In March of 2007, AOL Style Blog interviewed Cycle 6 winner Dani Evans two years following her win and appearance on the show. Here is the text from the interview (written and posted by AOL Style Blog Staff):
Tyra Banks’ Protegee Distancing Herself From ANTM
“I wanna separate myself from ‘America’s Next Top Model,'” season 6 winner Danielle Evans said as stylists prepared her for her Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week debut on Feb. 2, 2007. “No disrespect to anybody,” the Arkansas import interjected, careful to note her effort to carve out an identity outside of ANTM is nothing personal against show creator Tyra Banks.
“I called Tyra actually a couple of days ago just to check in with her and see how things are going,” Evans explains.
For Evans, this distance is necessary to establishing a real career as a model — a reality she says wasn’t conveyed on the show. “On the show it’s so dramatic and it’s so overly played and it’s so different than what it is in real life. Now that I’m in the industry I’m finding out what a real model is about,” Evans continues, no doubt referencing the show’s gimmicky challenges and the pressure of the contest dynamic. Real modeling, Evans, 21 says she is learning, is made up of “regular, normal, calm day[s].”
The only challenge she’s facing right now is proving that she isn’t a gimmick. “In a sense the real world feels like the obstacles that we went through on the show were set up for us to go through,” Evans says, but she’s ready to topple these perceptions.
“I wanna prove myself to the designers and everybody in the industry that I am cut out for this,” she says through a mist of hairspray, a hairstylist elevating her hair in a pompadour for Kimora Lee Simmons’ urban-empress-themed Baby Phat and KLS show. “I can be a legitimate model so book me for the shows, book me for your photo shoots, book me for your editorials.”
To learn more about Cycle 6 winner Dani Evans, visit her bio page here.
Source: Television Without Pity
Photo: CW / Jim De Yonker
