The mega-talented & multifaceted Chris Parente

It’s pretty tricky to live in Denver and not know about Chris Parente. He’s been in Denver for nearly nine years, and he’s currently working at several local stations covering the entertainment beat. Before you start lunch, it’s likely that Parente’s workday is already over.

With his day starting typically at 4am, Parente lives for coffee. His day begins with Channel 2’s Daybreak with Tom Green, which consists of three to four entertainment segments throughout the morning news. Next up is Everyday, his 10am talk show alongside co-host Kathie J on Fox 31. His job generally ends around 1 or 2 in the afternoon.

“I get up so early that usually, when I’m done, I go home and take a nap,” Parente says. He’ll spend his post-work hours hitting the gym or catching as many shows and movies as he can to stay fresh on the entertainment scene. This kind of schedule normally puts him in bed by 9pm.

“I absolutely love, love what I’m doing,” Parente illuminates. After years of working as a hard news reporter, he says that gig could get very depressing.

“Making the shift over to more entertainment anchoring and hosting my own talk show has allowed for more positive energy, fun, laughter … and definitely a lot more imagination and creativity,” he says. “We certainly cover the news of the day, but it’s a lot more fun.”

Parente describes his talk show as part Ellen, part The View, part The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon. He says his co-host, Kathie J, is a dream.

“I’ve been in the business for 23 years,” Parente recalls, “and I can honestly say the Everyday show is what I am the most proud of, most excited about, and have the most fun doing. It truly is unlike anything else on local television.”

The Emmy-winning Everyday started about seven years ago, and there have been a couple other hosts before Kathie J joined two years ago.

“Kathie J reminds me a lot Melissa McCarthy,” Parente says. “She’s bold, she’s out there, she says what’s on her mind, and she’s proud of who she is.”

She also co-hosts a morning radio show with Larry Ulibarri, another one of Parente’s cohorts. Parente and Ulibarri have worked together on several appearances, notably hosting the broadcast of Denver’s Pride parade for the last couple years.

“Larry and I kinda do a three-way with Kathie J,” Parente says. “He gets her in the morning, and I get her at 10.”

Ulibarri recently joined as a guest improviser with Parente’s monthly improv show, The Queerbots, the only GLTBQ improv troupe in Colorado.

“Improv is one of my truest loves,” Parente says. “I studied with Second City … and really, improv is what I do on television every day anyway. It takes up a lot of my time, but it’s a blast and my passion.”

Most weekends, Parente will either fly to L.A. or New York since his station gets exclusives with upcoming movies. He’ll watch a few flicks, sit down with the casts, and then bring those interviews exclusively back to Denver. Over the years, Parente has taken his show internationally to Iceland, Russia, Vienna, Bora Bora, as well on location at Disneyland.

An Indiana native, Parente kicked off his journalism career with an internship at a station in Lafayette, where he snagged a job right out of college.

“One of the things about this business is you start at the bottom and work your way up,” Parente explains. Back in Lafayette, he covered county fairs and corn, mostly. Think a town like in the Andy Griffith Show.

While working as the morning anchor at NBC in Louisville, Ky., Parente got a call about a job in Denver, flew out, and took the job the next day. He fell in love.

Parente, who’s been out since he was 20, said he’s fortunate to have a supportive family, and he’s privileged that he is able to be openly gay on television. But early in his career, the understanding was that he shouldn’t acknowledge it, which he felt was a form of bigotry.

“I’m in a unique position, and I’m proud of it, that I’m able to be openly gay on television every single day and celebrate it,” he elaborates. “I would say I’m the only person on the air who’s able to do that now in Denver.”

But Parente explains that it comes with his style of job, and he wouldn’t expect a regular news reporter to need to divulge that kind of info about themselves.

“I’m proud of the ability to be a visible person on television who’s happy, relatively well-adjusted, and totally cool with being openly gay on television. And that’s no different than if there were a talk-show host who’s straight — he’d talk about his wife, his kids, his family. Gay people come in all shapes and sizes and styles … and God bless all of it. I love the diversity,” he clarifies. “I’m not on TV to promote the gay agenda. I’m just being fully who I am, and every single one of us has the right to be who they are fully.”

That’s the kind of message Parente wants to spread.

Parente says there have been several times where he’s received letters from young gay kids who are struggling and being bullied, and one of the most meaningful things is to read those letters and hear that his visibility is helping them.

“It’s good to remind them that it’s okay,” he says. “There are happy, well-adjusted. successful gay people that are no different than their straight counterparts.

Parente also follows a vegetarian diet, which he’s done for a couple decades.

“Here I am, an Italian Catholic raised in the Midwest. How many things can I do to alienate myself?” he jokes.

One of his first jobs was as an environmental reporter. When he saw the cruelty that happens at animal-processing plants, he just couldn’t be a part of it.

“I believe we should go through life trying to do as little harm as possible to any living thing. I just can’t get behind suffering and death just so I can have something tasty on my plate. That makes no sense to me.”

But Parente says he’s living a total dream … you know, aside from crow’s feet, growing older, and heading to bed at 9pm.

Parente heads back to his hometown every three months or so to visit family for a week at a time. It’s important for him to spend time with his mother, who is currently living in a nursing home with Alzheimer’s.

With what Parente has experienced in caring for his mother, he would love to see religious protesters focus their efforts on caring for the elderly in nursing homes or clothing the poor rather than fighting gay marriage.

“Gay marriage doesn’t hurt a damn person,” he says. “The only harm that’s being done is when you deny gay people. If you really want to do the work of Jesus, go out there and help people.”