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A 70-year-old playwright won Brooklyn’s first all-ages and all-genders beauty pageant! Denise “Mistah” Coles was crowned the winner of the Feb. 27 event in Brooklyn, N.Y.

, per pageant organizers Simone Tetteh and Thomas Tomczak. In an exclusive chat with PEOPLE, Tetteh and Tomczak explained that they were tasked with planning a fundraising event for the Brooklyn Community Kitchen , a soup kitchen that helps feed local residents, and they wanted to plan something that wasn’t just your “standard” fundraiser. When Tomczak suggested a beauty pageant, they instantly knew it would be an all-ages and all-genders event “It was important for us to do something that reflected our community and the culture of the kitchen that we volunteer at — the volunteers as well as the greater Brooklyn area .



We wanted to do something that felt really inclusive and of course really fun,” Tetteh explained. They put out an open call for contestants — including talking about it on the local news podcast 1010Wins — which is ultimately how Coles found out about it. Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE's free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer​​, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories.

“She was everything,” Tetteh said when recalling their first meeting with Coles at the show’s first rehearsal. “She got a standing ovation [at the show] and [..

.] I saw some people tearing up.” While speaking to The New York .

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