in Lexington but raised in Versailles.
He said his high school life encompassed traits from every character in Euphoria.
“Life was… very shitty,” Rogers said. “I didn’t graduate high school; I got expelled from two high schools a senior year. I worked at a shitty pizza place, then went to a slightly less shitty diner but had to walk six miles to get there. I know I sound like an old man – ‘oh, I had to walk up and down the hills to get there,’ but it’s true, I did!”
Even his coming-out story was a bit of a tragedy. Like many Queer people, Rogers’ coming out story was a little less than terrible but still not quite it.
“It was… an absolute nightmare,” he said.
Rogers was outed by the first gay person he ever met that lived openly gay, but Lane didn’t want to date him, which made for an uncomfortable situation. Naturally, the unrequited love led to a revenge outing.
“Though I didn’t get to come out on my terms, I feel as though it made me get over the pressure of it much quicker and come to terms with things much more easily, but it was not easy at first,” he said. “And not a positive experience.”
Unfortunately, his mother was supportive and caring, and so was his brother. The lack of affirmation throwing him off the most was his “friends.” Unfortunately, not all coming-out stories are positive, but all of these stories deserve to be told.
After Lane was outed, he immediately noticed a distinguishable difference between who talked to him and who didn’t get any longer at school — something he seems thankful for now. “It showed [me] who my true friends were and who were not,” he said. Who wants homophobic friends? Ew.
While life proved challenging for the Versailles native, life took a positive turn thanks to a spontaneous Grindr match. On a late night, Rogers was working at the “slightly less shitty” diner (by working, I, of course, mean aimlessly scrolling through Grindr) when he stumbled upon a cutie to pick him up from the restaurant at the end of his shift.
Several Burnett’s strawberry vodka lemonades later, he wakes up to three topless girls holding hands, screaming, and jumping up and down. After gaining full consciousness, he shortly realized these women were raving about how much money they had made the night before. Slowly putting things together, he decided to ask what was going on.
“Are you guys strippers or something?” he asked.
“We’re like…virtual strippers,” they replied. Still riding the high, the girls explained to him the sensation of “camming” and how profitable it had been for them for school and their confidence. Not long after this, Mr. Blake Mitchell was born.
Starting in their late teen years in a reasonably small town, Rogers thought having a stage name would be an excellent way to get his foot in the door of the industry and separate him a bit from his other work.
Blake Mitchell came about in the simplest of ways. Blake? It’s a hot guy’s name, duh. Mitchell? THE hot guy. He was a real boy next door type and one of Rogers’ first crushes. Although the name’s origin story is quite cute, he has stepped away from performing under the word these days. A few years back, before he had openly come into his role, he started being blackmailed with his real name. People threatened to “out” him to the world, so he ultimately decided to out himself.
“My REAL friends were starting to ask me questions like… ‘Well, should we call you Lane, or should we call you Blake?’ And I realized I had gotten lost in the ‘character.’ And it was terrifying.”
This was when he began to realize that his work was changing his life and forcing him to become who he was as a person. Rogers decided that he wanted the power — that he had created with the development of this name — back for himself. Big top energy. Mr. Blake Mitchell slowly became a BRAND rather than a person. Although he has decided to produce everything under his name nowadays primarily, he said he plans to make a few professional things under the brand for his fans.
With an array of sex workers hailing from Kentucky, it is a wonder why the Bluegrass state produces so much adult entertainment for the world. Other adult entertainers from Kentucky besides Lane include Wendy Williams, Calhoun Sawyer, Tera Wray, and Charley Chase. So, why are there so many sex workers from this state?
“Well. I’m still developing a full opinion on this because I would like to talk to more sex workers from Kentucky first, but I think it’s because this is a place that is a border element for the US,” he said. “Bit of north, a bit of south. Incredibly mixed identity. We’re midwestern but also southern; we have a big Ohio influence with the true holler. There’s some West Virginia and Tennessee influence. Indiana is in the north of the state. It’s a primary crossroads in the US. There’s an amalgamation of identities that creates this very multifaceted pool of ideas and expression. One of the easiest ways for people to be expressive and creative in their identities is through sex work. It’s the perfect recipe for it, and Kentucky is its birth platform.”
Rogers added that he believes Kentucky is a midpoint gateway, not too far from the East or West but very much in the middle.
“You can go pretty easily from Kentucky to California or New York City even,” he said. “One of the most significant points that Lane and I both had in mind with this topic is that sex work is a great way to make an economic jump on the latter for poor Kentucky folk because there are tremendous socioeconomic disparities within the state. Diving into the field has allowed Lane to come up in ways he could have never imagined whenever he was younger, and he wants it to do the same for other poor Kentucky folk as well.
For a while, Rogers was traveling all the time and having to leave friends, family, and, sometimes, beloved pets behind. He has two furry babies — a dog named Bandit and a cat named Galaxy. Any separation from those two cuties must be challenging, but being a famous gay porn star will do that, unfortunately. The constant traveling to link with models from various industries sounded like such a thrilling experience, but Rogers described it as a bit limiting. Working with professional porn industries means only being able to work with their models. While there were often many to choose from, it just wasn’t a very diverse pool. He says he’s trying to get more so into filming with all different types of people. Less with people who look just like him, and he’s felt constrained for years.
He resisted for as long as possible, but the temptation was too overwhelming. In 2018, he finally caved and joined OnlyFans. The ability to work with and help bring up amateur sex workers was the best idea for him.
“I was trying not to be a crotchety old man about it because it gives power back to the actual stars and gives them more credit and payment.” He says he has been doing exclusively that ever since. Ever since joining the platform, he has been able to film with women, transgender people, people of color, and more. He’s become such a big fan of it because he makes his own schedule this way and travels where he wants to. He also gets to work with whoever he wants to now and has opened the door to people with backgrounds he would’ve never gotten to work with if he had continued down the professional agency route.
Despite the popularity of the Mr. Blake Mitchell brand, Rogers has several other ventures going on as well. His Youtube page, now deactivated, had taken off for quite a while, giving his fans unique insight into his life. He was also streaming on Twitch for quite some time but is gradually seeking an end to this.
He said he felt he was letting people too far into his life and giving way too much of himself away. He said he thought pretty exhausted with it all and felt like he was giving too many small pieces of himself to multiple things when he could be giving his all to the things he loves and wants to do. He also seemed to be very tired of keeping up appearances, stating that “people want the real” him, but the portion of him that fans want isn’t how it always is, referring to the glitz and glam lifestyle that’s shown on his traveling and food vlogging on Youtube. While he has traveled to some of the most amazing places in the world (some of his faves being Montana, Niece, and Montreal), things aren’t always bubbly and sparkly in life. And it can be daunting to live up to this image all the time.
As much as he loves the things he does on his Youtube channel and streams on Twitch, he would like to keep some of the fun for himself. One wrong face in a video and fans will immediately comment, asking if something is wrong or creating gossip around things that may or may not be happening in his life, without even knowing him. Though he has played many games throughout the years, he continuously goes back to PC gaming, which he loves to do for himself and his happiness in his free time. His favorite games include World of Conflict (WIC), Fortnite (though he judged it for many years before playing), and Assassin’s Creed. Although he may delve back into this realm at some point in the future, Lane has decided to take a little time for himself.
When he has free time, Rogers does much more than just gaming all day. He also loves to eat. His passion for food seems pretty intense. His favorite foods include macaroni and cheese, steak, and veggies (except onions because he is allergic). He also absolutely adores poutine, a love developed during his time in Montreal. Some of his favorite local restaurants are Goodfellas, Burl Food, presented by Kismet, Arirang Garden – Korean BBQ, and his ultimate go-to, Waffle House! Some shows he likes to indulge in while eating all this yummy food include Euphoria (obviously), Goliath, Barry, and anything with Conan O’Brien or John Oliver.
With that in mind, I asked Rogers what inspires or motivates him to keep going every day. After discussing some of his favorite celebrities — Zendaya, Tom Holland, Nikki Glaser, Brad Pitt — I imagined he would mention one of them or potentially his mother. Still, the answer I got was much better than that. The person that inspires him the most is a younger version of himself. He said that for a long time, he wasn’t sure if he would even make it to 25. So, he would be thrilled if he could talk to his younger self to reassure him that everything would be okay. Awww. Yeah, I teared up too.
Lane is currently enrolled at the University of Kentucky for exploratory studies, but he says he may eventually go after a business degree. He plans on going for his MBA in the future. He is starting to like communications and advertising/marketing, but his ultimate goal is business administration with more of a focus on visual communications.
His main plans are to focus on college and not give as much of himself away to the world for a bit. He says he would like to work on creating the content that he believes is most important via his OnlyFans because he wants to work with small creators that are mostly starting up. He would like to use the platform to help others come up and do well, impact people in a more positive way, and shine a light on sex work and sex workers all around.
And yes, Kentucky dears, he does drink Ale-8-One.
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