MTV’s cringe-inducing, bisexual dating show, “Shot at Love with Tila Tequila,” has created an unlikely star – Dani Campbell, a lesbian firefighter from Florida.
The 29-year-old has even created a new word to describe her style, “futch” (pronounced “footch”).
Neither feminine nor butch, she says she’s somewhere in between, and created the mashed-up word to get her point across.
And it’s caught on with fans.
Campbell is even designing a clothing line, called Futch.
“In today’s world it’s just a way for people to identify themselves,” Campbell says of the label she uses to describe her sexuality. “Society still seems to need that for some reason.”
This week, fans of the bizarre dating show discovered that Campbell is in the final two, vying for the affections of Internet star and glamour girl Tila Tequila (whose real name is Tila Nguyen), 26. Campbell’s rival is a guy, Bobby Banhart, 25, from Worcester, NY. The finale of “Shot” airs Dec. 18.
But win or lose, Campbell is the show’s breakout star. And she did it by avoiding the typical traps of reality TV. Instead of being wild and attention-hungry, she has come across as down-to-earth, open-minded and funny.
“I’m not ever going to get ahead by trying to make somebody else look bad,” she says. “There’s no reason to have to belittle somebody just because you’re competing against them.”
A mark of her popularity is Campbell’s Myspace page, which has grown from 200 “friends” to more than 30,000 since “Shot” debuted last month.
“Maybe it is because she’s a firefighter, maybe it is her amazingly cute face or her toned and fit firefighting body,” comedian Margaret Cho wrote on her blog recently trying to describe Campbell’s appeal.
“Who knows? Dani’s adorable, and I ain’t afraid to say so.
“I also like her sincere butch ways. I don’t know who Tila’s going to pick but if I were her, I would totally go for Dani,” Cho wrote.
Campbell’s notoriety is even rubbing off on her firefighting colleagues, who seem to be enjoying their brush with fame.
“People are hounding them to get to me,” she says. “It’s amazing, I thought I was going to get a lot more s- -t from them for being on the show, but they’re 100 percent behind me.”
Her projected clothing line – which will look sort of like men’s clothing but in smaller sizes – began as just a couple of “Team Dani” T-shirts she offered for sale online, she says.
Last night she was working fast to get her first Futch shirt up for sale online.