Young surfer takes
spotlight after attackBethany Hamilton is busy
with interviews and might turn
her tragedy into real profit
KILAUEA, Kauai >> There's talk of a reality show and a clothing line, speaking appearances and a book -- a lot of attention for a 13-year-old girl who's never recorded a song or rehearsed a script.
Bethany Hamilton was known for her surfing skills on Kauai's North Shore, but now tragedy has made her one of the most in-demand teenagers in the national media. On Oct. 31, while she was on her surfboard just off shore, a shark attacked her, biting off her left arm. Fellow surfers got her to shore, using a surf leash as a tourniquet.
Hamilton made her national debut with a series of interviews last week. In one of the first, she told The Associated Press she will surf again despite her loss. "I can't change it," she said. "That was God's plan for my life and I'm going to go with it."
She's off to a busy start.
Her TV debut came Friday, when she appeared on "Good Morning America," "20/20" and "Inside Edition."
More is to follow: appearances with talk show hosts Jay Leno, David Letterman and Geraldo Riviera, not to mention stories expected in newspapers and magazines from People to YM.
Her father, Tom, appeared on NBC's "Today" last week and received a call from his interviewer, Matt Lauer, later that day.
"He said, 'You know, your daughter's the most sought-after teenager in the world. She's even surpassed Jessica Lynch,"' Tom Hamilton said.
Hamilton is the latest victim of tragedy to grab the spotlight, a place that's been occupied by everyone from Olympic figure skater Nancy Kerrigan, clubbed on the knee in a plot linked to rival Tonya Harding, to Aron Ralston, the hiker who cut off his own arm after it was pinned beneath a boulder.
Unlike victims whose fame is fleeting, Hamilton's manager, Roy Hofstetter, believes her ordeal will have a lasting impact.
"What I'm trying to do is make this 15 minutes of fame into Brand Bethany Hamilton," said Hofstetter, who speaks of the young surfer with the type of enthusiasm that's half doting uncle, half Hollywood promoter.
He said he's also in talks for movies, books, a reality show, a clothing line and a speaking tour.
"This is a really amazing story that will last many years," Hofstetter said.
Others aren't so sure.
After CBS's "48 Hours Investigates" dropped out of the competition for an interview with Hamilton, the show's executive producer, Susan Zirinsky, said she wasn't sweating it.
"These stories are like buses," she told the New York Post. "You try to catch them, and if one passes you by and you don't make it, there's always another."
But tragedy sells well, said Simon Moore, communications professor at Bentley College outside Boston.
"In our wired world, tragedy is like cereal or deodorant," Moore said. "The media is aware that tragedy sells, so naturally we get a lot of them."
Bethany says she doesn't like interviews and doesn't pick which ones she does. But she says some good can come out of her story, relating how she was told that two young girls "came to know the Lord" because of her demonstration of faith during tragedy.
Many say sharing a personal tragedy can also help healing.
"Anyone who has felt like a victim at one time or another will find it liberating to unload," said Judith Lederman, a publicist and author of her own story, "The Ups & Downs of Raising a Bipolar Child."
Although some television shows, like "Inside Edition," pay their subjects, Hamilton was not compensated for most other interviews. Hofstetter won't say how much "Inside Edition" paid, though he says "it's nothing astronomical."
Paid or not, interviews enhance the young surfer's image, fueling the possibility of profit from other endeavors of Bethany.
"The bigger the scale of the tragedy, the larger the amount of money," said Robert Smith, author of "How To Be Famous in 90 Days."
But Sally Stewart, a former reporter and author of "Media Training 101," a guide to dealing with the press, said "many people caught in tragedies don't make a penny."
"The biggest beneficiaries," said Stewart, "are the media themselves."
Michael Sands, a Los Angeles publicist, said the media is just giving in to consumer desires.
"The reader gets involved in the person's life," he said. "It is a quick movie in five minutes -- a soap opera with real high drama."
At the expansive, borrowed Kauai estate where Hamilton gave her first interviews last week, her father explained his family's decision to go public.
"We're not into this for the money," said Tom Hamilton. "But the opportunities are there and people want to know the story."
