When TV Finally Discovers Adult Creators, We Should Ask Who Gets to Follow That Path

By Lila Monroe, staff writer at Only Fans Insider Magazine

When Joseph sent me the screenshot of Emma Gillman’s LinkedIn post, I understood immediately why it caught his attention. Emma is the founder of The Siren Group, a PR agency that works with adult creators and culturally provocative brands, and her point was simple: television is finally catching up to what adult creators have been building in public for years. The Siren Group describes itself as a PR agency founded by a former sex and relationships journalist turned PR strategist, with a focus on helping provocative creators become the story instead of waiting for traditional media to define them.

She’s right that something has shifted. Apple TV’s Margo’s Got Money Troubles stars Elle Fanning as a young mother who turns to OnlyFans to make ends meet, with the series premiering in April 2026 and drawing major talent including Michelle Pfeiffer, Nicole Kidman, Nick Offerman, and David E. Kelley. HBO’s Euphoria has also moved Cassie, played by Sydney Sweeney, into an OnlyFans-style storyline in Season 3, a choice that has already sparked criticism and conversation around how these women are being portrayed. Stan’s upcoming Turned On: Dirty Sexy Money is being positioned as an eight-part reality series pulling back the curtain on top adult content creators, featuring Annie Knight, Lily Phillips, and Blue Eyed Kayla Jade.

That is progress. I do believe that. I think Emma is right to recognize the cultural moment. A few years ago, adult creators were mostly treated as punchlines, scandals, or cautionary tales. Now they are becoming central characters in prestige dramas, streaming series, and reality formats. Long-form media is finally admitting what creators have known all along: this space is not fringe anymore. It is a business ecosystem, a cultural force, and a place where women especially have been building direct-to-fan revenue models long before mainstream media knew how to explain them.

But this is where I start to get protective.

Because while I’m happy to see adult creators represented as more than stereotypes, I also worry about what kind of fantasy these shows create for the average content creator watching from home. Television has always had a strange relationship with mobility. It loves the idea of the breakout star, the overnight success, the woman who turns a difficult situation into money, glamour, visibility, and reinvention. That makes for good drama. It does not always make for a realistic roadmap.

Most creators are not going to become Cassie on Euphoria. Most creators are not going to become the subject of an Apple TV series. Most creators are not going to land in a high-gloss reality format about the top one percent of earners. For every creator who becomes a recognizable media figure, there are thousands trying to build consistent income, manage burnout, avoid shadow bans, stay safe, negotiate agency relationships, and figure out how to turn attention into something sustainable.

That’s the part I keep coming back to.

Is this progress, or is it just another version of the same old media machine discovering the most dramatic, beautiful, extreme, or profitable edges of an industry while ignoring the people in the middle?

Adult performers crossing into mainstream media is not new. Sasha Grey became one of the most cited crossover examples after Steven Soderbergh cast her in The Girlfriend Experience, a film that Variety described as a breakthrough mainstream moment for her. Traci Lords rebuilt a mainstream acting career with roles in John Waters films including Cry-Baby and Serial Mom, while Jenna Jameson appeared in Private Parts and Sasha Grey later appeared in projects including Entourage. OnlyFans itself has already experimented with reality programming through OFTV, including House of Sims, where Chloe Sims and her family signed a multi-year content deal with the platform after leaving The Only Way Is Essex.

So yes, there is a pathway. But it has always been narrow.

That is my concern. The industry loves pointing to the exceptions and calling them proof of possibility. And they are proof of possibility. They are not proof of accessibility.

If a creator sees these shows and thinks, “Maybe this is how I become famous,” I understand why. Fame is seductive. Mainstream validation is seductive. The idea that TV is finally paying attention can feel like the industry is opening its arms. But fame is not a business plan. A streaming series is not a scalable creator strategy. And being represented in media is not the same thing as having infrastructure that helps creators earn more, protect themselves, build brands, and create long-term career mobility.

That is where I think the conversation needs to mature.

What would real progress look like for the majority of creators? It would look like more access to press without gatekeeping. It would look like creator-owned storytelling. It would look like better education around contracts, agencies, taxes, brand partnerships, affiliate revenue, licensing, merchandise, events, and subscription strategy. It would look like platforms and media companies treating creators not as plot devices, but as business owners.

It would also look like creating more pathways that do not depend on being chosen by television.

That’s why I think Only Fans Insider Magazine matters in this conversation. We are not waiting for HBO, Apple, Stan, or any other platform to decide which creator story is worth telling. We are building a place where creators can publish their own stories, updates, collaborations, business moves, product articles, and announcements directly. Not someday. Not after a casting director notices them. Now.

Because the future of this space cannot just be a few creators breaking into mainstream media while everyone else watches from the sidelines.

I want the creator who is making a few thousand dollars a month to have a path forward. I want the creator who is burned out from posting every day to understand how to build around her personality, not just her output. I want the creator who has been rejected by brands to learn how to prove conversion. I want the creator who has worked with an agency and felt used to have a place to share that experience. I want the creator who has a story but no publicist to still be able to own her narrative.

That is the difference between representation and infrastructure.

Representation says, “Look, adult creators are on TV now.”

Infrastructure says, “Here are the tools that help more creators build better businesses.”

Emma Gillman’s post is important because it captures a real shift. The Siren Group and others like it have been pushing adult creator stories into public conversation, and that work matters. But from where I sit in Brooklyn, reading creator interviews and watching this industry evolve almost every day, I don’t want us to mistake visibility for liberation.

TV catching up is good.

But the real question is what we build next.

Because if this ecosystem only creates fame for a few and false hope for the rest, then we have not created mobility. We have created another stage where the same small group gets selected, packaged, and sold back to everyone else as proof that the system works.

I think we can do better than that.

- Lila Monroe, staff writer at Only Fans Insider Magazine