Renee Young and I are in the basement of her ranch house in Rockland County, NY. Glitzy party photos from her publicist days are everywhere; a curio cabinet displays ceramic lady heads from the 1950s; a tuxedo cat eyes me suspiciously from a plastic-covered couch.

Young looks wistful. “You never know where your career might lead you when you’ve got a lot of bills to pay,” she says as she lays out a ball gag, cat o’ nine tails, leather mask, and nipple clamps on her Mah Jongg table.