Thursday, September 02, 2004
Copyright © Las Vegas Review-Journal

Longtime Las Vegan finds role on reality show

Kevan is one of the city people on UPN's 'Amish in the City'

Kevan, a former Las Vegas resident, is one of the participants in "Amish in the City." THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Cast members of UPN's new reality series, "Amish in the City," from left, Jonas, Miriam, Randy, Ruth and Mose pose in this undated promotional photo for the series. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Cast members of "Amish in the City" include, from left, Reese, Nick, Whitney, Ariel, Kevan, Meagan, Randy, Ruth, Mose, Miriam and Jonas. THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

"Amish in the City" puts five Amish and six city people, all in their early 20s, together in a house in the Hollywood Hills.

It's a situation ripe for misunderstandings and conflict, and a different take on the typical reality TV concept of tossing together different personalities and watching the fireworks.

But from the first moment of taping the UPN show that airs at 8 p.m. Wednesdays on KTUD-TV, Channel 25, it was the city kids who got the big surprise, says Kevan, a 22-year-old salesman for a payroll company who lived 15 years in Las Vegas and is a graduate of Cimarron-Memorial High School and the University of Nevada, Reno.

"We'd been told there would be a house with people with diverse backgrounds," says Kevan (UPN does not release the last names of reality show participants). "But we didn't know it would be as extreme as the Amish. When we opened the door (in the first episode) we got thrown for a loop."

Kevan found himself getting along better with the Amish -- Jonas, a construction worker from Iowa; Miriam, a waitress and hotel maid from Ohio; Mose, a construction worker and former teacher from Wisconsin; Randy, a construction worker from Indiana; and Ruth, a factory worker from Ohio -- than his fellow city participants -- Ariel, a waitress from Los Angeles; Meagan, a freelance fashion stylist from Chicago; Nick, a busboy and musician from Boston; Reese, a club promoter in Hollywood; and Whitney, a college student in Los Angeles.

"The producers were looking for a wide range of people who would represent, to the extreme, every walk of life in America," says Kevan, who has a degree in business from UNR. "I learned a lot from the show. It was really eye-opening that someone your age had never seen an escalator or been on an airplane. I saw those things through their eyes."

Kevan (pronounced Kay-von) figures he was chosen for the show partly because he comes from a household of differences -- his father, a pit boss at The Mirage, is of Persian descent, while his mother is a Presbyterian from California.

But he found the Amish, supposedly totally protected from the technological modern world, were "a little more with-it than we'd thought they'd be," Kevan says. "There were some things they'd known about. Some had seen a rock concert, but not seen a parking meter."

Kevan says he got involved with the hit show by accident.

He was hanging out on the beach and working at his sales job when the show's casting director saw him and told him he should try out for the show. After nine extensive interviews, he found out he had a job when a producer asked him, "What are you going to wear on the first day on the show?"

Since the show began airing, Kevan has been getting his share of attention from viewers who spot him around Los Angeles. "It's kind of fun," Kevan says. "I don't act like Mr. Big Celebrity, because I'm not."

Kevan says he knows the "life-span of a person on a reality show" is short. But he liked the experience of taping the show for 2 1/2 months.

"Other people are getting a reality check of seeing themselves on the show," Kevan says.

Each episode is 44 minutes long, but actually is a condensation of a week's worth of shooting, Kevan says. "People like train wrecks. So the producers pick the stuff that's going to make headlines. There's nothing I did on the show that I'm too ashamed of. I just chalk it up and say, `That's what I was thinking at the time.' "