Confidence helps performer Taurean Everett navigate society’s perceptions of him

Viewed through a certain lens, Taurean Everett’s life is enough to provoke jealousy: He’s strikingly attractive — his chiseled abs get particular attention — and he’s living his dream of performing in New York.

Then there’s the reality: Everett is a gay, Black man in a world where both face discrimination, working in an industry where rejection is the norm.

“Every day is an experience of standing up for myself and really challenging this perception that is placed on me,” said Everett, a Wichita native.

He owns who is he, even sharing his age — 36 — in an industry where you’re not supposed to do that.

“But I am saying that because I am very proud of who I am,” Everett said. “I think that your confidence defies age.”

He was 35 for his second appearance as a model on the hit TV show “Project Runway,” a possibility that a 25-year-old Everett would have laughed at.

Though Everett is comfortable in his own skin, the color of that skin regularly forces him to confront how others feel about him, from suspicious police, to co-workers seizing on stereotypes — white directors and choreographers who ask, “Will you do that but be more Black?”

At six feet and all muscle, Everett can be an imposing presence. He wears a ball cap to avoid the sun, and when he adds a mask due to the pandemic, he said it is “enough to make people cross the street” in fear.

He said he tries to make them feel better for his own safety.

“Hello!” he’ll call out, adding some variation of, “Have a great day!”

Though it’s forced friendliness in this situation, Everett is naturally able to connect with people.

“He’s such a beautiful and open human being,” said Sabrina Vasquez, a senior educator in the dance program at Wichita State University. She taught Everett and remains close friends with him.

Vasquez said it’s Everett’s on-stage vulnerability that speaks to audiences.

“There’s a power to him when he’s on stage that is authentic,” she said.

She said that quality is there even when he’s playing an over-the-top character, as Everett did in his most recent Broadway performance, “The Cher Show.”

“He was a hoot.”

That adrenaline rush

As the second of five sons of Victor and Junetta Everett, the well-known Wichita businesswoman, Taurean Everett was just as athletic as his brothers but realized it wasn’t as important to him.

“Taurean never fit that mold,” said his mother, who named him after an actor from “Hill Street Blues.”

She said her son had beautiful penmanship and was nurturing to everyone, particularly his younger twin brothers, even when he was a mere 3 years old himself.

“Taurean was the one who made sure those boys were taken care of if mom was busy,” Junetta Everett said. “He still is that caring brother.”

Had it not been for allergies, Everett said he might have become a veterinarian.

He grew starry-eyed watching live shows and television.

“I saw myself there.”

Junetta Everett remembers seeing a video of her son singing in “Grease” when he was in sixth grade.

“My mouth flew open,” she said, “My goodness, I didn’t even know he could do that.”

As a freshman in high school, Everett accompanied a friend to her cheer squad tryout and was asked to join himself.

“I developed the taste for performance. . . . I like that feeling of adrenaline rush, and I like that feeling of nervousness and being not 100 percent confident that I can accomplish it.”

No one gave him grief about being a male cheerleader, although the decision was an adjustment for Everett in a way.

“I learned to train my brain to believe that it takes a stronger, more confident sense of self to go against . . . what society says you’re supposed to be doing.”

He cheered for a year at WSU, where he was a dance performance major.

Everett moved to New York at age 24 with the goal of appearing on Broadway. He started making audition rounds.

“That becomes your job.”

He gravitated to shows with dance numbers. He took vocal lessons. To make money, he worked at a gym.

“It led me into this relationship with fitness.”

Everett also did lots of regional theater.

“I kept my eyes wide open and took that time to learn and absorb everything I could.”

What he said he saw was people being confident in what they are, which he calls a constant struggle.

Everett also got used to hearing, “No,” but he has what he called a strong strain of confidence that he got from his mother.

“During all the rejection, it just made my skin thicker.”

Once, Junetta Everett chartered a bus to take relatives from Kansas to Dallas to see Taurean in “Priscilla Queen of Dessert.” Some of the relatives were disturbed at the premise of the production, which features drag queens.

Taurean Everett said his parents have always been supportive, though.

“I cannot recall a performance of mine that they ever missed, even if they didn’t understand it.”

On Broadway

In 2014, Everett landed his first Broadway show, “Mamma Mia!”

“Broadway presented new challenges,” he said. “OK, I have to get a second show now to prove this is legit.”

Then after the second show, “Miss Saigon,” Everett decided he needed a third.

“That’s the wax seal that said, ‘You’re legit.’ ”

Still, he said, “My dreams didn’t end with the Broadway show. Now it’s I want to live and continue to revel in this space I fought so hard for.”

The pandemic put a hold on that, but it’s not entirely a bad thing.

Pre-pandemic life was “hustling so hard and trying to get the next thing and trying to get things lined up and figuring out how am I going to make this work?” Everett said.

The pandemic has given him time to sleep and visit family. After so much rest, he said he’s finally getting some new creative energy.

Everett teaches schoolchildren through the Inside Broadway program, which for now is online. He said it’s gratifying to teach children of color and show them what’s possible.

“You can’t be what you can’t see.”

Everett also is heavily involved in the Black Lives Matter movement through an accountability group he’s part of.

“He is very involved in making sure that the hard conversations are still being held, not just with his friends but anybody who will listen,” his mother said.

Everett’s dreams include animating for Marvel, choreographing music videos for girl group trios and even appearing in Times Square for a Calvin Klein underwear ad.

“Creativity doesn’t have a shelf life.”

A career highlight came when Everett was one of six shirtless men carrying actor Billy Porter on the red carpet for 2019’s Met Gala (if you look at photos, he’s in the front — the one with the most-defined abs).

Porter is known for defying conventional ideas of how men and women should dress, often combining the two.

Like Porter, Everett said he refuses “to live my life based on someone else’s limitations.”

“He doesn’t allow anyone to tell him otherwise,” Everett said. “That’s something I wish for every person.”