THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Saturday, September 16, 1995 TAG: 9509150048
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY CHARLISE LYLES, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: ATLANTIC CITY LENGTH: Long : 140 lines
THERE SHE IS . . .
Amber Medlin, a fast-moving bright blur in white shorts and an official Miss America Rembrandt toothpaste T-shirt. Yet, you somehow sense that she is cooler, calmer, not offensively effervescent as some beauty queens.
Her makeup and smile have a natural shine, free of that come-on-ask-me-about-my-platform gleam that pageant contestants get in this city where a girl has got to have good mascara.
Maybe, you figure, it's because she got her Miss Virginia crown secondhand, after winner Andrea Ballengee of Newport News was dethroned for falsifying academic credentials. That sort of thing could keep a contestant real cool.
But if Virginia's brown-eyed entry at this annual altar of beauty had the time to stop, she would tell you that she resists the plastic pageant persona that can possess a girl the minute she crosses the casino city line.
``I don't want to get caught up in the sticky hairdo. You can, though, because you can't think. You have to smile all the time,'' says Medlin, a hairspray-free, bobbed brunette with a cute mole near her chin - it's airbrushed out of pageant publicity photos.
``But there's one person who totally motivated me to be myself and not fall into that false image, and to remember who I am.''
That was Cullen Johnson, Medlin's former classmate at Cox High School in Virginia Beach. She was last year's runner up to Miss America, Medlin would explain, if she could stop. But there she goes. . . .
She and 49 of the other finest lasses in the land must prepare for tonight's pageant at 9 on WAVY TV-10. The 75th anniversary performance, produced and directed by Jeff Margolis - he practices on the Oscars - promises to be an unprecedented three-hour spectacle.
The official Miss America ``hostesses'' close in on Medlin. They are older women who dress like, well, beauty contestants, many in mini dresses and high heels, pageant would-have-beens.
Beneath Clairol-controlled coifs, some are as tough as bouncers, but with a touch of gentility. They will take her now.
Through the Atlantic City Convention Center's official Miss America indoor parking lot, out to the boardwalk and into a swirl of reporters and photographers, Medlin disappears along with Miss Alaska, Miss Kansas, Miss North Dakota.
This time it's for a Parker Bros. Monopoly game spot, one of a zillion the contestants will do this week, promoting everything from toothpaste to Konica cameras.
``I have to go because Virginia Avenue is on the game board,'' Medlin explains apologetically.
There she is . . . elusive Amber out on the sunny boardwalk, by the sea, in the shadow of that tacky Trump Plaza, playing Monopoly.
The card she draws: ``Beauty Contest, second prize, collect $10.'' ``Seems I always get that, huh. Second prize,'' she laughs to Kimberly Cooley, Miss North Dakota.
If not for the stern-faced, somewhat moody cop positioned in front of her, Medlin might tell you: ``No one has made me feel that I'm less than anyone else because of what happened. But they do want to ask questions about what went on.'' Earlier this week at pageant rehearsals, the ladies were almost as sequestered as the O.J. Simpson jury, and surrounded by almost as much controversy.
Virginia notwithstanding, Maryland, Delaware and Massachusetts had sore losers who demanded recounts. Linda Yueh, expelled as Maryland's first runner-up, even attempted a court injunction to stop tonight's pageant.
Miss America. Who is she? What is she? Why does Amber Medlin or anybody wannabe?
The major motivator is not the crown but cash - a $40,000 scholarship. To emphasize beauty and brains, this year's pageant is subtitled ``A Scholarship Program.''
But how can Miss All be decent and of high virtue? She has to parade in a swimsuit in a palace sandwiched between Trump towers of titillation, across a narrow street from the go-go Playground Lounge.
For Medlin, who entered her first pageant at age 10, it all has meaning. In the pageant's official swimsuit poll, she was among the 84 percent of contestants who voted to keep the competition.
There she goes, hostess by her side, whisked away to swimsuit rehearsal. ``Maybe she'll have time for an interview tomorrow,'' her hostess sort of promises.
Medlin reappears, not in swimsuit but in a T-shirt promoting General Foods International Coffees.
The stage, as wide as a city block, looks out on a cavernous coliseum with rows and rows of seats that tilt sideways toward the coveted runway, supposedly for better viewing. It gives the feeling that you're not quite on solid ground.
From a far right corner (that's where you should see her on the TV screen), Medlin struts, perky but not prissy. She stops sharp on the cusp of the highly polished, though slightly scuffed, runway. TV cameras occupy half its length.
Before them, she strikes the eternal Miss America stance, one foot on forward diagonal, the other at a right angle. Behind her, stage lighting glimmers from green to aqua to magenta to lavender like a giant, electronic mood ring.
Officials don't give out contestants' measurements any more. But Medlin began exercising her slender, medium-height frame three years ago when she got serious about the Miss America title.
``It's tradition,'' she would say. ``Plus, it only counts for 15 percent, but the public doesn't understand that.''
If she had time, Medlin would tell you that it's the interview with judges that really counts.
``I got up at 4 a.m. just so my mind would be clear for it,'' she would say.
She told the judges about her Christian background and her Special Olympics platform.
And they asked her about Virginia's losing a proposed Disney theme park.
``I told them it would've been wonderful for economic development in the state and a big plus for tourism. And I was telling them about how this Disney character came up to our table and he was writing messages to the others like `What is your state flower?' And when he got to me, he wrote, `Ha, Ha. No Disneyland.' ''
And Medlin would tell you that the talent competition, in which she'll play a Chopin Polonaise, Opus 53, A flat, is definitely more important than swimsuits.
A 15-minute break whisks her away again. But it ends early. Forty-nine others fan out over the steps and wings, never touching that runway. Medlin's stillness makes her easy to identify.
Music pipes up: ``Under the Boardwalk.'' They turn and twist, doing a bouncy hip swivel. When the music dies, they grow restless and chatty.
``Smile and be cute. That's easy for all of you,'' snaps an annoyed producer who has worked the girls through the dance routine.
On stage, Medlin slips comfortably inside a rickshaw, a prop in tonight's show. It looks like a giant white baby bassinet. Just for a moment, days of Disneyland, nights at restaurants like Planet Hollywood and hospital charity balls stop whirling in her head.
There she is, eyes closed and smiling, perfectly contented to be Miss Amber Medlin. ILLUSTRATION: MPOZI TOLBERT PHOTOS
Amber Medlin of Virginia Beach will represent the state tonight in
the Miss American pageant.
BEGINNINGS: Amber, top, at age 2 with brother Brad, 6 months, in
1974; and bottom, showing her winning smile in the sixth grade.
Amber, right, practices with Miss Illinois Tracy Hayes and a dancer
for tonight's TV show.
by CNB