Preteen pageants rarely lead to stardom

Parents push hard for fame, but casting directors are looking elsewhere

	Beauty pageant contestant Madison Neill, 8, poses for a portrait in her Glendale, Calif., home. She has won her share of trophies in the last four years in beauty pageant competitions.
Stefano Paltera / AP

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updated 12:28 p.m. ET Sept. 28, 2006

LOS ANGELES - The hotel ballroom was filled with nearly 100 distracted parents, many of them juggling toddlers on their laps. They had just spent a mind-numbing half-hour watching a parade of identically dressed preadolescent girls read cliche-filled advertising copy.

Then tiny Madison Neill took the stage, and the crowd squealed. She wore a bouncy blonde ponytail and a smile that could melt icebergs. She radiated personality. She is also 8 years old — and was participating in the acting competition at one of National American Miss' state-level pageants, the Miss California Junior Pre-Teen.

This kind of attention is not new for Madison. After she placed in the top 10 at several other pageants her parents made a life-changing decision. Last month, they said goodbye to their home in Virginia and moved to Los Angeles, hoping to launch their daughter's entertainment career.

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Think they're crazy? Blame Simon Cowell. Well, sort of.

In our already celebrity-obsessed society, reality television has further fueled the notion that anyone young and ambitious enough can — and should — become a star. "American Idol" and its imitators fill hours of prime-time programming, while tabloid magazines tout the latest ways to infuse your life (and, by implication, yourself) with "celebrity style."

Methods of becoming famous — be they realistic or imagined — surround us these days.

For some families, child beauty pageants represent a potential road to stardom, despite the scorn the pageant industry has endured in the decade since JonBenet Ramsey's death. At that time, the country's attention was focused on the so-called "glitz pageants," in which girls as young as five are dressed in sophisticated (or even sexy) evening gowns and loaded down with heavy cosmetics.

Many of the country's largest pageant companies occupy a different niche: They are scaled-down "natural pageants," which don't allow makeup, teased hair or a swimsuit competition. The winners of these pageants are girl-next-door types — OK, little girl-next-door — rewarded for their outgoing personalities and stage presence.

But while the types of pageants vary widely, there are some common factors: nearly all offer cash prizes and rhinestone tiaras, and many promise that some of their judges will be modeling agents or talent scouts. That proposition can inspire parents to spend thousands of dollars or even move cross-country in hopes that pageants will lead their child to a lucrative performing career.

A "Breaking Into Showbiz" section appears in each issue of Pageantry magazine, which describes itself as "the Bible of the Industry." This month, the magazine offers interviews with "Access Hollywood" co-anchor Nancy O'Dell (who competed in pageants in the 1980s) and actress Lee Meriwether (Miss America 1955).

CONTINUED : 'If you ever move to Chicago, call us'

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