I spoke with Stephen Lands, the promoter of Mr. Gay New York, and he proved to be a wealth of information regarding the qualifications to enter and the way in which it is run. He also explained the intricacies of the nationals where Mr. USA will be chosen.
How did you become the promoter from Mr. Gay New York?
I used to live in Arizona, and I competed for Mr. Gay Arizona and Mr. Gay West Coast. When I moved to New York I was the only one on the East Coast that had been in the Mr. Gay USA pageant system, so they asked me to be the promoter for Mr. Gay New York so that I could try to find somebody to compete for Mr. USA on the East Coast.
So tell me a little bit about the pageant.
Mr. Gay New York is a preliminary for Mr. Gay USA. Mr. USA has been around for about 13 years, and there are 39 preliminaries for the pageant. Most of them are in the South. In the West they don’t really have any, and in the East—New York is the first in the Northeast.
So who will be competing?
Wilhem will be competing in Mr. USA as a representative of New York.
So what exactly are the criteria?
In the Mr. USA pageant system, everyone has to go through an interview portion, which is a one-on-one with the judges. The judges have about 15 minutes with the contestants, and they just ask them a series of questions based off of what the contestants tell them about themselves. The interview portion is mainly for the judges to determine who would be the best person to represent the state, who is going to be able to travel, and if they get booked at a gig to perform, who would have the ability to have a conversation with the person who’s hiring them, and who could really represent New York in a very genuine way.
Then with the audience there is a club wear portion. We call it club wear, because with formalwear, everyone ends up dressing the same, with a white shirt and a black tie. It becomes very boring. It doesn’t determine who has any real class or who has any kind of fashion sense. For the club wear, we put a theme to it, which was masquerade. Their job was to come up with a costume, something that you would go out in at a masquerade-themed party in New York. The club portion will be different for USA. The contestants are really going to have to think out of the box to determine what their club wear is going to be, in a national sense, that really balances the whole overall aspect of what club wear is. Then the last category is talent. The talent can be whatever they want it to be. Wilhem danced and lip-synced. His performance was more of like a male entertainer with a drag aspect. That is actually very, very common in the South, where men perform the same way drag queens do.
What is the prize for Mr. New York?
They get $300 and $150 for travel.
How do you raise the money?
We get some gigs to do. We sell shots at different venues. Therapy is going to hire both of us for a few weeks to sell shots.
Wilhem sounded like he was a blast.
The one thing I really like about him is that he wasn’t someone who is typically involved in New York City nightlife. Which is great, because we’re pulling someone from out of nowhere and putting them in a very big spotlight. He’s super sweet. He’s fun, and he’s professional. I think he’ll really represent New York very well.
How do you select the judges?
The judges were picked from people that I’ve had a really good relationship with.
