Photo by Erin FredrichsTribune

Tribune

Jenny Marlowe checks her reflection as seamstress Masako Lujan pins her cocktail dress for a slimmer fit. Marlowe, the current Miss New Mexico, will compete Saturday in the Miss America Pageant, which is striving this year to shed its fusty image and take on a more modern sensibility. "I'm ultra-positive," Marlowe says. "If you don't believe you're going to be Miss America, then you won't be."

Photo by Erin FredrichsTribune

Tribune

Jenny Marlowe, Miss New Mexico, rests her head on fiancé‚ Rob Bierbaum's shoulder during a commercial break of "Miss America Reality Check." Friends (from left) Heather Yeo, Meghan Bodey and Andrea Rascon joined them to watch the show, which put 52 Miss America contestants in a house for nine days and cut them off from all outside communication. "I was one of the few girls who hadn't already psyched themselves out," Marlowe said.

Photo by Erin FredrichsTribune

Tribune

Jenny Marlowe passes out autographed photos during a trunk show at El Pinto Restaurant. The event raised $5,000 to help cover her expenses in preparing for the Miss America pageant, which airs live Saturday night.

Photo by Erin Fredrichs

Jenny Marlowe stretches on the floor of a workout room at her apartment complex in the Northeast Heights. Marlowe worked with personal trainer Brittany Umbridge in the three weeks leading up to the Miss America pageant. "Kick my butt. I'm ready," Marlowe told Umbridge in one of their last training sessions.

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Jenny Marlowe wants to be Miss America, but she has no interest in being a cliché.

"The thing is, Miss America is not perfect," said Marlowe, also known as Miss New Mexico. "Miss America is real, and that's the Miss America who I want to be."

Marlowe, 23, a graduate of Eldorado High School and the University of New Mexico, wasn't born and bred for the beauty pageant world.

Her mother, Barbara Marlowe, said she would never have predicted pageants when her daughter was playing varsity sports at Eldorado. But she acknowledges that relatives nicknamed Jenny "Hollywood" when she was a child.

Because of her father's military career, Marlowe has lived all over the United States, but Barbara Marlowe is a native New Mexican and said she recognizes that heritage in her daughter.

"She is very genuine, and I think she has a lot of spunk," Barbara Marlowe said proudly. "I think she embodies that part of New Mexico — I mean, we're a tough group out here."

Jenny Marlowe said she started competing in pageants three years ago and found she enjoyed the friendships she was making. As a singer, she appreciated the opportunity the pageants gave her to perform on stage.

With the scholarship money she won from local pageants, Marlowe was able to study theater and Shakespeare in Europe for six weeks.

"It was a time for me to figure out who I was and how I wanted to live my life," Marlowe said of her experience abroad. "It made me feel like I could really do anything."

With that spirit, Marlowe hopes to advance farther than any New Mexican before her. Since the Miss America pageant's inception in 1921, Miss New Mexico has never been crowned Miss America, and none has made it into the top 10 in the past 25 years.

But this year, the pageant — traditionally known for big hair and poofy gowns — is self-consciously striving to be relevant to modern America. A reality show that gets the girls to ditch their polished pageant personae has been airing on TLC.

Marlowe said there will still be plenty of glitz and choreographed moves Saturday night, but contestants will have to prove they have smarts and individuality.

"I don't want the misconception of pageant girls to keep going," she said.

Yes, Marlowe has a pretty face, a knockout figure, wears the latest fashions and will be strutting her stuff in a swimsuit this weekend as she competes.

But along with her sparkling smile and flirty A-line bob haircut, Marlowe has a degree in musical theater and is working on her first full-length album with Shepherd Studios in Albuquerque. A self-taught pianist, Marlowe performs weekly at local venues such as Martini Grill and Q Bar.

Michael McDade, owner of Shepherd Studios, has worked with Marlowe for three years. He said she treats her music professionally and passionately.

"Her lyrics are progressively getting deeper as she matures," McDade said. "She really examines what she is saying. She is a musician first."

Marlowe's background in musical theater serves her well, McDade said, enabling her to write melodies that are unique in the pop genre.

Marlowe said she writes music from a Christian perspective, but she wants people to be able to relate their own lives to it.

"Behind (my music), there is a spiritual side, but I'm not the kind of person that is ever going to force what I believe on someone else," she said.

Marlowe has dreams of moving to New York and performing on Broadway and has worked to make them a reality. She worked a full-time job throughout college and has been saving money for the past five years.

Friends, family and acquaintances consistently describe Marlowe as the hardest working person they know.

McDade said he is impressed with Marlowe's talent and networking skills.

"Jenny will change whatever she touches, and it will be improved by the fact that she's part of it," he said.

Marlowe's Miss America campaign platform is "Learn to be powerful against physical and sexual assault" — a theme she has come to understand through counseling victims at Agora Crisis Center and visiting children at Carrie Tingley Hospital.

As Miss New Mexico, Marlowe has also become an advocate and speaker for the Rape, Abuse and Incest National Network.

For the past few months, Marlowe has been home only eight days a month because of her busy schedule representing the state in events such as the Rose Bowl Parade and getting ready to compete for Miss America.

"I think I have a better chance (of winning) because of how I've prepared," Marlowe said. "I've worked really hard to be at the top."

That includes coaching by communications professionals to enhance her public speaking skills and presentation. She met with pageant professionals to pick the song she'll perform and had her dresses professionally designed and tailored. And she's been working out.

"I rocked out my body because I want to win swimsuit," Marlowe said.

But Marlowe also understands that being in shape means she'll be able to keep up with a rigorous schedule.

"Miss America cannot afford to get sick," Marlowe said. "You don't get days off."

The Miss America Organization makes more than $45 million available in cash and tuition scholarship assistance every year. If Marlowe is crowned Miss America, she will win a $50,000 scholarship.

And Marlowe has big plans for what she'd do with the job.

"I want Miss America to travel to Iraq and sing to the troops," she said. "She should be an ambassador."