It has not been revealed for certain where Arcadia Lake was born, where she went to school or where she died. Ron Jeremy has said she was teaching a college physical education aerobics class before beginning her adult film career. In Show World--a Times Square sex emporium--around 1977, she met Eric Edwards while dancing on the live stage. He claimed to have helped her stop using cocaine while she performed in films with him. He also said she was able to leave a methadone treatment program with his help. They were said to have married in 1980, but jealousies and disagreements followed regarding his multiple partnerships. Of course, without methadone, it was more difficult for her to stay off of cocaine. The money she earned from her successful porn career and her troubled marriage only fueled her return to her habit. Director Carter Stevens, a director of photography on many of her early films, said she "had the most beautiful, clear porcelain skin" complexion he had ever seen. Arcadia had such a clean, wholesome look in her films it was difficult to imagine that she had any drug problems at all. Rumors about her 1991 death range from her being the victim of a Mafia murder to her having faked her death so she could leave the porn world and take a new--and more respectable--name and career. Wherever she might be now, her beautiful dark, jet black hair and unforgettable sweet smile could live forever in the dreams of her fans.
While best known for her role in Debbie Does Dallas (1978), most aficionados agree that her best films were Secrets of a Willing Wife (1979)--in which she played a cook who seemed not connected to the film's main plot--Honey Throat (1980) and Summertime Blue (1979).
