An interview with Lynn and Alex of "The Amazing Race"
Shana Naomi Krochmal
Lynn Warren, 30, and Alex Ali, 22, may have come in fifth place on this season of CBS's around-the-world adventure reality show "The Amazing Race," but the couple will definitely go down in the show's hall of fame for quick wit and bad car luck. Just after their last episode aired, the West Hollywood-based pair phoned in an interview with PlanetOut.
I hope you haven't been feeling too much like the token gay guys, because this is totally going to be the token gay interview.
Alex: We love our token gay things.
Excellent. So how was it being the token gay guys?
Lynn: There was also Patrick, so we weren't the only gay guys, but we were the token gay couple. And we loved it. We knew that they hadn't had a gay couple in two seasons, and we were excited to be a different version.
Alex: Absolutely. We're proud of our relationship, and we were proud to show it to America.
CBS has had a pretty diverse group of gay people from one show to another. What was different about you?
Lynn: We're a little kooky. We're a little crazier than ["Amazing Race 5" winners] Chip and Reichen. We knew we weren't breaking the gay stereotype. But we knew that we would stand out as a team.
Alex: I think we kept the race light and were good competitors at the same time. We brought an element of humor to the race that I think a lot of the gay teams don't.
Lynn: A lot of the teams in general don't.
Alex: They're just so focused on the money. Lynn and I knew only one team was going to be millionaires. So why not have fun while we did it?
Was anyone you know who saw the show surprised you were gay?
Lynn: No person in the world would be surprised that we're gay.
Alex: My dad didn't know I was gay before we did the race. Lynn and I have been in a relationship for four years. We share the same house. He would come over and visit us, and there would be one bed. All the rest of my family knew, we just didn't tell my dad. He's Egyptian, from a different culture. I knew by going on the race I would have to tell him.
Lynn: I think his father knew before Alex told him.
So how'd it go?
Alex: It's a little rocky, but we'll work through it.
Lynn: Every day it gets better.
You guys met at a bar. That's like winning the gay lottery.
Lynn: It really is one in a million. It was so funny that it worked out so well. I mean, I knew as soon as I met Alex that we were going to be together. Unfortunately, he didn't know it at that point.
Alex: And I was like: Wow, this guy's real clingy.
Lynn: I just knew. And here we are four years later, happily married and having a great life.
There wasn't a lot of PDA shown on camera. Were you kissing and it got cut out?
Lynn: No, CBS was very good at editing it so it was reflective of how we are in life. We're not big on PDA -- not because I'm ashamed or because I'm embarrassed, but that's just not who we are really.
Alex: Lynn and I hug and we hold each other when we're walking. But when you're racing, "Am I kissing you enough on camera?" is the last thing on your mind.
Was there any culture shock in other countries about your sexuality?
Alex: In South Africa, gays can get married. In Australia, they're trying to create a gay nation. In India, men can be very affectionate toward each other and it's OK, because there's a fine line, almost a blurred line, between "Are they gay?" and "Are they just best friends?"
Lynn and I thought that was really interesting -- so interesting that we thought we would pitch a documentary about gay life in other cultures. While America's so preoccupied with labels, these countries aren't, and yet it still exists on a different level.
Lynn: But during the race we didn't feel uncomfortable.
Alex: Yeah, in India I could kiss Lynn and it would be OK.
If you'd had to do the race with someone else, who would you each have picked?
Lynn: My friend Stacy. We've traveled in the past to Thailand and to Europe. I don't know if we would have done any better than Alex and I did. I think the dynamic would have been different, absolutely.
Alex: I would have chosen my other boyfriend.
Lynn: [Laughs.]
They should make a threesome team!
Alex: A threesome team! I'm going through the list of everyone now. After running the race, I realize that I would have only done that race with Lynn.
Lynn: That's such a better answer than mine!
Alex: That is a better answer. Because Lynn kept the race light, and when I imagine doing it with anybody else, I can see them just focusing on the negative, then me focusing on the negative, then us being the first off.
Lynn: Alex is just a bit of a negative Nancy. Just a bit.
Alex: So Lynn's my cheerleader. He wears the little outfit and everything.
My favorite of all the funny lines you guys had was the one about how much you missed your Kiehl's. Have they called and offered to send you supplies?
Lynn: I actually worked as a producer on a show for Style Network called "Modern Girl's Guide to Life," and the Kiehl's PR person let me go to the store and pick out one of everything. I would love to do that again. It was like a religious experience for me, it was so beautiful.
Alex: Lynn was dying.
Lynn: They haven't called me yet, but I would love to work with them again in that capacity.
Alex: The funny thing is that on the race, you can't be anybody but yourself. People thought that we had thought of all these one-liners, wrote them down and said them during the race randomly. But that's just Lynn and me. That's just us in a situation trying to make the best of it.
Lynn: We're just clever, witty gay guys. I mean, "Amberexia"? That just came out of my mouth, no forethought whatever.
It will be one of the great lasting gifts to "The Amazing Race." Imagine that in your post-race celebrity you are faced with several endorsement dilemmas: Which would you choose, Absolut or Kiehl's?
Alex: I would go for Kiehl's. We're not big drinkers.
Lynn: Plus, Kiehl's makes you look younger and Absolut makes you look older.
Good point. Gatorade or Hummer?
Alex: Hummer!
Lynn: Hummer! I love Hummers. In every sense of the word.
Alex: I would say a Land Rover -- I think a really funny commercial would be us in a Land Rover, and it's always breaking down. And then us magically fixing it. We went through three of them!
If a friend was going to do some adventure traveling, what advice would you give them?
Lynn: Number one is, focus on the positive -- it's harder to see than the negative things in life.
Alex: And I would say number two is learn just little words of the language. I mean, Lynn butchered Spanish, but we did learn how to say "hurry" in Hindi. Every time we would go to a new country, we would try to ask them to give us a few key words.
Lynn: And another tip is to learn the currency exchange. I think these cab drivers make half their income on people overpaying.
You're very good at speaking for each other. What don't you agree on?
Alex: We don't agree on how to raise our kids.
Lynn: We're planning to adopt.
Alex: Lynn wants to send her to boarding school!
Lynn: Not for her whole education. I just think it's a good opportunity -- but we're not going to get into that whole thing. But yes, we sometimes disagree on raising children. We have slightly different political views. We don't have big points we disagree on.
Alex: All the things we disagree on are so trivial.
Lynn: Raising a kid is not trivial!
Alex: But you could work through that. By the time we get a little girl, she'll raise herself, it will be so different.
Lynn: We need Rosie O'Donnell to help us raise a child.
Alex: Yeah, she writes about us on her blog. I want to write back and say: "Help me get a child!"
Lynn: We would love to have Rosie help us out. You should put that in there.
Don't you have an agent who can do that for you now?
Alex: Yeah, we should talk to our publicist!
Lynn: We would love to do something like that. We would love to be advocates for adoption.
Alex: We also disagree about what to wear in the morning. We'll both get dressed separately and then we'll look at each other and we'll be twinsy fags.
Lynn: There is nothing worse than a twinsy fag couple.
Alex: And we'll be all, "You change!"
Lynn: We literally had this argument this morning.
So who won?
Alex: I made Lynn change, but I had to find his outfit for him.
Lynn: And I must say, it's great-looking.
You seem well-poised to be funny TV personalities of one type or another. Who's your favorite TV personality?
Lynn: Paris Hilton.
She doesn't count as a TV personality!
Lynn: She's a personality!
But she doesn't talk. I mean a comic, or a host or someone who does a red carpet thing.
Lynn: This is so ridiculous I'm almost embarrassed to say, but I love Joan Rivers.
Alex: I love Joan Rivers, because she says exactly what's on her mind. If she likes it, she likes it. If she doesn't, she doesn't. The only thing I wish she was more of is starstruck.
Lynn: That's what the red carpet lacks. A couple on there, a gay couple named Lynn and Alex, who are starstruck by those celebrities.
Alex: If the people watching at home were meeting those stars, they would ask them different questions, give them different reactions, and I think it needs to go in that direction. With all this reality TV going on, you need reality meeting these stars on the red carpet.
Lynn: Oh, that was good, Alex.
How will you know when you've become a celebrity and you're not normal anymore?
Lynn: When I build a Neverland.
Alex: I would say when I don't want to go outside because I don't want to get noticed. Now it's fun, but it must be really difficult for huge, real stars, and I can understand why now. I sort of get it.
Lynn: We went to the Ivy and the waitress was so excited to meet us. When you're getting noticed at the Ivy, you feel like a big celebrity, because they see real stars there.
http://www.gay.com/entertainment/interview.html?coll=pno_entertainment&sernum=1026&navpath=/channels/entertainment/television&page=1
