E-Mail This Article to a Friend Queen for a year Anything seems possible for Lawrence native and former Miss USA Susie Castillo. Just don’t ask her about world peace. BY CAMILLE DODERO

SUSIE CASTILLO comes first, Miss USA comes second. That’s how the 24-year-old beauty queen from Lawrence usually introduced herself during her reign, offering the proper noun she owns before the temporary one she was loaned. "Susie’s who I am and [Miss USA] is my job," she declared. "I bring myself to the title — the title doesn’t manage me."

Sounds scripted, yes. But the Endicott College graduate is remarkably good at making platitudes sound heartfelt. Which’ll come in handy, since Castillo wants to pursue an acting career now that her Miss USA reign has ended. A cliché that rarely comes to pass, right? Yes, although morphing from pageant contestant into Hollywood starlet isn’t unprecedented: both Halle Berry and Ali Landry are Miss USA alumnae (Berry didn’t win), and Vanessa Williams briefly served as Miss America before losing her title following a Penthouse photo scandal.

So now that Castillo has bequeathed that diamond-and-pearl crown to Shandi Finnessey at the Kodak Theatre, in Los Angeles, this past Monday, she insists she’ll be entirely comfortable. For one thing, she won’t have to work around the clock for the Miss Universe Organization — which produces the Miss USA, Miss Teen USA, and Miss Universe pageants — anymore. "You’re busy everyday," she says. "Your life is on hold." She won’t have to rise at 4 a.m. for Telemundo interviews, preside over Hunkiest Husband contests with Regis and Kelly, or host farewell celebrations for aging female elephants moving out of Miami zoos. But she’s also kissing goodbye the innumerable perks of the position: having every expense covered while racking up a sizable salary; mingling with the likes of Bill Clinton, Derek Jeter, and Donald Trump; and always being the center of attention.

"It is a good, good year," she says, as if one good, good year is long enough. "It’s so awesome that you get a year to just pack it with all this experience. You’re blessed for that year. And you’re able to pass that along to somebody else and let them be blessed for their year." There are those sincere-sounding platitudes again.

Castillo’s unwavering confidence might not be merely a product of extensive media training, but a consequence of that particular moment, when she sat down to talk with less than a month left in her term. Dressed in fitted pants with pink pinstripes, a mauve sleeveless shirt, and pink-and-white pointy-toed heels, she was safely tucked into a conference room of Miss USA’s Manhattan public-relations firm, a posh agency perched on the 30th floor of a Sixth Avenue skyscraper. All around her was the stuff dreams are made of: the satiny Miss USA sash before her on the conference table; the tip of the Empire State Building in the panoramic window behind her; a Tommy Hilfiger fashion show awaiting her that afternoon. And the future looked even brighter: following the end of her term, she’s got a deal with Elite Model Management, representation by the William Morris Agency, and an apartment secured in Los Angeles. And although Castillo didn’t know it then, her boyfriend of four and a half years, Ipswich native Matt Leslie, would propose to her in a little over two weeks, during an April 5 television appearance on On-Air with Ryan Seacrest. (She accepted.)

After a year in the spotlight, everything seems possible for "Susie Castillo, Miss USA" — even something as implausible as world peace.

DO NOT CALL Susie Castillo "Miss America." She hates that. "People see me and they’re like, ‘Miss America is here,’ " she says with frustration. Miss America is better known, Castillo thinks, not because it’s any better than Miss USA — just 31 years more established. "It’s just because Miss America was the first pageant," she reasons. "It’s more old-school."

Miss America is more conservative, more old-fashioned, more traditional; old ladies and housewives might call it "classier." Miss America contestants are more likely to sport one-piece bathing suits for their requisite swimsuit competition; Miss USA contestants model designer bikinis as comfortably as most people wear socks. And the pageants’ prizes emphasize differing values: Miss America prides itself on awarding winners hefty educational scholarships, while Miss USA victors win cash, a $20,000 clothing stipend, a cameo on the soap opera Passions, and various other extravagances, like a "luxury" Manhattan apartment shared with Miss Teen USA and Miss Universe, complimentary dental work, dermatology services, and a $4000 crystal chandelier.

"People always say, ‘What’s the difference between Miss USA and Miss America?’ " Castillo says. "And I’m like, ‘I’m much cooler than she is, obviously.’ "

In other words, Miss America is for dorks. Conversely, Miss USA is unrepentantly cheesier. Miss USA’s idea of a celebrity judge was E!’s former Wild On bikini model Brooke Burke; Miss America’s was, most recently, Fox News’ Greta Van Susteren. And after last year’s Miss USA coronation, there was a special edition of Fear Factor featuring six of the losing contestants vying for $50,000.

Castillo is noticeably embarrassed when asked about the Fear Factor episode. She’s a master of eye contact, holding your gaze intently while she talks. But when Fear Factor comes up, she stares at the table. "Yep." She pauses. "Six of the 51 girls will be competing for 50 grand. [Last year] it was 25 for the delegate, and 25 went to charity." Then she starts talking about her sash.

Miss America also has the image of being a kinder, gentler, more charitable creature, a judgment that annoys Castillo. "People think there are all these wonderful philanthropic things that [Miss America does] during the year, but you do those same things as Miss USA," she says. In fact, part of Miss USA’s job is to raise breast- and ovarian-cancer awareness. And so, over the past year, Castillo has toured the country, meeting cancer survivors, sufferers, and their families, delivering speeches, and showing up at benefit dinners. "We work to spread awareness and raise as much funding as we possibly can for research. I’ve helped raise around $29 million," she says. There were other charitable appearances, too: walks for AIDS, the March of Dimes, Making Strides Against Breast Cancer, even a United Way Massachusetts public-service announcement in which Castillo bowled with kids at Jamaica Plain’s Milky Way Lounge & Lanes. And she worked extensively with the United Services Organization (USO), visiting US troops overseas. Naturally, the soldiers really liked her. "They’re like, ‘Hey, Miss USA!’ " laughs Castillo. " ‘Wanna come ride in the tank?’ "

But what else, exactly, does Miss USA do? She spends a whirlwind year making symbolic gestures. Locally, Castillo signed autographs at the North Shore Mall, in Peabody, met with Governor Romney, rang the opening bell at the Boston Stock Exchange, threw out the first pitch at a New England Riptide Professional Women’s softball game. She took countless tours (cancer-research facilities, military complexes), attended a few film premieres (Brother Bear, Elf), appeared on television (The Tonight Show, Best Damn Sports Show Period, Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade), and posed with celebrities (Jimmy Fallon, Buzz Aldrin, Jason Giambi). "I met Bill Clinton and I was like, ‘Yo, Bill, what’s up?’ " she says, busting out a peace sign with her right hand. "He was like another person. I wasn’t intimidated. I wasn’t like, ‘Oh, my God!’ like most people would be."

But there’s also a kind of absurdity in the overnight transformation that engulfs someone who becomes Miss USA. She can go from living on the Methuen/Lawrence line her whole life to bounding across a Panamanian stage in a Wonder Woman costume in hopes of becoming Miss Universe. (Castillo finished in the Top 15.) It can turn a high-school volleyball player into the host of Lifetime’s reality-TV show The "I Do" Diaries: Instant Wedding. And it can turn a girl into a Wayniac. Last July, Castillo traveled with the Dallas Cowboy Cheerleaders, Chris Isaak, and Wayne Newton to Korea with the USO. "I love Wayne!" she cries. "Allure magazine asked me who I thought the sexiest man alive was. And I said Wayne Newton. Everybody expects me to say Brad Pitt or Keanu Reeves. And they’re like, ‘What?’ " She laughs. "And Wayne sent me flowers! He sent me roses to the office and a thank-you."

Becoming Miss USA can also catapult a girl into a soap opera: Castillo recently filmed a cameo on Passions, which aired in early April. "The first time I watched that, I was like, ‘This is what I’m going to be on?’ " she remembers. "Then I get there and the crew, the actors, they have so much fun with it." Her role? An Elvis zealot interviewing to be a surrogate mother, who insists that the baby’s name be either Elvis or Priscilla. "Obviously, I don’t get hired as the surrogate mother," she says, "but it was fun."