Interview with Miguel Zarate from "Step It Up & Dance"

AE: What was the most fun moment just for you to watch? And which moment made you cringe? Like, “I’m not sure I can even watch this …” ?
MZ: My favorite moment to watch would have to be my solo … that, and the fight between me and Michael was really fun to watch.

AE: Wait – which one?
MZ: [laughs.] I know, right? The one during the Jacques Heim challenge when I really couldn’t take it anymore – the one where I said, “Question of the f*cking year.” That one.

And the thing I hated watching the most, was … probably the argument between me and Mochi. I didn’t like that. … That’s another story too…

AE: Really? Will you tell me?
MZ: No, I don’t know if I can.

AE: Well, I loved the episode with Tina Landon, and I know you love her.
MZ: I should have been a team captain! OK, let me tell you that because I killed that routine on the rooftop. I mean, there’s footage of it. And second of all, I choreographed about 90 percent of that routine. That one part where Nick has the umbrella and says, “Oh, let’s do this trick…” With the umbrella behind his back and he drops it? Nope. That was my trick.

AE: Oh, you definitely didn’t get credit for that.
MZ: No. Story of my life on that show. … I don’t know … there’s a lot I want to say, but I’ll wait until my tell-all book. I’m happy I did it, I’ve been bashing on the negative, but I got a lot of good things out of it. I made great friends, and I grew … up … whatever.

I do feel, and I can say this, out of all of the contestants, I got the short end of the stick. Maybe the way they edited it, they thought it was good TV, but I’m very much a sincere person, and they f*cked me over a lot in the way that they edited things. They put words in my mouth … a lot of stuff wasn’t the way it really happened, and more so with my character. And I never understood that, and I felt really disheartened by a lot of these people I thought were my friends on production that I thought would edit me better, and they didn’t. And that’s just something I have to get over, but …

AE: That sucks. I can only imagine.
MZ: And I’ve heard Jerry say it before: “That guy is not the same guy.” I’m not an asshole. [high-pitched] I’m not an asshole!

AE: OK, Nancy O’Meara: Does she just need to get with the times? You were so secure that you were marketable as a dancer, but she was always saying you were too gay to be marketable.
MZ: I don’t know why she thinks that way or why she took that approach to my dancing. I’m thinking she wouldn’t hire me, but she’s not hiring every job. Maybe the dancers she likes are more hetero-driven, but, I mean, the people who dance behind Britney and Janet are f*cking fags … and even if they’re not fags, they’re masculine guys who have to learn how to dance like that. In the same way when I go to an audition, half the time I fag out, but usually I have to butch it up.

And it’s funny because what caused this whole commotion from episode one was my freestyle. In a freestyle, I can pick my nose onstage for 30 seconds. I wasn’t performing the choreography like a fag, I was performing my freestyle, which is my interpretation of the song. And we were dancing to a Spice Girls song. OK? We were dancing to Spice Girls. How was I not supposed to club out? Hello? … like, idiots…

But I don’t know. I don’t think Vincent and Nancy enjoyed that I was confident about my dancing. They wanted someone to mold … and I don’t know what Nancy’s deal with me was. I’d like to ask her one day, but I don’t know if she’d give me an honest answer.

AE: I don’t know either. It bugged me.
MZ: Girl, it bugged me. Trust.

Miguel (left) & Nancy O'Meara

Photos credit: Bravo / Isabella Vosmikova

AE: Well, that’s funny you’re friends with Nick now. I didn’t know you guys liked each other.
MZ: Me and Nick were really good friends, and they never showed it on-camera. It was like they didn’t want the straight and the gay to co-exist. And since day one, we were always homeys – mad homeys. They only showed me and Janelle on-camera.

AE: I did like you and Janelle together, though.
MZ: Oh, me too. I love Janelle.

Janelle (left) & Nick

AE: I liked when you gave the top four their Sex and The City characters – but is Nick really the Samantha? Or was that just what was left?
MZ: No, he really is. He always has a chick.

AE: Really?
MZ: Yes! He’s cute, girl. He’s not my type, but he’s charismatic as all-f*ck. When you meet him in person, it’s like, panties-down! Some mystical straight power … I don’t know what it is. He’s definitely a male slut.