Joanna Angel is an American alternative pornographic and mainstream actress, director, and writer of adult films. She is best known for starting BurningAngel in April 2002 with her flatmate Mitch Fontaine, and has been credited with helping the alt porn scene grow and develop in industry. Launched as a response to websites such as SuicideGirls, it featured alternative performers acting in exclusively hardcore scenes with a stronger focus on a punk aesthetic.
Angel was born in Brooklyn, New York, to an Israeli mother and an American father. She was raised in River Edge in Bergen County, New Jersey, where she attended Cherry Hill Elementary School and graduated from River Dell High School in 1998. After graduating, she enrolled in Rutgers University, where she earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in English literature with a minor in Film Studies.
She worked in a kosher fast food restaurant in Teaneck during high school, then at an Applebee's and another restaurant called Happy's Health Grille during college.