So, here's the scenario: Chris Brown raises a ruckus in his dressing room at ABC's Good Morning America. Brown is so upset he parties on. The network is so upset it invites him back to the show, and, for good ratings, sorry, for good measure, honors his upcoming booking on Dancing With the Stars.
Can you say wrong? Better yet, can you say publicity stunt?
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The lifestyle site SheKnows already did. It suggested Brown is cribbing from the Kanye West playbook. (Page 45: How to make sure your morning-show appearance gets prime-time coverage).
That's plausible enough, but we were thinking of something grander, something where Brown and ABC join forces to drive viewers to GMA and DWTS, and record buyers (should there be any of those around anymore) to you-know-who's new album.
But that's just crazy talk.
Um, isn't it?
People don't really stage publicity stunts, er, right?
Media and P.R. guru Peter Shankman, who, yikes, has staged publicity stunts for his clients, reminds us anything is possible.
"If he'd just gone on and said life is fine, [the story's over]," Shankman says of Brown. "Now it has a life until next week."
That would be next week when the singer is scheduled to perform on DWTS.
As we suspect you've heard by now.
"If it's a stunt," Shankman says, "it's done exactly what it was supposed to do."
Well, maybe not exactly.
DWTS has been slammed for not shunning the dressing-room-wrecker, already on probation for the Rihanna assault, while Brown has been slammed for acting like the worst version of himself--again.
"He really hasn't done great work for himself here," Shankman says.
Then again, Brown doesn't have a lot to lose in the reputation department, and since ABC isn't pressing charges for the GMA incident, he doesn't even have a lot to lose in the freedom department, either.
"As long as you threw a cooler and didn't hit one of the females in the eye," Shankman says, "I can't see him hurting himself anymore."
But, if DWTS' own message boards on the ABC site are an indicator, he could hurt the hit show.
On second thought, this is sounding more like it could be a publicity nightmare than a publicity stunt.