Tina Russell

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Tina Russell
Birthdate:	September 23, 1948
Birth name:	Linda Marie Mintzer
Date of death:	May 18, 1981 (aged 32)
Hair color:	Brown
Ethnicity:	Caucasian
Alias(es):	Lina Russell, Dianna Baker, Tina Russel, Diana Baker, Linda Sanduson, Linda Sanderson
No. of films:	(40 per IMDb)
Tina Russell at IMDb

Tina Russell (September 23, 1948 – May 18, 1981), born Linda Marie Mintzer, was a pioneering adult film actress active in New York between about 1970 and 1975. She also performed in some of the earlierst "live sex shows" to appear in New York in the early-1970s (they actually featured simulated sex). Russell was born in Williamsport, Pennsylvania.

In the late-1960s, she married photographer John Sanderson, later called Jason Russell, and the couple moved to New York City, where Linda enrolled in New York University. Under the pseudonyms Jason and Tina Russell, the couple began their film careers appearing in short, pornographic "loops" which were shown in peepshows in New York's Times Square. They appeared in a number of "marriage manual" films during the early-1970s and Tina Russell was a featured actress in some of the earliest hardcore pornographic feature films to be produced in New York.

Sometime in the mid-1970s, the Russell's relationship came to an end. Tina became depressed and alcoholic. She was visiting her brother in San Diego in May 1981 when she collapsed and was hospitalized. She died several days later of renal failure. Russell is buried in Resurrection Cemetery, Montoursville, Pennsylvania, under her real name.

In 1985, Russell was posthumously inducted into the X-Rated Critics Organization Hall of Fame.^[1]^[2]