“Being gay is fun” is Mateo Tomas’s slogan, and there’s no doubt that this mantra helped him win the title of Best Newcomer at the 2025 Grabbys America Awards, the most prestigious awards for the gay adult video industry.
“My brand is happy, fun, loving, validating. I’m trying to create the visual glorification for men that we never had growing up. A lot of adult gay videos are based on dominance, submission and power, whereas I’m trying to create something about happiness and joy that, in turn, helps us to love each other and love ourselves,” says Tomas.
The other thing that probably helped Tomas win a Grabby is that he’s ruggedly handsome, has a hot body and really does know how to make gay sex look fun on camera. Though he’s hosted gay events and parties for years, Tomas only started doing porn in February 2023. It’s a career that started in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, a city he’s grown fascinated with.
“Originally, I was scheduled to be a part of a production in Puerto Vallarta with some major stars, but that didn’t quite end up working out,” he tells Wander+Lust. “One of the actors said, ‘Don’t worry, I got you a real gig.’ And I did my first scene for the studio Cutler’s Den in Puerto Vallarta, and that’s how I started.”
Tomas grew up in Prince George, British Columbia, but moved to Vancouver and started producing gay parties more than a decade ago. That got him tapped into the wider international gay scene even before he started doing porn. Off the top of his head, he knows that the man behind Mexico City cruising club Sexto Piso (6th floor, Eje Central Lázaro Cárdenas 123, Centro, Cuauhtémoc, Mexico City) is also the man behind gay LGBTQ+ music festival/dance party Arena (Playa del Carmen, usually January/February, 2026 dates TBA).
After discovering all Puerto Vallarta has to offer, Tomas started digging into its modern gay history. Which starts, surprisingly enough, with the late Hollywood icon Elizabeth Taylor.
Taylor got her divorce from Eddie Fisher in the resort town and then in 1964, with her next husband, Richard Burton, acquired a property there, which Taylor kept until the 1990s. (The property—Casa Kimberly, C. Zaragoza 445, Centro, Puerto Vallarta—is now a boutique hotel.)
Sounds straight enough so far. But in the 1980s, Taylor, who had an affinity for gay men, became an early advocate for HIV/AIDS awareness and research, using her fame to support the cause. In 1985, she co-founded the American Foundation for AIDS Research (amfAR), and in 1991, she established The Elizabeth Taylor AIDS Foundation (ETAF).
“This was a period in our history when gay men were dying and were treated as lepers. People were scared to breathe the same air we breathed,” says Tomas. “Elizabeth Taylor would help us go to Puerto Vallarta to receive AZT, the drug that was available then to extend men’s lives. And there were men who would go there to be under the sun on the last days of their lives, just trying to live a little longer and celebrate each other.”
At the time, Mexico was a very sexually conservative, very Roman Catholic country. Acapulco, in fact, was considered to be Mexico’s most gay-friendly beach resort city in the 1980s, ’90s and early 2000s. But according to Tomas, the PV locals got used to gay men being around and appreciated their spendthrift ways. Bars and clubs started opening up. “Look, we’re great customers, we tip well, we line up for things. Puerto Vallarta realized this pretty quickly and said, ‘Okay, we’re going to become gay friendly, even though maybe at that time it wasn’t okay to be gay friendly,’” he says. “Now Puerto Vallarta has this gay village where anyone can go and meet people from all over the world. For me, I feel the spirits of those men who came there to live and to die watching over me, saying, ‘Mateo, take that dick up your ass.’ And I’m like, yes. I can just feel the goodwill from those men who came before us.”
Tomas’s first PV visit was six years ago. He loved the fact that visitors could let their guards down: “It completely blew my mind. There are two types of people who go to Puerto Vallarta—ays who have it all together and gays who have none of it together. I’m the latter, always. As soon as I get there, I feel the electricity in the air.”
Several gay porn producers have used PV as a filming location, but Tomas also likes to mix with non-performers. He loves a party called Guapo PV, which takes place in a rented villa on long weekends during the peak tourism season. “The villa has a bunch of different rooms, and in every room there’s an orgy. There are, like, 500 guys there. Everyone’s naked. It’s like the craziest party out of a dream,” says Tomas.
Though he will also go on tours, go jet skiing, take boat rides and swim with the colourful local fish, Tomas prioritizes exploring the gay scene in Puerto Vallarta—and wherever he goes. “When I’m travelling, I’ll sometimes stay at different fans’ homes. If I get a hotel, I try to stay in gay neighbourhoods, which are usually the most expensive areas, unfortunately. I think we call it gayflation,” he says. “People are like, ‘You should go here and climb this mountain.’ But for me, I like connecting with guys, learning about local gay culture and the challenges they face in their communities, whether it’s the ongoing police searches of gay men in Spain or the trouble accessing PrEP in Mexico.”
Though Puerto Vallarta has a special place in his heart, it’s not his favourite city. That’s Barcelona.
“It’s really sophisticated, so metropolitan and gay friendly. There are so many interesting fashion designers and artists. It reminds me a bit of Montreal, but without the attitude. I love the store Boxer (Carrer de la Diputació 182, L’Eixample, Barcelona), which sells fetish wear. Right across from it is Boxer Cafe Bar (Carrer de la Diputació 167-169, L’Eixample, Barcelona). The owners are so nice. And there’s ClubOpenMind (Carrer d’Aragó 130, L’Eixample, Barcelona), which is an amazing sex club. Oh my God, I found the biggest dick in the world there.”
Yep, Tomas’s brand is “Being gay is fun.” And he’s always on brand.
