The Edge’s Jay-Jay Harvey has publicly apologised for a radio stunt she was involved with last week which saw More FM’s Simon Barnett and Gary McCormick duped into interviewing an impersonator they believed to be Tom Cruise.
Kiwis proved to be divided over the incident, with some calling it ‘bullying’ while others defended it as a simple prank.
Now, Jay-Jay herself has taken to Facebook to explain that she had no intention of upsetting the More FM team and had personally reached out to Simon to apologise for what happened.
“Firstly, I am not the sort of person who would ever intentionally want to hurt someone or upset them. I don’t personally know many people who would. Our main goal was to stitch up some fellow radio colleagues, much like what we do to ourselves on our own radio show, or even when we have listeners on to prank their friends or family on features like ‘Wind up your Wife’ or ‘Make Mum Mad’.
“We sincerely thought Si and Gary would find our prank call funny and laugh it off, calling us out, and maybe even get us back one day. We did not mean to upset them like we did. We have been very good work friends with Simon over the years, and we have even had him on our show to do a funny bit when he wanted to win Justin Bieber tickets from us. So you can see why we thought he would appreciate the gag. He didn’t though, and I am sorry. When I heard his Producer Sam crying, my heart sunk in my chest. None of us saw that coming and we would never have wanted that to happen. What sort of person would want that?
“I have been in contact with Simon and personally apologised and he has replied. We both had a good discussion and I understand how he felt at the time. I asked for his forgiveness and he gave it to me. I have also messaged Sam, who I adore. I was having a few wines with her at the radio awards just last week, so of course I feel horrible for upsetting her like that,” she wrote.
“Being on the radio, working hard to come up with fresh, fun content every day is not really that easy. Sometimes we do great stuff (like giving breast implants to a woman who had a mastectomy), and sometimes we miss the mark completely,” Jay-Jay continued.
The prank saw Simon and Gary speaking to a man they thought was Tom Cruise for around 15 minutes, discussing everything from his career to what he thought of New Zealand before discovering he was an impersonator.
In the lead up to the interview, the duo had launched an intensive hunt to get the movie star on air, offering up a $5,000 bounty for a lead or contact details. When Jay-Jay, her husband Dom and co-host Clinton Randell got on the line to explain what had happened, More FM producer Samantha Baxter broke into tears, telling them to “get a life”.
After the interview was over, Simon – who counts Cruise as a personal hero – called it “truly disappointing”.
“I was so stoked, and now my wife and kids are texting. My whole family’s texting. That’s to me what’s wrong with the world, because if people think that’s funny … That’s actually not even funny … I mean, you’d never do that,” he said at the time.
The prank also proved to be polarising with Kiwis listening in, with several taking to Twitter to express their shock.
