About Background

Michael Lucas was born in Moscow on March 10th, 1972. His parents, Lev Bregman, an engineer, and Elena Treivas, a literature teacher, gave their son the maternal maiden name of Treivas, as to curb the personal effects of anti-Semitism in soviet Russia. Growing up in a communist nation as a gay-Jewish boy, Lucas faced a great deal of oppression and discrimination. “I have a very liberal Jewish family,” Lucas says, “they are open-minded and respectful about my sexuality and, later, my choice of profession.” In grade school, Lucas experienced firsthand the abrasive forms of anti-Semitism and later in graduate school, the cruelty of homophobia. Quite early in life Lucas understood that he was a gay man and even with such intolerance, he never hid that fact. “I was never in the closet,” states Lucas. “Not to my family and not to my friends.”

In 1994, Lucas obtained a law degree from Moscow State Law Academy. After graduation, Lucas began to sharpen his entrepreneurial skills by founding and operating a travel agency. Lucas states, “I got into a lot of problems with the Russian mafia, as the success of my company caught their attention. I would rather have closed my company than share it with them, so I did.” Directly after he closed shop, Lucas sought greater acceptance and left Russia for Europe. Here is where Lucas first delved into the career that would make this young man a sex icon. In Germany, he starred in a straight pornographic film; Lucas swiftly changed gears and settled in France for the next two years. While in France, under the direction of the most renowned French porn director, Jean-Daniel Cadinot, Lucas lured interest by performing in two gay adult films.

In 1997, Lucas fulfilled his longtime aspiration and moved to New York City. His journey to make it to the top in Manhattan was documented years later, along side Naomi Campbell and Lorne Michaels, in an April 2009 issue of New York Magazine. In 1998, Lucas put his savvy business expertise to the grind and founded his own company, Lucas Entertainment. In 2001, Michael Lucas brought his family to America, where they settled in Brooklyn and on November 12, 2004, Lucas was sworn in as an American citizen. Now, a decade after its launch, what once started off in his West Village studio apartment, Lucas Entertainment offices now occupy a 5,000 square foot space in the heart of midtown Manhattan.