CHARLIE HERSCHEL GAY SINGLE NYC LAWYER ON SURVIVOR GABON AND ONLINE BUDDY CLAY HAIKEN

29 year old Charlie Herschel, who makes his reality-TV debut on Survivor: Gabon tonight, thursday, September 25th on CBS, was a confidant of Clay Aiken’s before Aiken decided to come out of the closet this week.

It’s a big week for Charlie Herschel. Forty-eight hours before his big debut on the 17th season of Survivor, the 29-year-old New York–based corporate lawyer is finding out with the rest of the world that his online chat buddy of two years, American Idol runner-up Clay Aiken, has announced on the cover of People that he’s gay. The two started chatting on social networking site.

You’re friends with someone who knows a bit about what it’s like to be in the spotlight of the gay community: Clay Aiken.

Well, he’s not a close friend of mine. We’ve only hung out, like, twice. I fell out of touch with him for a little while, but there was a point when I was in law school that I was on IM almost every day, so we used to IM almost every day. But we haven’t spoken since I got back from Africa, so he doesn’t even know I was on Survivor. But there was a point, up through when I left for Survivor, where we were in pretty close contact.



Reality shows have been criticized in the past for casting the token gay character. Did you have any worries about that?

On Survivor, a lot have romantic interests out there and that distracts them from winning the game. I knew I was never going to be tempted out there because I was going to be the only gay person, so if anything, I knew it was just going to help my game. But it does add a little bit of stress being the only gay character and knowing you’re going to be representing that demographic.

read the full interview on The Advocate

Comments

[Anthony]

wow, hes like, really goodlooking... Damn Clay Aiken!

[Lester Bisibisera]

I watched the show all the way. You just did it. Looking great and fantastic