It’s been a heck of a ride for Jonny McGovern. He gained a buzz in his early days in the clubs in New York City before becoming a viral sensation in 2003 with the video Soccer Practice. Now he divides his time between his Gay Pimp podcasts, albums, stand up shows, and to being a headline player on LOGO’s Big Gay Sketch Show.
McGovern’s alter-ego, The Gay Pimp, was the launching pad for much of his success, ironically because of rapper Eminem.
”I had been doing a series of midnight musicals in the east village with a bunch of other artists down there, we were putting on these retarded late night musicals. At the same time Eminem started picking on the homos. I remember thinking that lots of people didn’t seem to think it was that bad that he was calling us fags and things like that. So the thing I could do as a comedian was to do my own super rock musical. That was my own way of protesting.”
The Wrong Fag to Fuck With: The Gay Pimp vs. Eminem was born.
“Gay Pimp was a pop star who confronts Eminem at the MTV music awards. You can imagine how it ended; Eminem got fucked in the ass and gay teens were set free forever. The songs I was performing were also really popular and it was fun for me to dabble in music. In high school I imagined that I would be an R&B singer and be taken very seriously. As I grew up I realized that, as a 6’4” white homo, that probably wasn’t going to happen. Suddenly all my music came in, I was performing them around town and DJ’s started picking them up. I could see that something was on a roll.”
We caught up with McGovern on the phone while rehearsing for the third season of The Big Gay Sketch Show. The fun thing about his music is that it is incredibly catchy (check out the video for Somethin’ For the Fellas (That Like the Fellas) and try to get it out of your head, I dare you!) but also hysterically funny.
“I am a comedian before anything, it is not like I am going to sing serious ballads. There will always be a joke or a wink in the material. I usually start with some funny concept and start building a track around it. So the comedy always comes first.”
For an independent gay artist, the viral world is a great asset. McGovern’s music videos can be found on YouTube and he also hosts a podcast.
“It was the key to it, and continues to be so. Even though I am on the Big Gay Sketch Show now, the internet was how I was discovered in the first place. When I did the video for Soccer Practice that was before there was even YouTube. People were just trading that back and fourth to each other. Had that happened today I would have had an easier route to riches. There are a lot more ways for people to make money from their content that is online than there was even five years ago. It allowed me to build on that. My podcast, my web series Three Dollar Bill are both on the internet and doing very well. It is key for me to be able to continue to release things without any rules or someone corporate telling me what I can do. As a gay artist that is extremely important.”
Of course, his videos are chock full of incredibly good-looking, scantily clad men. Poor Jonny McGovern has to be surrounded by cute boys all day. While it may seem glamorous, he testifies that it is still a lot of work.
”The hanging out with cute guys is very fun. As an independent artist, putting together a video is a long and arduous process. I usually am co-directing and producing the video with a crew on a non-existent budget to look like it is a very high budget. There is a lot of pretend glamour going on and pulling in favors from everyone you can. Luckily all the homos that roll in our crew are in the entertainment industry and can lend a hand that way. It is a lot of shuffling, shucking, and jiving to try and get people to show up on time and look like it magically happened, like it would for Janet Jackson. Janet Jackson doesn’t have to call people up and remind them to come to the shoot.”
Drag and Trans artists are a big influence on McGovern, whose videos include Linda James, Ericka Toure Aviance, and Maxinne Innis. While McGovern’s own drag is purely comedic, he does respect the art form.
“I keep my own personal drag for comedy only, because I know I make one ugly woman. I certainly love the art of doing drag. In my videos drag queens are everywhere because in my life drag queens are everywhere. Working in nightlife in New York City I have met and seen some amazing drag queens like Kevin Aviance, Sweetie and the girls I work with - Coco, Ericka and Linda James, who is my co-host on the podcast. I think it is an art form that sometimes is not treated as such. There is so much creativity. It is great to see RuPaul’s Drag Race showing all the different things it takes to be a drag queen and shedding light on that. Even the clothes, most of the queens are wearing outfits created by them. There is a lot of craft and ingenuity in just the clothes that are made for shows, let alone the nuances of performance. It is something I don’t look too beautiful in but I can appreciate the art in all the queens around the world.”
While most of the songs are upbeat, fast paced club mixes, McGovern did channel his inner R&B singer for Don’t Fall In Love With A Homo (A Song For The Ladies), which describes what many a gay boy has gone through with his girlfriend(s).
“I found that over the years, no matter how gay the material, even if I sang a song called ‘hey ladies I like to fuck guys in the butt’ I would get a girl or two who would have inappropriate questions of me. The girl who used to direct all of my one-man shows around New York had a crush on me. It became a long-standing joke, I would just tell her, girl there is no way you can’t fall in love with a homo, you gotta find a real man. Obviously that is something that happens to everybody. When I was putting together Gays Gone Wild we wanted to end the record with a big 70’s style ballad. If you are going to talk to the ladies you have to talk to them in a really smooth way to get your message across. We sat down and the lyrics flowed because it came from a very true place. Whenever I perform the song live, the girls get really into it and their homos say ‘yes! This one right over here!’ I always know in a room full of a straight audience I can get half the crowd on my side because the ladies can relate to that song.”
McGovern has gained huge exposure for his projects as part of the hilarious Big Gay Sketch Show. The show is entering its third season on Logo and is spearheaded by two early lesbian activists – director Amanda Bearse (Married with Children) and producer Rosie O’Donnell.
“It is pretty amazing. Rosie was very involved early on in the process; she picked us in the auditions. When we taped the pilot she was there every step of the way to help us figure out the tone and she visited the set quite a bit. During the second season she appeared at the end of each episode like Waldorf and Statler in the Muppets. With her being someone I watched on TV it was amazing to chat with her and have her know my name. When she was doing The View we used to get a lot of inside dirt. She would come directly from The View set to our set and we heard stories, which was a lot of fun. Amanda is our director, so every season we are working hand in hand with her. We have gotten to know her really well. She is a great lady. Being one of the first, visible out lesbians in Hollywood when I was growing up, it is amazing to get to work with her.”
The show has experienced its growing pains but has evolved into a very entertaining television spot.
“The first season everyone was testing the waters to see how LOGO wanted us to do the show. In season two is where we really hit our stride, they really gave us a lot more freedom and it got a lot funnier and dirtier. This season is going to be even better; it is extremely edgy, topical material and our funniest one yet,” said McGovern, before going on to recall some of his favorite characters. “I really enjoyed the Logo Life Tips characters, although they were never brought back for season 2 or 3. One of my favorite characters is Tranny Chocolate Puddin’, who was in the first season in Tranny 911 and in season 2 So You Think You’re Smarter Than a Tranny Hooker. That is a character I used to do in my one man show Dirty Stuff, and in my podcast, it is a character I have done for so long it is great to bring out. This season I get to play Karl Lagerfeld, which is a lot of fun.”
It is remarkable to think that we live in an era where there are TV stations dedicated to gay content. McGovern is happy to be breaking ground and have the opportunity to influence gay youth.
“The network is doing well but there are so few doing extremely gay material, it is still a struggle to get past what someone thinks. They ghettoize you as ‘too gay.’ I am certainly glad to be on LOGO because what better place for me to do gay comedy? It is great that there is a place for it but it still needs to be branched out more. Now kids have role models and pictures of gay life that aren’t what we had. I remember looking on TV for any kind of gay person when I was in High School and only found Blanche’s brother on Golden Girls. That was not something that made me feel like, yeah I’m great, I’m gay - I can be like Blanche’s lonely older brother! Now there is a lot more different points of view for people to see. When the Soccer Practice video came out all those years ago I got an overwhelming amount of E-mail from gay teenagers who had never seen something that was gay, tough and cool, and they thanked me for it. There is a lot more of that now. When I did that video the idea of an independent gay artist doing a video that might get on MTV or VH1 was unheard of. Now everywhere I go in the East Village somebody is shooting a video, and there is the LOGO clicklist. We still have awhile to go but thank goodness we’ve made some strides.”
It is great to see a talented, openly gay man having such success. McGovern is thankful for what he has achieved so far, but at 33 years old, he feels he still has lots to accomplish.
”I am grateful to have been able to find my way as an artist from obscure theatres on the lower east side, to be able to be in videos that were seen on MTV in Europe and Asia, toured the world and been on LOGO. I am still growing and trying to figure out myself. Every year I ask, what am I going to do new? What will be interesting for me? How do I evolve? If you don’t evolve it gets boring. Especially as a gay independent artist you have to love what you are doing, so you have to know yourself and what you are going to do and if it will make you happy. I just want to get bigger and better. I’m on LOGO, let’s go and get a Jonny McGovern show on primetime!”
