"Tyra and I, whether it was in L.A. at her house or my house in New York, would lie on the bed and dream up ideas. I was always taking her lead, and quite genuinely, when she started the show, she really did want to find the next top model. And she really did want everything rooted in something she had done. We would come up with an idea and then she would say to me, "And you do you.""
"By season three, the show had become a thing, but I still felt like there was a level of integrity to what we were doing. At that time we were bringing in sponsors for the shoots and it was my job to work with product integration. Season three was the introduction of CoverGirl. People make the assumption that, "Well, Tyra was a CoverGirl, so of course CoverGirl came on board." But we had to go through a formal pitch process that Tyra was not involved with."
"Then there was the famous race-swapping shoot. I remember my heart dropping out. I was like, "There's no way I can do this." Because of my last name, people think I'm Spanish. I'm actually biracial and my parents are from South Africa and grew up under apartheid. I remember calling my mom and saying, "I don't want to do this shoot. How can we put someone in blackface?""
Early production involved close creative collaboration with Tyra and personal freedom on shoots, with an emphasis on finding and authentically presenting models. By season three the role expanded to include sponsor integration, and CoverGirl joined after a formal pitch process. By cycle four the production environment changed to larger meetings and top-down directives. A race-swapping shoot forced participation in a concept that felt racially insensitive, prompting moral conflict due to biracial heritage and family ties to apartheid-era South Africa. Requests to be excused were denied, and contractual obligations constrained the ability to refuse participation.
Read at Queerty
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