The Complete Transformation Of Tila Tequila

In the early 2000s, social media was in its infancy, dominated by the now-defunct platform known as MySpace. While MySpace proved to be the launching pad for numerous future stars — including makeup-loving influencer Jeffree Star, comedian Dane Cook, and British singer Lily Allen — at the top of the pyramid stood model and singer Tila Tequila. Deemed to be the most popular person on MySpace, she parlayed that internet fame into TV stardom cloaked in controversy when she was tapped to be the central figure in television's first bisexual dating show, MTV's "A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila."

For a while, she was a ubiquitous figure in the pop-culture landscape, regularly appearing on TV and releasing singles. But as the 2000s gave way to the 2010s, she gradually faded from view. And whenever she did pop up in headlines, it was inevitably due to her latest scandal, certainly not her achievements.

She's been out of the spotlight for some time, but hasn't faded away completely. To find out more about her strange and singular journey, keep on reading to experience the complete transformation of Tila Tequila.

Before she was Tila Tequila, the future reality TV star was known as Thien Nguyen, Singapore-born child of Vietnamese parents who'd immigrated to the U.S. As she recalled for Entertainment Weekly, her family wound up in Houston when she was an infant, living in a community run by Buddhists. "It was more like their own cult kind of thing," she said, remembering that only blue and white clothing could be worn. 

Growing up in such a restrictive environment became stifling. Even before hitting adolescence, she embraced the concept of teenage rebellion with a vengeance. "When I was 11, I did a lot of Ecstasy," she told EW. "I used to rob houses, steal cars and stuff. And it just got worse in high school." Eventually, she was sent to a special boarding school for troubled teens. "I got sent six months to juvie. But once I got sent to juvie it was scary," she wrote on her blog, revealing she soon realized she'd be in peril unless she aligned herself with one of the racially segregated gangs. Without a Vietnamese gang, she gravitated toward the Mexican gang. "They took me in as one of their own & protected me from the other gangs in juvie," she added, revealing it was a member of that gang who gave her the nickname Tila Tequila.

Tila Tequila was just 16 when she left Houston for New York City, armed with big dreams and $300 — until running out of money, which forced a return to Texas. Using a fake ID, she then landed a job as an exotic dancer. At 18, she was shopping in a Houston mall when she was approached by a modeling scout for Playboy. "I never thought about modeling before, but 'Playboy' was a bigger thing so I did a test shoot," she told IGN. That led to an offer to model in Los Angeles. "I'd never been to California and it was like a free trip," she explained. "So that's how I got started." 

She soon became an in-demand model and was working steadily when she began using the Internet as a promotional vehicle. Posting steamy pics on her MySpace page proved to be a savvy move, attracting millions of followers and becoming the most popular person on the platform.

That online fame led her to television when she was cast on the VH1 reality series, "Surviving Nugent," as one of the contestants competing in challenges cooked up by rock guitarist/bowhunting enthusiast Ted Nugent. Interviewed by VH1, she jokingly claimed she was tricked into appearing on the show. "The casting people made it sound like some fantastic fantasy getaway at some exotic place or something, but I had no idea that it was what it was!" she declared.

As Tila Tequila's Internet stardom grew, so too did the opportunities presented to her. She received a big one in 2007, when she was hired by MTV to star in her own TV dating show, "A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila." A tongue-in-cheek spin on "The Bachelor," the show's groundbreaking twist came courtesy of her bisexuality. "The show is a rollercoaster ride of drama, conflict, and emotion, busting stereotypes and challenging the norm — proving that the rules of attraction are made to be broken," said MTV exec Tony DiSanto in a statement to TV Week.

The cast featured 16 straight men and 16 lesbians, all vying to win Tequila's heart. As she told the Associated Press (via Fox News), getting romantic with someone while a camera films it all is not for the faint of heart. "It was kind of weird at first," she admitted. "I thought, 'What am I doing here? Can I leave now?' But once you get to know people, you become involved."

For MTV's DiSanto, viewers who tuned in stayed tuned in, due to an element of drama that was baked into the show's premise. "I think there's an innate curiosity in wondering what is going to make Tila decide between a man and a woman," he said. "It makes for a compelling piece of programming that you just can't take your eyes off of."

All that viewer curiosity resulted in some big ratings; and "A Shot at Love with Tila Tequila" was among the 15 most-watched cable shows on television. In fact, the first season's finale episode raked in 6.2 million viewers to become MTV's most-watched episode ever.

That success bred more success, with The Hollywood Reporter revealing that a spinoff had been greenlit: "That's Amore!," focusing on fan-favorite Italian contestant Domenico Nesci. MTV then announced plans for Tila Tequila to return for a second season of "A Shot at Love." As CNN reported, the premise for the new season would be identical: straight guys and gay women competing to woo her. When the show returned for a third season, however, Tequila was not part of it. According to Reuters, the new season had been titled "A Double Shot at Love," in which bisexual twin sisters Rikki and Vikki Mongeon — a.k.a. the "Ikki Twins" — date their way through 12 straight men and 12 lesbians.

She subsequently revealed that the reason she wasn't involved in the third season is because she'd signed a deal to star in her own reality series, which would follow her day-to-day activities. "It's just my life, about being a mogul, and doing all this on my own ... and see how I can handle all this while being all crazy ..." she told VladTV. That show, however, never saw the light of day.

As anyone who lived through the 2000s may recall, the notion of a bisexual dating show dredged up controversy, raising hackles among America's more conservative elements. Among the critics of "A Shot at Love" were L. Brent Bozell III of the controversial Parents Television Council, the morality-focused group that has targeted such TV favorites as "Family Guy" and "South Park," and once urged NBC to boot radio shock jock Howard Stern from "America's Got Talent." In a 2007 column, Bozell eviscerated Tila Tequila's MTV hit as "another nasty show that hooks viewers with its so-bad-it's-good formula." Meanwhile, conservative religious group Focus on the Family likewise decried the show. All that pearl-clutching, however, paled in comparison to a review from the right-wing Culture and Media Institute's Robert Knight who wrote, "There's nothing holy about MTV's latest attempt to seduce kids into orgiastic partying and homosexuality."

Tequila addressed the controversy in an entry posted on MySpace. "I just want to say that I am truly blessed to have had an opportunity to share with the world and teach the world that it is OK to be who you are! Gay or not!" she wrote, as reported by The Christian Post. "The church should understand that they have a higher responsibility to teach the youth about unconditional love, and how we can spread the love, not why being gay is a bad thing."

An entirely different type of controversy engulfed Tila Tequila during her first season of MTV's "A Shot at Love," when the New York Post claimed that she wasn't actually bisexual, and was secretly dating a guy. "Tila has and has had a boyfriend for over a year, and she's not really bi," a source told the Post (via Fox News). "She's made out with some girls in her past, as all girls have, but she is not bi at all."

MTV responded by forging ahead with a second season of "A Shot at Love," which concluded with Tequila choosing a woman, Kristy Morgan — who then broke Tequila's heart by turning down her offer of romance, insisting that she was just being honest with herself.

The truth finally came tumbling out in 2019, when Tequila — who had since become a born-again Christian — confessed that her bisexuality was indeed as bogus as the Post reported. "I was never bisexual, I was never a lesbian, I was never gay. It was all gay for pay," she explained in a video she posted on YouTube. "As a matter of fact, when I was filming that reality show, I had a boyfriend. ... I was only acting gay for pay because in Hollywood, they require you to defile yourself with gay rituals, homosexual rituals, pornography." 

As fans of Tila Tequila's MySpace posts already knew, she also fancied herself a wannabe pop star, posting her music on the site for fans to listen to. In 2006, she shared the single, "F*** Ya Man." In 2007, she unveiled another single, "I Love U." Released without a record label, the track was produced by rapper Lil Jon.

Then, in May 2010, she unveiled a new single, "I Love My DJ," which she then followed with the release of her first EP, "Welcome to the Darkside." Despite the fame she'd gained from MTV, she was apparently unable to land a record deal with an established label; as a result, she released her music on her own label, Tila Tequila Records. 

She also attempted a bit of a rebrand, crediting her single and EP to her new moniker, Miss Tila. A press release announcing the new EP and fledgling record label dropped some iconic names while offering some staggeringly high praise for Tequila's prowess as a singer. "With a new style and a sultry tone, Miss Tila resembles the likes of Billie Holiday and Marilyn Monroe on this three-track EP," the release noted, via the A.V. Club. "I have my own original sound," Tequila told Entertainment Weekly in a 2010 interview. "Because I had released music a long time ago, before I was famous."

As part of her promotional push for her new EP and record label, Tila Tequila booked a gig performing at 2010's Gathering of the Juggalos, the annual music festival headlined by extreme rap group Insane Clown Posse. As CNN reported, the group's hardcore fans — the aforementioned Juggalos — responded to her music by hurling rocks and bottles at her. The mob then chased her off the stage, forcing her to hide in a trailer. "She's pretty cut up," one of the show's performers said, requesting anonymity in order to avoid the Juggalos' wrath. She subsequently threatened to sue.

Andy Pellegrini, Insane Clown Posse's PR rep, issued a statement declaring the incident to be "extremely unfortunate," (via Phoenix New Times). However, he insisted the group bore no responsibility for their fans' actions — because she was warned that the Juggalos hated her. "Ms. Tequila was made aware, in advance, of her unpopularity with many Juggalos at the Gathering, but she insisted on performing," the statement read, noting that she'd been paid in advance, and had been told she didn't have to perform — and that if she did, she was free to exit the stage the moment she felt endangered. "As soon as her show started the crowd began to boo heavily and throw garbage," Pellegrini continued. "It was immediately obvious that she was not welcome. Her injuries were only sustained because of her refusal to leave the stage."

The journey of Tila Tequila took an unexpected twist in 2013 when she issued a since-deleted blog post titled, "Why I Sympathize With Adolf Hitler Part 1: True History Revealed." She wrote (via USA Today), "I used to think all of those horrible things about [Hitler] until I learned the truth about the war and what Hitler truly did and he was not a bad person as they have painted him out to be. Not even close!!" She continued by complaining that the Nazi despot had been demonized after his death, and that she shared "the same hopes and dreams as Hitler." 

Despite her admiration for the architect of the Third Reich, she insisted there was nothing anti-semitic about fangirling over Hitler. "I am not going to sit here and say that I hate Jewish people because that is not the case nor is this about Jews. It is about Hitler and his side of the story that was never told since he was not the victor," she said. To emphasize her fandom, she also posted a photo of herself on social media, holding a gun and sporting a swastika armband while striking a sexy pose in front of the notorious Auschwitz death camp.

In 2015, Tila Tequila was cast on the U.K. version of reality TV hit "Big Brother," in which a gaggle of D-list celebrities live together in a house equipped with hidden cameras so they can annoy each other for the amusement of TV viewers. Early on, however, the show issued a cryptic tweet announcing she'd been ditched from the show. "Due to reasons outside of Big Brother, earlier this evening Tila was removed from the house," the tweet read.

It later emerged that producers had just become aware of her controversial Hitler comments from 2013. "The views Tila had expressed, and permitted to remain uncorrected, are totally unacceptable and, accordingly, her continued involvement in the program was untenable," a spokesperson told Entertainment Tonight.

Tequila issued a statement backtracking from her earlier remarks, offering an array of excuses. "Back in 2013 I made a statement about Hitler not being a bad person, and immediately realized soon after that I had made a terrible mistake that would ultimately come back to haunt me," she wrote, claiming that she'd lost touch with reality, had become addicted to drugs, experienced severe depression, and had attempted suicide. "It was absolutely the lowest point I had ever reached in my life," she added, "and today I am truly sorry to everyone that I may have hurt along my self-destructive path." Despite her apology, she was not invited back.

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It would be easy to assume that Tila Tequila's apology about her Hitler fandom was sincere, but that proved to be otherwise. Less than a year later, her X (then Twitter) account was suspended when she tweeted a photo of herself and two men, holding their arms outstretched in the notorious Nazi salute. As The Washington Post reported, she'd captioned the photo, "Seig [sic] Heil!" The photo was taken after her appearance at an alt-right conference sponsored by white nationalists. 

According to the New York Daily News, the conference was held by the National Policy Institute, the creation of white nationalist Richard Spencer (credited with coining the term alt-right). Tequila, noted the Southern Poverty Law Center, had become chummy with Spencer, lending her celebrity — as faded as it had become — to his toxic cause.

Spencer's dream version of America is an all-white "ethno-state" that would get rid of minorities. So where would the Tequila, of Vietnamese heritage, fit into that? "There are always exceptions, I guess," Spencer told The Washington Post. "I'm a generous guy."

During her journey from bisexual reality TV star to Hitler-loving scandal-magnet, Tila Tequila became a mom. In 2014, she welcomed her first child, Isabella. In an interview with Us Weekly ahead of her daughter's birth, she declared, "I truly feel that my baby has saved my life ..." In 2018, she announced she was pregnant again; her second daughter, Annabelle, was born in September of that year.

In 2016, TMZ reported that Isabella's father, Thomas Whitaker, went to court to seek full custody of their child, citing Tequila's mental instability and alcohol consumption. That legal battle dragged out for years. In 2018, The Blast obtained court documents in which Whitaker cited such incidents as Tequila costuming Isabella as Adolf Hitler in a since-deleted Instagram photo. He also claimed that she was barring him from seeing her daughter, and that she'd "engaged in a history or pattern of child neglect." Tequila responded by accusing Whitaker of being jealous because she and her husband had recently had a baby, and declared, "Jesus Christ says that Thomas will he [sic] punished for his crimes."

In late 2019, the squabbling exes reached a custody agreement. According to The Blast, she was ordered to refrain from ingesting any alcohol or controlled substances "while in possession of the child," while Whitaker was ordered to pay $217 per month in child support.