Japanese porn actress Chisato Shoda, 54, got a relatively late start in the adult video (AV) industry at 35 but has remained active and popular for almost 20 years.

Chisato has a son in his mid-twenties and she has never hid what she does for a living from him.

Chisato divorced her husband in 2000, and filmed her first AV when her son was in primary one.

In a recent interview, Chisato revealed she would sometimes show him stills from her various projects. She wasn’t sure how much he understood of her work when he was a kid but said that he received his first phone when he was in primary four, and so he could Google her if he wished.

According to Chisato, her son was 15 when he told her: “Please don’t be so famous."

Back then, porn magazines were readily available at newsstands, and Chisato would often grace the covers of those publications. Her son hated seeing them and tried to avoid them in stores.

However, Chisato's son remains grateful and close to his mum and once told her: “Thank you for raising me, you are both my dad and my mum.”

Speaking of the prejudice directed at sex workers, Chisato said: “I told my mum I quit my office job, and originally wanted to be a caretaker for the elderly, but I ended up filming adult videos. She might have cried… but I was already an adult and I didn’t care how other people would view my job.”

However, Chisato said that not everyone around her reacted negatively to her new career. Her ex-husband’s female former colleague complimented her for being “really cool”.

After being in the AV industry for almost 20 years, Chisato admitted that she has started to feel “melancholic and apologetic” about being in the nude these days.

She’s unable to face the fact that she’s ageing, and that her stamina is not what it was before.

In the past she was able to give her all, and could “begin a scene at any given moment”.

“But now, I will say “let me lie down for a minute first”,” she chuckled.

Chisato has “stopped performing certain actions” as she no longer has the strength to keep up.