If you happened to catch the “Beauty and the Geek” Season 3 marathon on MTV Saturday, Sept. 16, you might have seen a familiar face. Drew Sawa, the “Trekkie” on the show, lists his hometown as Brookfield, and his family owns Sawa’s Old Warsaw restaurant in Broadview.
The show basically pairs women who rely on their good looks with men who rely on their intellect. And it provides them with several challenges where the “geek” tries to teach the “beauty” to be more scholarly, and the beauty tries to help the geek overcome social awkwardness. The winning pair walks away with $250,000.
Sawa’s team did not win the money, however. Sawa’s Season 3 actually ended its regular schedule on the CW Television Network in February, but was rerun on MTV.
Sawa decided to pursue the opportunity after watching the first season of the show.
“I loved it and thought, ‘I’d be perfect for this show,'” he said.
Although he wanted to participate in season two, he didn’t meet the 21-year-old age cutoff at the time. For season three, he was old enough and sent in an audition tape where he talked of his love of Star Trek, and demonstrated his “glow stick ability”-where he takes fluorescent sticks and moves them around “like a light show.”
He was sent to Los Angeles for a week-long interview process, where he couldn’t leave his hotel room unescorted, so as not to run into the other candidates. Sawa, who had just gotten out of school at Marquette University in Milwaukee, where he was majoring in finance and entrepreneurship, said he didn’t mind the confinement.
“I took a break basically,” he said. “I played video games, and they had HBO and cable. It was fun.”
He said he was “ecstatic” when he found out he was selected for the four-week stint in Los Angeles, although he couldn’t share much information with the people back home.
“We signed a three million dollar contract that we wouldn’t talk, and that was a pretty good incentive.” He joked, “Maybe if someone wanted to give me three million and one dollars..”
Once there, the group had to pair up into teams. Sawa was chosen by Erin Gipson, a voice teacher from Mount Prospect for his answer to the question, “What is your favorite word?” (Sawa said “fantastic”-a word Gipson also likes.)
The teams then got down to work six days a week-sometimes being in front of the cameras for 12-hour days.
“The experience was a huge payback, but it was a lot of work.”
For his participation, he was given a stipend of $500 a week, in addition to having food and housing provided for him.
“It might not sound like a lot of money to people, but I was a student,” Sawa said.
He said one of his favorite challenges included getting a makeover and then being sold as part of a date auction. Sawa said he enjoyed that one because all he had to do was walk down the catwalk. Another favorite was putting together an exercise routine.
“That was the one that I learned the most at, did my best and enjoyed the most,” he said.
Although he didn’t win the money (he and Gipson came in fifth out of eight teams), he says he did walk away with some life lessons.
“I learned more confidence, and I learned about fashion.”
And there were other perks too. He said he keeps in touch with “just about everyone,” that he does get recognized at times and gets more attention from women.
“I’m very happy I participated,” Sawa said. “I’m probably not going to do anything else like it, but I’m glad I got to experience that. It’s definitely an experience to pursue.”
As for being labeled a geek, one of Sawa’s memorable quotes from the show demonstrates that he doesn’t mind: “I consider the word ‘geek’ a compliment. It’s just another word for ‘smart.'”