Alas, No Catfights at the Elite Model Look 2001 Contest Aboard the Intrepid
As the worst dressed male in the city, I felt a little out of place: I was at a competition that could determine the next generation of supermodels. And from what I'd heard from friends who claimed to know something about the event, it was supposedly a pretty important one.
I was looking forward to a night of bitterness and hostility among the 32 teenage girls, hopefully culminating in some shattered dreams, tears and, if I was really lucky, maybe even a catfight.
"What can I say?" said Giusepp Daponte, the champagne pourer. "There are a lot of beautiful girls."
Before the official beginning of the Elite Model Look 2001 national finals, at sunset on the deck of the Intrepid two weeks ago, the scene could not have been more perfectly cliched. I've never seen an audience of more attractive and elegant-looking women together with a group of the most unattractive and skuzzy-looking men. It wasn't hard to pick out the female alumnae of the event?they're about 6-foot-4 and no doubt basking in their multimillion-dollar contracts with Elite. They were being flocked to, and had mastered the subtle art of the double-cheek air kiss. About 10 feet away from me was a stubby male with spiky dark hair wearing an elaborate pink sports jacket and flipflops talking angrily on his cellphone. I didn't know this guy even existed outside of E! Entertainment Television.
For some reason I recalled that a few weeks ago, right here on the Intrepid, where tonight future big-name models were getting their start, boxer Bee Scottland fell into a coma and later died after taking a few too many punches during a minor bout.
I made my way into the tent and sneaked over to a seat on the photographer's platform directly in front of the runway. I was almost booted off a couple times by various event organizers telling me it was only for guys with cameras, but I managed to hide in a little crevice on the side of the platform until the models began to emerge. About 30 judges, who were either scouts from magazines, Elite models or personnel, or photographers, sat along the perimeter of the runway.
"These are the creme de la creme, the best of the best," said the judge and scout for Vibe magazine, Memsor Kamarake. "When picking you have to go for the look, but also personality and presence... But [the judges] know who the special girls are and we can see the photograph right there. We know what works and what sells."
Of the 32 finalists, three would be winners. Those three winners go to Nice in September, where they will compete against winners from all over the world.
As I waited for the festivities to begin, a small melee brewed in front of me. An overweight photographer was trying to fit into a space way too small for his enormous hindquarters, directly in front of the runway.
"Could you please just move over a little bit?" he asked the photographer next to him.
"Hey, get the fuck out man, I was the first one in this mothafuckin' seat, and I ain't movin' for no one," was the reply.
"Come on, just a little?"
"I said get the hell out of here!"
The fat man managed to plop himself down anyway in the space half his size. The man next to him moved over.
Aspiring models came out, under the glare of the bright runway lights and to the beat of some loud Van Halen. The first one had a strange swagger in her step, with sudden gyrations in her midsection, making me wonder if there was something severely wrong with her hips, or maybe her gluteus maximus, which was, not surprisingly, quite minimus. But it became clear that this was something the girls were all taught to do, each protruding her buttocks more than the one before. One girl avoided the swagger altogether, actually walking normally, so I picked her as my favorite, knowing she probably didn't stand a chance.
After about 15 minutes, as the strutting and sashaying came to a close and the judges handed in their votes, I began to handicap my horses. I placed private bets on the winners, confident that I'd get two or three of them right. I was wrong on all of them. For some reason the judges went with the more exotic-looking girls, not the most attractive.
The judges even picked a fourth winner, which visibly upset a blonde winner. After being told there would only be three winners, I guess she wasn't eager for the extra competition in France.
After it was over, I was eager to talk with some of the participants, hoping to find some brainwashed JonBenet Ramseys or at least bitter losers. But when I spoke to some models, I became disillusioned by the answers I was receiving, to the point where I had to accept a painful conclusion: these girls were actually normal, and even worse, had no feelings of malice toward the others.
Alyssa Hayes, 14, from Kansas City, one of the four winners, said that she made friends with the other models and that she would go so far as to keep in touch with them.
"Everyone was cool," Alyssa told me. "No one was competitive... We were all really nervous until we got back there, and then we just realized we really had to pee." I reminded myself that she was one of the winners.
But then New Orleans' Ebbra Gordon, 16, who didn't win, said she'd made some friends too. "This was so fun," she added. "And I learned how to walk in two-and-a-half-inch heels."
What was this sense of humor from the losers? Where was the animosity, the basic wishing of ill will? I decided to focus my attention on the crazy, overprotective, mercenary parents. Daryl Searcy, from Franklin, TN, the father of one of the winners, said he really didn't know much about the process or even about his daughter's upcoming trip to Nice.
"It's our first time going through this, so I'm relatively new to the process," he said. "But I'm just really proud of Ashley."
As I walked down the stairs of the Intrepid I listened closely to a conversation between two of the losers, hoping for some shred of anger or bitterness. Once again, I was disappointed.
"Ashley totally deserved it," said one girl.
"I know!" said the other. "She's just so cute!"