Paula Deen’s husband wins Hemingway contest
62 year old wins on his tenth attempt
“I think everybody here really has to pay their dues and I did.” Michael Groover,
2018 Hemingway Look-Alike Contest winner
After nine previous tries, the husband of celebrity chef Paula Deen has won the Hemingway Look-Alike Contest held in the city where writer Ernest Hemingway lived and wrote during the 1930s.
Michael Groover won the contest held on Saturday at Sloppy Joe’s Bar, which is where the author often relaxed with friends, The Associated Press reported. Deen applauded the victory of her 62-year-old husband, who is a harbor pilot from Savannah.
“I think everybody here really has to pay their dues and I did,” Groover said, according to WTVJ-Ch. 6.
The contest was held on the 119th anniversary of Hemingway’s birth and is a highlight of the annual Hemingway Days celebration.
Contestants are judged by grooming — is the white beard expressive enough? — but, more important, personality. Look-alikes must do anything to curry favor with the judges, who are themselves former lookalike winners: sing, read poetry, shadowbox in fighting trunks. At no point would this fraternal order of hirsute Hemingways ever admit the irony that the real author was never old and bearded in 1930s Key West. He was a young and strapping brunet with a mustache and a clean-shaven chin.
Judged by former winners, the contest attracted 151 entrants. Semifinalists included entrants from Australia, Norway and Ontario, Canada.
Groover, who had entered the contest nine times, said he shares Hemingway’s love of fishing and hunting, and has written a book, “My Delicious Life with Paula Deen.”