Nancy Kerrigan: NBC Airs Kerrigan-Harding Scandal Documentary
Nancy Kerrigan used to be an Olympic figure skater back in 1994, but Kerrigan is most famous for her rivalry with Olympic figure skater Tonya Harding. Before the 1994 U.S Figure Skating Championship, Kerrigan and Harding were set to face off in the “ladies figure skating Olympic short skate”, but on January 6th,1994 Kerrigan was attacked by an assailant wielding a baton that was meant for her leg. The attacker turned out to be Shane Stant who was hired by Tonya Harding’s ex-husband Jeff Gillooly. Tonya Harding however claimed to be unaware of the plan to attack Nancy Kerrigan, until after it happened. Harding says she was scared to come forth because of what Gillooly might have done to her.
Twenty years later, NBC decided to revisit the scandal Sunday night before the closing ceremonies for the Sochi Winter Olympics as a documentary. The Documentary is called Nancy & Tonya. NBC’s goal for this documentary was to do a character study. Mary Carillo is the producer and narrator of the documentary, and she states why she wanted to produce this documentary now:
“I Think 10 years might still be too close, but 20 is a long time. Looking back is going to be a distant experience anyway. What did this do to them? I think that comes over very strongly.”
At first Carillo was having a hard time getting Nancy Kerrigan to agree with the documentary, but she continued to pursue Kerrigan’s agent Jerry Solomon.
“I’ve Known Jerry since he represented tennis players. I would see him at tennis tournaments and I would say to him, ‘Look, I want to do this thing for the 20th anniversary, Carillo says. “He would say, ‘No, she would never want to be apart of that. It’s not something she wants to talk about. For years, he’d tell me that, but I kept at him. He must’ve seen me coming and been like, ‘Oh God! We’re at a tennis tournament. Why is she talking about this? But we all knew it was a good story.”
Nancy Kerrigan’s, and Tonya Harding’s rivalry was all over the media back in the 90’s. Their rivalry was labeled as brunette Vs. blonde, elegance Vs. athleticism, and high-class ice princess Vs. white trash wild card. Nancy Kerrigan had a working class background with loving parents, while Tonya Harding claims to have had a tough lifestyle because her mother would beat on her everyday. Today their scandal is still being capitalized.
Currently Tonya Harding is working for truTv, and had written a book about the incident, and she even claims she was raped in her book. She now lives with her new husband and son in Oregon. Nancy Kerrigan is now a full time mom with three children, a husband, and is currently an NBC correspondent.
