If certain people weren’t totally fanatical about their insatiable quest for fame, then celebrity sex tapes and Speidi wouldn’t exist. Jon and Kate Gosselin would probably still have a family intact, and Perez Hilton would be out of a job.
One such famewhore recently burst forth upon the media in the most creative way yet. Richard Heene, who had earned a little quasi reality TV fame via the show Wife Swap, a show which switches wives from vastly different lifestyles, may have destroyed his family with his incessant yearning for notoriety. This pursuit of celebrity led Heene to almost pull off one of the biggest hoaxes since the Loch Ness Monster.
Heene and his wife Mayumi, falsely claimed their six-year-old son Falcon was trapped in an airborne helium balloon. Of course, Falcon was found safely hiding in the attic of the family home and the Heenes triumphantly celebrated Falcon’s return from obscurity in front of the watchful eye of the television cameras. And they had all but pulled off the giant publicity stunt, if it hadn’t been for Falcon, who let the cat out of the bag during a live interview with Wolf Blitzer.
Young Falcon declared as his parents grimaced, “You said we did this for a show.”
Rapidly, Richard Heene’s intricate web of deceit began to unravel, as it came to light that the Heenes had been shopping a reality TV show pitch centered around his “wacky” family to various television networks. Tom Forman, the CEO of Relativity Real and creator of Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, said that Heene shopped his pitch around to more than one network, and had lied to him about doing so. There was also a bizarre video of the Heene boys doing a crappy rap, with unintentional Arrested Development-like undertones. Then, a man named Robert Thomas came forward claiming to have been developing a Mythbusters-style show with Richard Heene. He said Heene had told him he planned to draw attention to the concept with a major controversy.
Heene told Thomas: “How much do you want to bet we could facilitate some sort of a media stunt that would be equally profound as Roswell and we could do so with nothing more than a weather balloon and some controversy?”
Thomas said, “I clearly remember Richard telling me that, if we accomplish this, it would be the most controversial and widespread UFO news story since Roswell in 1947.”
Now, police are charging Heene and his wife with various felonies. But let’s face it, the real crime committed here was that Richard Heene toyed with our hearts. He forced us to watch his show – the show where supposedly, a frightened young boy sat huddled inside a mushroom-shaped balloon that soared aggressively across the afternoon Colorado skies. We watched Heene’s diabolical scene play out, aghast. We were sick with worry and captivated by the drama. When we realized we’d been had, we felt foolish. A crime like this one isn’t committed, well, ever, and punishing the Heene parents with a sentence that will both satisfy the law and the public, will be difficult. Sports Interaction has just posted odds so you can get in on some Balloon Boy betting. Will Heene serve jail time? If so, how long? Place your bets, people.
Whatever the future may hold for Richard Heene, he certainly succeeded in bringing attention to his family. Hell, for all we know, he could be the next reality TV star. He’s already gotten everyone’s attention. All he needs now is a producer brave enough to take a chance.
