Johnny Weir
If you follow figure skating at all, I’m sure you know who Johnny Weir is. Even if you don’t, you may have seen the recent viral email with him singing karaoke to “Before He Cheats”. I’d include the video here, but 1) it’s not available on YouTube and 2) it was REALLY terrible!
Anyway, Johnny is always irreverent and always outrageous. Recently he’s been in trouble with anti-fur activists after he added some fox fur to one shoulder of the costume he wore at Nationals. Now, he’s apparently been receiving threats.
It has always seemed a little “off” to me to threaten human lives in order to protect animal lives, but maybe that’s just me. In any case, it does seem like the Olympics is the proper venue for airing those kinds of grievances. He’s changed the costume he’s wearing, so I don’t know what else people want from him.
What do you think?
Here’s a clip of Johnny skating at the 2010 U.S. Championships where he finished third and earned another trip to the Olympics:
On February 4th, Johnny Weir tweeted:
Just found out that a karaoke video of me is on NBC Olympics website. Mortified. I cannot sing, and I will never claim to have talent.
NBC set up a series of Olympians to have fun with it, lol.
When asked about exposure and reality shows, Johnny once made some wise observations. He said he did not want to be a reality show maven. He wanted to be known for being excellent at something, rather than just to be famous and popular.
He is an excellent skater— and good to know he has no illusions about his singing