Interview with "The Real World"’s Derek Chavez

The most noteworthy thing about having a gay man on MTV’s The Real World is that it is no longer the least bit newsworthy. In fact, it hasn’t been for quite some time as three of the last five seasons have included a gay man (as well as bisexual women, lesbians and the show’s first transgendered housemate last season).

You can add The Real World: Cancun to that list of gay-inclusive seasons as last night’s premiere introduced viewers to twenty-one-year old Derek Chavez from Loving, New Mexico.

After graduating as valedictorian from his high school, Derek headed to Phoenix to earn a degree in Kinesiology (the science of human movement) with the ultimate goal of becoming a physician’s assistant. While Derek is currently single and happy about it, he did date a couple of guys during his time in Mexico. Then there was that ex-boyfriend who crashed his twenty-first birthday party.

Derek recently took time out of finishing his studies to talk with AfterElton.com about growing up gay in a small town, why he wanted to be on The Real World, what he looks for in a guy and more!

AfterElton: Your bio says you're from Loving, NM. If I looked up the right place, it's really small.
Derek Chavez: Very, very small.

AE: What was it like growing up there?
DC: It was alright. When it's all you're used to when you're little, that's you're hometown. You make the best of what you have. I had fun. I hung out with my friends and let the time go by. You just live your life. I just knew I wasn't meant to be there forever, so as soon as I graduated, I was gone.

AE: What made you want to go on the show?
DC: It's something that I've always wanted. My friends have always been like, "Oh, you'd be perfect for that show!" My freshman year there was an audition for Season 20. Me and my friends decided to do it and see if one of us could get on, but then I got really sick and had to miss the audition. So I thought it was never going to happen again.

But then the Cancun audition came up and my roommate Amber had gotten this invitation saying, "You and a guest can skip the line for the audition and go straight into the first interview."

She said, "You need to come with me!" Guess what? I was sick again. But I knew I couldn't let it go this time. This opportunity isn't going to come that often, so I went. I thought I had strep throat, so I didn't sound like me at all. I sounded really, really bad, like I had a frog in my throat. We went down there and I was just myself, and I made it.

AE: They had to know you really wanted it if you showed up so sick.
DC: Exactly. The thing about it is, you could tell a lot of people really wanted it, but they tried way too hard. I was myself. They asked about a misconception about myself, and I said, "Oh, I'm Hispanic so people automatically assume I speak Spanish, but I'm the whitest Mexican you'll ever meet. I understand some words, but I don't know how to speak it. I barely passed Spanish in high school. That's how bad it is." I made them laugh.

Then they get into this huge debate and everybody gets in this huge argument over the questions they ask, and the only thing I said, because my throat started to really hurt and I couldn't talk anymore, was they talked about politics, and when it came to me, I said, "I'm gay. I'm voting for Obama."