Wed 21 Jan 2015 In: New Zealand Daily News View at Wayback View at NDHA
Current Mr Gay New Zealand Troy Williams A scaled-back version of Mr Gay New Zealand is to be held this year, with people now being asked to put their names forward if they are interested in being the 2015 representative at Mr Gay World in South Africa. If more than one person enters, there will be a simple committee process to decide the winner. However they will need to pay for their own trip to Mr Gay World, which is being held in Cape Town and Knysna from 26 April - 3 May. Organiser and current Mr Gay New Zealand Troy Williams says they haven’t had enough time to get sponsors to top up current support from Wireless Nation, to get the winner to South Africa. He says they were going to concentrate on strengthening the competition into the future, and weren’t going to run one this year, but after hearing there was interest, decided to offer someone a chance to claim the title. “If there are people who are keen, who want to pay for it, and want to put their names forward, then yeah sure, why not,” he says. “It just seems like the easiest way to do it in the short term.” Williams pulled out of Mr Gay World last year, along with the Australian contestant, as they were unhappy with the way it was run. He says the Mr Gay World team have told him the South African competition will be run professionally – as a previous Mr Gay World run in that nation was. “Hopefully it’s going to be a better event,” Williams says. It’s hoped 2016 will be the start of a new format for Mr Gay New Zealand, which will be made of up of regional competitions coinciding with regional pride events, culminating in a national final supported by Family Bar in Auckland. Wireless Nation has agreed to pay to get contestants to Auckland for the final, while sponsors will be sought to cover the costs of attending Mr Gay World that year. “It will make it a more national competition – there are probably some really good contestants in other cities.” Anyone who is interested in entering Mr Gay New Zealand 2015 can send a bio and images to news@gaynz.com and we will pass it on to organisers.
Credit: GayNZ.com Daily News staff
First published: Wednesday, 21st January 2015 - 9:55am