He says he did it to wake up journalists about shoddy sex scandal reporting and the absurdity of "media spectacles". But Ken Tipton's Internet prank last summer not only has him in litigation with a Web producer who backed out of a deal to show the prank live online, it's cost him in his usual profession, he tells ABC News.
Speaking to ABC producer Buck Wolf for The Wolf Files, Tipton says the stunt cost him his agent and "months" of work as an actor/comedian. The former stand-in for John Candy says he also received letters close enough to death threats over the idea of a virginal couple surrendering their virginity live on the Internet.
"I also got a lot of angry people upset because the event never came off," Tipton continues. "I was damned either way."
And one of the more damning revelations in the whole case, according to Wolf, was the fact that the female half of the virgin couple turned out to be a former Dallas Cowboys cheerleader and veteran of MTV's popular Road Rules series, Michelle Parma. An Alabama actor was set to portray her boyfriend.
Wolf says Tipton's plan was hatched a few months after he noticed "all the hoopla" surrounding a live online birth, and he got the idea for a Web site, a book, and a movie. Tipton still plans to make the film, whose script he says is two-thirds finished except for the outcome of his litigation with the Netcaster who backed out of the Web deal.
Tipton and Internet Entertainment Group have sued and countersued. Tipton has sued for breach of contract and defamation, saying IEG backing out of the Netcast deal cost him two million dollars in revenues. IEG has countersued for fraud and breach of contract, not to mention defamation.
"From the very start, this sexcapade had fraud written all over it," comments Wolf. "You just had to visit Tipton's Web site and look at the two kids, 'Mike' and 'Diane,' who were supposed to be unschooled in carnal knowledge. They both looked a little too much like runway models who wouldn't be caught dead doing this if they could get a decent job in show business."
Tipton tells Wolf his plan was to stage the online deflowering and then, at the last moment in the show, "Mike" and "Diane" would not make love but talk safe sex. He says he thought that would have been both a great message and a great way to start the movie.
But IEG isn't buying it. Their attorney Derek Newman maintains Tipton knew from square one the entire event was a hoax and that it was "only natural" for IEG to sever the relationship. "IEG has a reputation to protect," he says. "(Tipton's) claims are curious, considering he also claims he didn't set out to profit from the public."
Newman says IEG learned within days of signing a deal with Tipton that he intended to charge the public for an event never intended to happen, but Tipton says he intended to sell advertising and collect marketing information from his audience.
Aside from an IEG request to a judge to throw the case out, both sides have a 30 August court date to set a trial in the case.
Tipton's attorney, Stan Lieber, told AVN On The Net earlier this week only that damages in the case will be "tons".
