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The Portlandian, the Internet's premier source of Tonya News
June 21, 2009 Edition -
(C) 2009 Portland Ice Skating Society
http://www.geocities.com/portice
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Welcome to the latest edition of the Portlandian, the Internet's
leading source of Tonya news.
The past few months have been something of a mixed bag for Tonya.
Tonya has made several high-profile media appearances since our
last issue, and has also suffered a major personal loss.
TONYA RETURNS TO THE BOXING RING FOR "SMOKIN' JOE'S SPORTZBOX"
Tonya was back in the boxing ring in June, but fortunately this
time the sparring was only verbal. She was participating in an
event at Bally's Casino in Atlantic City entitled "Smokin' Joe
Frazier's Sportzbox", an innovative concept in entertainment that
is billed by its creators as "part Hollywood Squares, part Dean
Martin roast, part Family Feud".
The three-day event featured a whole galaxy of stars from the
worlds of sports & entertainment, including Frazier and his son
Marvis, Joe Piscopo, Vincent "Big Pussy" Pastore, Gianni Russo,
Gerry Cooney, Vinny "The Pazmanian Devil" Paz, Bobby Rydell, Dan
Grimaldi, Bill Bergey, Garo Yepremian, Maureen Shea, Chika
Nakamura, Cathy Rocco, Chuck Wepner, Arthur Nascarella and TV
stars Bill Boggs and Gus Johnson (CBS Sports).
http://www.sportzbox.com/champs-and-stars-show.html
Things kicked off on Friday June 12, with the Ribbon Cutting &
Red Carpet Parade along the famed Atlantic City Boardwalk and
into the Red Carpet Celebrity Party to benefit Gilda's Club, a
cancer charity founded by Gene Wilder in memory of his late wife
Gilda Radner. Here's a nice photo of Tonya at the red carpet
event:
http://www.wireimage.com/ItemListings.aspx?igi=377000
Saturday saw the weekend's "Main Event", the "Champs & Stars
Show", a night of hilarity and highlights where celebrity sports
and entertainment stars faced off on a "boxing ring" style stage
in a faux game show, answering questions on the "facts, fiction,
fanfare and foibles from the rich history of the American Sports
and Entertainment industries", while multimedia clips were
played as well on 4 big screens. Al Bernstein (Showtime/IBN),
Dave Bontempo (ESPN) and comedian Jeff Pirrami refereed the
event. Photos can be seen below - Tonya is about half way down:
http://www.wireimage.com/ItemListings.aspx?igi=376989&nbc1=1
The weekend wrapped up on Sunday with Allan Doyle, PGA Senior
Tour Champion, hosting a celebrity Golf Tournament at Blue Heron
Pines.
We have received word that the organizers were very impressed
with Tonya. One of them said that "It was an absolute pleasure
working with Tonya. She was a pro and everyone commented on how
much they enjoyed having her participation. We look forward to
the next opportunity... Really it was GREAT to have Tonya there."
More details can be found at:
http://www.sportzbox.com/sportzbox.html
http://www.sportzbox.com/our-concept.html
http://www.sportzbox.com/business-overview.html
http://www.sportzbox.com/photo-gallery.html
And if you think some of the guys in the photos look like
gangsters, there's a reason: they're cast members of "The
Sopranos". But perhaps that's appropriate, because with ticket
prices starting at only $100, this was definitely a case of "an
offer you can't refuse" if you're a Tonyaphile in the Atlantic
City area!
DOUGLAS UPDATE
Linda Lewis has now sent us two photos of Tonya in Douglas, one
of her catching the catfish, and another of her meeting local
underprivileged kids:
http://www.geocities.com/portice/photos.htm
And here's another photo of Tonya, on roller skates:
http://johnlangfordphotography.com/pics2/DSC03005.jpg
Tonya was also filmed by TV crews for two shows, and clips from
these appearances are now starting to show up on-line. First up
is footage of Tonya catfishing during her trip to Georgia on
Fox's "Strollin' With Nolan" show:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tXZEeD5FtNI
Great to see how excited she gets when she sees the size of her
catch!
And here's the complete interview from HBO's "Real Sports with
Bryant Gumbel" which aired Feb 17th. Bernard Goldberg is the
interviewer. This one features an uncensored version of Tonya
catching the catfish. Then Tonya rips into President Obama for
bringing her name up on the campaign trail when there are so many
more important things he should be dealing with:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=el_d9p2I5xU (part 1)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KbhTrzpCHmQ (part 2)
Overall, it seems to be remarkably positive and even-handed,
speaking of Tonya's charity work, and showing footage of her
roller skating with kids at a rink in Douglas. It looks as if at
least part of the HBO interview was also shown on "The Insider"
on Feb 20th:
http://www.theinsider.com/news/1710137_The_Insider_on_TV_Tonight
We've also been told that Tonya has received considerable e-mail
from fans supporting her as a result of this interview!
TONYA ON INSIDE EDITION
Tonya was also on the March 12 edition of Inside Edition.
Although no video of the appearance appears to be available on-
line, this article has a good summary:
http://www.insideedition.com/storyprint.aspx?SpecialReportID=2714
Tonya is shown coaching a ten year old girl who wasn't even born
when the 1994 Incident occurred, and also performs several jumps
& spins for the cameras. She also expresses her irritation at the
fact that people continue to believe she was involved in the
Kerrigan attack, such as was demonstrated by the Obama comment.
TONYA ON OPRAH
Without doubt the biggest of Tonya's media appearances since our
last issue has been her guest spot on the Oprah Winfrey Show. As
we all know, Oprah is one of the biggest U.S. talk shows, so it
is a major coup for Tonya to be appearing (heck, even Sarah Palin
hasn't been on Oprah, and she was running for Vice President).
The interview, which aired April 23rd, featured new footage of
Tonya skating. The complete show is available on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=INEto2yWq-s (part 1)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Twg7rfQ5knU (part 2)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eaiU0fs-Q5Y (part 3)
The theme of the episode was largely a rehash of various 90's
scandals (Tonya, Lorena Bobbitt etc), in the "whatever happened
to..." vein. This was kind of a pity as we were hoping for
something that was more looking toward the future rather than a
recycling of the past.
Nevertheless, the interview went well; Oprah seemed sympathetic
to Tonya, and she generally handled Oprah's questions okay. We
also got to see Tonya skate at her local rink, Mountain View Ice
Arena in Vancouver WA, where she performed a couple of jumps.
Tonya also seems to be continuing to lose weight and looks better
than she has in years.
The Oprah site has a summary with photos, and also a plug for
Tonya's book:
http://www.oprah.com/article/oprahshow/20090409-tows-tonya-harding
http://www.oprah.com/article/oprahshow/20090409-tows-excerpt-tonya-tapes
NOWEGIAN TONYAPHILES MAKE FASHION STATEMENT
Also on the same photos page are some pictures of members of
Eventyrplassen Vannførelaget, a Norwegian community service group
that adopted Tonya as their mascot, modeling their new t-shirts.
Back in November, we mentioned that Tor Weibye of Vannførelaget
had written to tell us of a design given to them by Norwegian-
American Sarah Rosenbaum, a famous designer who was responsible
for the pictograms that were used to symbolize the various sports
at Lillehammer.
Tor tells us that Sarah made an additional design, only used on
some T-shirts she gave away to her friends from the US that came
to Norway to watch the figure-skating competition. And in the
years after she forgot the whole thing until last summer when she
gave the design to Vannførelaget due to their admiration of Tonya
and her skating.
Tor says that all the members are thrilled by the new shirt and
arranged this group photo.
The slogan on top of the design says: "A society free of ice is a
cold society".
A GOOD WHACK
This long-awaited documentary about the making of the Tonya-Nancy
opera has now been released. You can view a trailer at:
http://www.agoodwhack.com
Running time is 34 minutes. It can be purchased for $19:99 from
createspaces (https://www.createspace.com/263400) or Amazon.
LADIES' 3-AXEL COMPILATION
This video features a compilation of women performing Triple
Axels. All of them appear to be there - including Tiffany Chin
doing one in practice sometime in the early 80's, through to
Kimmie, Midori, Mao Asada, and of course, Tonya (including some
practice jumps). All set to a soundtrack of a work by the
infamous Phil Spector, "You Baby" by the Ronettes:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29SMYaEwGyM
Definitely worth a look.
MORE "WORLD'S DUMBEST"
There hasn't been an awful lot of Tonya news since her Oprah
appearance, so here's some more Tonya goodness from TruTV's
World's Dumbest series:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4S9nmfZzE0c - Tonya & Todd Bridges
discuss sex, violence & politics;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fyJZqG3UHbQ - cheerleader gets
trampled by football team;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2EZN_IBq-W0 - morons try to
destroy evidence by tossing bags of cocaine out the window of
their SUV while being chased by police;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z_zeC6TRY10 - magic show goes
disastrously wrong during half time at the 1987 Orange Bowl.
TONYA ON SWEDISH TV
A lengthy item (around 45 minutes) that Tonya did for Swedish TV
five years ago has surfaced on YouTube. Tonya does some sparring,
some skating, and helps the interviewers make hamburgers.
Although it starts off in Swedish, the vast bulk of it is in
English with Swedish subtitles:
High Chaparall - Pt 1: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=texYliJewCc
High Chaparall - Pt 2: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ceBQxItSlJI
High Chaparall - Pt 3: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1uslzOk0xtM
High Chaparall - Pt 4: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pDwk_pjmGCw
High Chaparall - Pt 5: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pE1msJ8d-kc
More details on the series can be found here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Chaparall
Sounds like one of those "let's laugh at how weird Americans are"
type things, though the Tonya stuff seems largely positive, with
Tonya being allowed to tell her side of the story. It's a pity
that it wasn't shown on U.S. TV.
AL HARDING
April was a month that saw two major events in Tonya's life, one
positive, the other negative. The positive one was the Oprah
invitation. The negative one was the tragic and unexpected loss
of her father. Both are mentioned in this article by Kerry
Eggers:
http://www.portlandtribune.com/sports/story.php?story_id=123922607997907700
Linda Lewis, Tonya's godmother says:
Tonya's beloved father, Al Harding, passed away on April 1st,
at the age of 76. Tonya is devastated by this great loss in
her life. She will continue to go forward in her life and do
the things that would make her dad proud. Al will be missed
greatly by all those who knew him. He loved his daughter and
always wanted what was best for her. There will be a private
ceremony for Al in the near future. If you would like to send
condolences to her, you can mail them to me, and I will
forward them on to her.
Al will be missed greatly by all those who knew him. He loved
his daughter and always wanted what was best for her.
Thank you,
Tonya Harding
c/o Linda Lewis
PO Box 736
Manor, Texas 78653
As we all know, Tonya was very close to her father, so his
passing will be something that is very hard for her to bear.
Messages of condolence can be sent by physical mail to the above
address, or by e-mail to Linda at LGLPR1@aol.com who will arrange
for them to go to Tonya.
Tonya has sent us some photos of a ceremony held last month in
memory of her father:
http://www.geocities.com/portice/photos.htm
The ceremony featured some members of the local branch of the
American Legion, who performed a 21-gun salute for Al, who was a
Korean War veteran.
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VISIT THESE GREAT TONYA WEB SITES:
PortIce - http://www.geocities.com/portice
David House - http://www.tonyaharding.org
Charlie Main - http://www.charliesweb.com/tonya/tonya.html
Puppetboy - http://www.usapaul.net/tonya/
Valerie Smith - http://www.olywa.net/radu/valerie/LilHam.html
Swan Lake - http://members.tripod.com/~TonyaHarding/index.html
Blades of Gold - http://members.tripod.com/tmhfan/index.html
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