What happens to your love life after you go on a matchmaking show?
“Million Dollar Matchmaker,” an American reality show, follows millionaires as they go on dates arranged by Hollywood personality Patricia “Patti” Stanger. It’s gotten a lot of buzz on island after David Cruz III, 44, a Guam son based in Los Angeles, landed a role on the hit We TV series.
Five years after the show, Cruz said it was an honor to be cast. As for his foray into Hollywood, he said, “I’ve always been that Guam kid, just living in L.A.”
Cruz moved to Los Angeles in 2009, after 15 years in Orange County, California. Raised on Guam, he attended San Vicente Catholic School until eighth grade, then studied at Father Dueñas Memorial School before graduating from George Washington High School in 1994.
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In high school, he settled on entering the entertainment industry. Before then, he considered becoming a news reporter and interned with Pacific Daily News.
Once he arrived in California, he wrote about single life and dating for a magazine. Then his writings led to a website and later, a podcast.
Six months after moving to Los Angeles, a scouting person approached Cruz at a bar, asking him to join the matchmaking show. “It was this weird thing, and I was like ‘I don’t do TV.’ They’re like ‘It’s this show that just started. No one will really see it,’” Cruz said. “That was my introduction into entertainment.”
Finding Cupid
For over a decade, Cruz talked, wrote and explained love. A longtime fan of “Sex and the City,” which chronicles women exploring Manhattan’s dating scene, Cruz provides relationship advice through his website, Finding Cupid.
“I’ve always wanted to be that person to say there’s a relationship out there for everyone,” Cruz said. “Stop thinking about love in the way where it’s destructive or when there are breakups and you’re dependent on somebody.”
During the pandemic, emails flooded Cruz’s inbox. People wanted to know how to transition from video to in-person dating. They wanted to re-enter the dating world but felt scared.
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That’s why Cruz launched two projects. By Valentine’s Day next year, he plans to reboot Finding Cupid and restart his podcast and radio show. With more time to reflect on dating after the pandemic, he’ll provide advice to lovers, this time for people used to speaking on the phone, without texting.
His second project, Fruitloots, curates gifts produced by LGBTQ+ makers. Cruz and a gay friend from Orange County founded the business, in hopes of promoting products by gay owners and people of color.
“I have always been someone who has believed in love, relationships and their contributions to one’s happiness in the world,” Cruz said. “It doesn’t mean that relationships are defined by what we know. There are so many types of relationships that don’t need to be defined by what we see in the movies.”
As a gay man, Cruz attempts to redefine relationships as they are portrayed in Hollywood. He hopes to bring his husband, Jonathan Hughes, who also wrote for the popular comedy “The Office,” to Guam.
Coming out as a gay man
As the son of Catholic parents with a military father, Cruz struggled to come out on Guam. In his late teens, people associated homosexuality with AIDS or dancing as a backup for Madonna, Cruz said.
Many years after high school, Cruz first came out to his sister, then to his parents.
“I absolutely remember the day I told my mother,” Cruz said. “A ton of bricks came off of my shoulders. The weight came off. It felt like I was trying to live the truest form of my life.”
Cruz also stood up for gay rights in California. When he arrived in Cypress College in California, he served as the school’s first openly gay student body president, then became editor-in-chief of The Charger Chronicle, the school newspaper.
But 2015 marked a special year in his activism for gay rights.
‘What I do know is my responsibility’
That year, he spoke at the University of Guam graduation as the commencement speaker. The U.S. Supreme Court had legalized same-sex marriage, but former Gov. Eddie Calvo spoke out against it, Cruz said.
Infuriated by Calvo’s response, Cruz spoke to graduates about freedoms, gay rights and legalizing gay marriage. To this day, he still considers the speech — speaking against the former governor, who sat in the audience — one of the most terrifying moments of his life.
“There’s a lot of things to think of when you do something like that,” Cruz said. “It’s a tiny island. I don’t know if I am going to piss off my aunt, my uncle or my grandmother. But what I do know is my responsibility, as I’ve grown up, is how being gay is a political act every single day.”
‘My love for the island is hardcore’
Despite mixed feelings about Calvo’s response, Cruz also considers the keynote speech a highlight in his career.
“I’ve spoken in front of a lot of people, but that was different. It was at home. It was talking about my journey and how I think people should be free and marry,” Cruz said. “I still get messages from people from the island, gay and straight, who say that my existence in this crazy L.A. world is important to them because they see a path forward.”
Might Cruz’s coming out experience on Guam and his island pride clash? “My love for the island is hardcore never going to die. I think it gets better and better as I get older,” Cruz said. “As we think about where we are today with gay rights, gay marriage and the things that we accomplished, we think about things that are still not accomplished. It’s the same with any other group of minorities that are fighting for representation.”
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‘That’s just how I grew up’
Once a young kid with cabin fever, Cruz left Guam three days after high school graduation.
“As a teenager, all you ever want to do is leave it all. You want to start on your own,” Cruz said. “When you leave, finally go to school and pay your own bills, it becomes very eye-opening. Now it’s your life and you’re in control of it.”
But even if he lives in a city, Guam stays with him.
“All those things that I learned on the island — being nice and welcoming, like the people on the island are — it becomes a part of who you are,” Cruz said. “Still to this day, my friends joke with me: ‘David, we just want to have a gathering with you. You don’t need to make a table of food and throw a party.’ That’s just what I do. That’s how I grew up.”
Reach reporter Anne Wen at awen@guampdn.com.
