Man Claims Times Sqaure ‘Fake Celeb’ Prank Was His Terrible Idea First [Video]

Last week, a man named Brett Cohen caused an Internet hububaloo when he hired a bunch of people to act

A man with a plan, that’s who (YouTube)
Last week, a man named Brett Cohen caused an Internet hububaloo when he hired a bunch of people to act as his entourage and walked around Times Square, just like a famous person. Exactly like a famous person, actually, because you know how you always see Andrew Garfield or those kids from The Hunger Games just chilling outside of Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. for hours, letting random people photograph them. Ugh, celebrities are the worst.

No, well, Mr. Cohen is actually more “the worst,” for thinking that duping a bunch of tourists and then putting the video online counted as some sort of statement on today’s celeb-obsessed culture.

Sign Up For Our Daily Newsletter

By clicking submit, you agree to our <a href="http://observermedia.com/terms">terms of service</a> and acknowledge we may use your information to send you emails, product samples, and promotions on this website and other properties. You can opt out anytime.

See all of our newsletters

But wait! The Observer received a correspondence from a gentleman named Thomas Cramer, a member of Chill Hill Media, who wants to claim ‘The Worst’ title for himself and his crew. Mr. Cramer says that he did this fake celeb stunt long before Mr. Cohen, and that the latter directly ripped off his idea.

In April, Mr. Cramer and a crew went to a mall in Virginia and pulled a similar “unknown celebrity” prank, with his people telling bystanders that he was in The Hunger Games and Spider-Man. For some reason, they also said his name was Thomas Elliott. A lot of people believed him.


Conclusion: People all over America will assume you are a celebrity if you hire people to tell them you are a celebrity.

But Mr. Cramer wants the glory and credit of this idea. “(Our) video received a ton of reception and coverage from many worldwide outlets,” he wrote. “Including interviews with some major players. We never broke the ‘appearance on GMA’ threshold, but were close.”
He goes on to say how much Mr. Cohen’s “social experiment” resembled his own, which is true in the sense that they both have pretty terrible definitions of “experiment.” And “social.”

From branding as a social expirement, to using the film Spiderman, to the photos with police officers, etc, we were pretty upset. Obviously in the creative world thing are copied, done bigger and better, and happen more than once. But to give this kid credit for an original concept would be a major mistake. There are several articles and interviews you can Google relating to what we did months ago.

We did just that, and found that Gawker had indeed written about Chill Hill’s prank. So there you go. You guys both get credit. Of course, you were also beat to the punch by David Hampton, and this guy and countless others, but who is counting?

Man Claims Times Sqaure ‘Fake Celeb’ Prank Was His Terrible Idea First [Video]