Given her post-Olympics international superstardom, perhaps it was inevitable a rapacious young American teenager would come along and muster the courage to ask double gold-medal gymnast Gabby Douglas to the prom. That the invitation came in December, months before the event -- and that it occurred on YouTube for the entire world to see -- may be a less fortunate turn of events.
The high schooler you see in the video above is a young man by the name of Leon Purvis, though he brands himself as jpmay, as his spiffy YouTube avatar attests to. Evidently Purvis was encouraged to ask Douglas to the prom after watching her interview with Barbara Walters in which the ABC fame maven asked the 16-year-old Douglas if she would like to go to prom.
At the time Douglas said, “That would be nice.” After seeing Purvis’ plea, she might be less openly enthusiastic about the prospect. To call Purvis’ intro aggressive is an understatement, and aggression is never a particularly good thing when it comes to celebrity fandom (there are hundreds of restraining orders that began with just such logic).
Purvis also could have used an editor before going live with his comments. While setting up his big pitch for Douglas to attend the senior prom at Glassboro (N.J.) High, Purvis rolled out a handful of grammatically incorrect statements, including “One of those people were.” He also slows down while offering up his prom invitation to a point where one might almost think he was trying to explain trigonometry to an infant.
Hey Leon: You’re inviting Gabby Douglas to the prom. It’s a cool idea, but it's not quite rocket science.
Still, you have to hand it to Purvis for having the pluck to up and ask Douglas, apropos of nothing. And given the May 31 event date, it isn’t like Douglas doesn’t have enough time to plan for Purvis’ prom, either.
So, will Purvis be escorting Douglas to prom this spring? Only time will tell. Though, as With Leather noted, the teenager could probably help his case by making a second video asking Oprah if she would help convince Douglas to go to prom with him. Get that video out and Purvis’ pro-Douglas prom PR blitz would be complete.
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