Here’s a total shocker (Not!): Kim Kardashian‘s relationship with NBA baller Kris Humphries, and the marriage that followed, was all the result of a well thought out plan by E! just to score major publicity for the Kardashians.
And guess what? Kris Humphries wasn’t even their first choice!
A source tells Wetpaint Entertainment that last fall, a representative of E!, the network that airs the many Kardashian reality shows, approached the New York Knicks to find out if Danilo Gallinari, the studly Italian who was then a forward on the team, would be interested in dating Kim.
According to our source, both E! and Kim were interested in having her date a big New York athlete for the debut season of Kourtney & Kim Take New York, and the Knicks were their first choice. (The show, which first aired in January 2011, begins its second season next month.)
Gallinari — then 22 to Kim’s 30 — was told that such a move would be good for his career and that he would garner lots of media exposure. Gallinari declined, saying he would be happy to meet Kim but wasn’t interested in dating or being a reality-show star.
After Gallinari respectfully declined, E! is said to have approached the New Jersey Nets to “acquire” Kris Humphries, and the rest, as they say, was history.
Within months, Kris proposed to Kim, and a few months after that, they got married in a big elaborate ceremony paid for by E! and several sponsors. So basically, the Kardashians made a boatload of money off of Kim’s relationship wit Kris Humphries.
So hearing that E! arranged Kim’s marriage to Kris doesn’t sound totally shocking. It wouldn’t even be shocking if Kim turned up pregnant within the next year, and they built a reality show around her pregnancy and the subsequent child birth. Would it?
