Did Sacha Baron Cohen strike again? People magazine is reporting that the actor famous for playing the character Borat is the one who pulled the recent filming prank at Wichita Mid-Continent Airport that is leading to a policy revision.
But Victor White, director of airports, isn't so sure it was Cohen.
"It's an interesting debate," White says.
(See what you think. Check out video at Kansas.com/business by clicking the link to the right.)
Cohen has been filming a movie about a Borat-style character named Bruno, who is an Austrian fashion reporter.
Regardless of whether Cohen was in Wichita, the debate is giving the airport some great worldwide attention.
"Wichita Mid-Continent Airport is on the minds of people around the world right now," White says.
There haven't been such happy outcomes at other places where Cohen, or the wanna-be Cohen, and his filming team have visited.
For instance, staff and members at Central Community Church were not amused by a mid-March visit. One staff member blogged that the crew tried to ruin a church event. "By God's power and providence, the plan was thwarted," he wrote.
And the marketing director for KWCH, Channel 12, lost his job over approving the film crew's visit to his station, though nothing was filmed there because the "reporter" (Cohen?) who was supposed to show up never did.
White says he's heard of a number of other stops the crew has made across Kansas. He says the crew had a permit to film at Kansas City International Airport but never used it.
"The assumption is after their cover was blown here... they decided not to show up in Kansas City after all," White says.
It's hard to imagine the somewhat juvenile footage from the airport here making Cohen's movie, but it sounds like White would buy a ticket one way or the other.
Did he see "Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan"?
"Oh, yes," White says.
He admits he has a strange sense of humor, but when asked if he liked "Borat," White thinks it's best not to say.
"No comment," he says.
The other Final Four
People may mock the WichitaWingnuts' name, but they've got to give props to the new baseball team's logo.
It's in the Final Four of CNBC.com's logo contest for minor league baseball.
"I'm surprised we've made it this far," says Joe Robertson, Associated advertising's associate creative director, who created the logo. "It's pretty crazy."
The logo features a personified baseball who has a wingnut for a hat.
So far, the Wingnuts have beat teams like the Trenton Thunder, whose logo is a large storm cloud with a baseball bat for a bolt of lightning.
"When we went up against them, I thought it was all over," Robertson says.
Final Four voting ends at 8 a.m. today (Click here to vote in the poll). If the Wingnuts make it to the finals, they'll compete against the Southern Illinois Miners. Voting will begin immediately.
So if the Wingnuts win, does Robertson get a raise?
"I wish," he says. "It's CNBC. I don't think we get anything."
Location, location
Lisa Vermillion recently discovered her Get Fit Bee Fit in Valley Center is strategically located for meeting celebrities.
Well, at least one so far.
The fitness center and tanning salon is just down from the Kansas Coliseum, where Keith Urban played last month. His personal trainer called Get Fit to ask if Urban could come work out before the show.
"We were like uh, yeah," Vermillion says. "Of course he can."
Urban's trainer and bodyguard showed up a couple of hours before he did.
"We think to probably check out and make sure there weren't 10,000 people there," Vermillion says.
Only the people who happened to be working out were there.
"We didn't tell anybody," Vermillion says.
Urban exercised for about an hour, which included elliptical training and free weights.
Vermillion says if she hadn't known it was him, she would have thought he was simply an average joe.
"He was a very cute average joe," she clarifies.
And she's hoping he won't be the last celebrity visitor.
"We're hoping because we didn't blab our big mouths that word might get around," she says. "It was just fun... to have a celebrity in our little town of Valley Center."
You don't say
"Elvis. Fire the Colonel; dump the drugs and the entourage. Live, man."
--Carolyn Russell, whose public relations firm was profiled in the national newspaper Public RelationsTactics, which asked her what historical figure she'd most like to offer some counseling.
