A pageant stage in Brighton Beach will once again belong to the grandmothers this Sunday, as the Your Highness Grandmother Pageant marks its 25th year with contestants ranging in age from their 80s to their 90s. The competition begins at noon at Tatiana Restaurant, with grandmothers who spent the past week rehearsing their routines ahead of the big day.
The long-running tradition has become a beloved Brighton Beach fixture over the past quarter century, organizers say, according to ABC7 New York. The pageant is organized by Be Proud, and Alexander Zhorov, chairperson of the nonprofit's board of directors, put it simply: every contestant is a winner. That ethos echoes what other outlets have found over the years — the Times of Israel has reported that all the women who compete are considered winners, each recognized in her own category rather than ranked against the others.
Among this year's contestants is Mara Goldshtein, who at 90 years old says she remains up for the challenge. “Her brain works more and more,” she said, according to the same report. Her son, Daniel, described his mother as a wild woman who always has been and always will be. Goldshtein wished all of the other contestants health, though she admitted she is unsure whether she will compete again next year, saying turning 91 is complicated.
A Quarter Century of Celebrating Babushkas
Also competing this year is Galina Baturina, who is 85 years old, one of several grandmothers whose ages this year span from their 80s into their 90s. Alexander Lachman, the pageant's longtime emcee, said the event lets families see their grandmothers in a new light. Pageant organizers celebrate every contestant for staying active, engaged, and young at heart, framing the event as a tribute to the wisdom, talent and vitality of local babushkas.
All of the pageant's judges, notably, are grandfathers — a rule that has held since the contest's earliest years, according to the Brooklyn Reporter. Winners may receive a crown, and the Brooklyn Reporter's coverage of the 22nd annual contest in 2023 found Galina Baturina winning the Queen Grandmother category that year while Bella Ibragimova took the Grandmother crown, at an event held at the Sky Wise Lounge in Sheepshead Bay with ten grandmothers from Russia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Ukraine and Moldova.
Origins Trace Back Decades, With Some Disagreement on Dates
Accounts of exactly when the pageant began vary. The New York Times described the event as a Brighton Beach fixture dating back to 1998, while the Times of Israel reported that founder Raisa Chernina launched the annual pageant in 2001 and folded it into her Be Proud Foundation two years later, in 2003. Chernina has said she started the contest to pay homage to her mother, according to reporting from Brooklyn Paper.
The Be Proud Foundation, a Sheepshead Bay-based nonprofit, hosts the pageant every year, per Bklyner. In past years the event has typically drawn twelve contestants selected from a pool of twenty to forty applicants, the Times of Israel reported. The pageant has traditionally featured immigrant grandmothers, with Brooklyn Paper noting many contestants are immigrants themselves, reflecting the Eastern European and former Soviet communities that make up much of Brighton Beach and Sheepshead Bay.
A History of Crowns, Categories and One Pandemic Pause
The pageant has long used two age categories, though sources differ on exactly where the line falls. Brooklyn Paper has described the categories as Queen Grandmother for contestants 77 and older and Grandmother for everyone else, while the Times of Israel reported the threshold at 75. Either way, the format has produced memorable champions over the years: Brooklyn Paper reported that Malkina Shumayeva won the Queen Grandmother title in one recent year with Margarita Mordukhayeva taking the Grandmother crown, and the New York Daily News reported that Shifra Blinova of Sheepshead Bay claimed her first Queen Grandmother crown in 2010 after four years of competing.
The event has not run uninterrupted. The Times of Israel reported that the pageant was canceled in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, a pause that briefly broke what had otherwise been a continuous annual run. National Geographic has covered the pageant's draw beyond the contestants themselves, reporting that one edition brought out more than 300 children, grandchildren and friends to cheer on twelve competing grandmothers, underscoring how the event has long doubled as a family affair as much as a competition.
