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The story of the a Mormon Missionary named Kirk Anderson, who claimed to have been kidnapped and held for several days of wild sex with a former Wyoming Beauty Queen named Joyce McKenney while on his mission in England, has been made into a very entertaining documentary entitled Tabloid.

New York Times film critics apparently liked the film and give it a favorable review when it was released in 2010.

I happened to see this documentary on cable (Showtime) today and was absolutely fascinated by the portrayal of Mormonism and Mormons by the real Joyce McKenney, and by the British tabloids, including the Daily Mirror and the Guardian.

All of the clichés are there in real life - the overweight Mormon missionary mother trying to protect her son from an attractive non-Mormon, interviews by mission officials of young missionaries wanting to know if they masturbate, a missionary getting married quickly upon his return home and becoming obese with his wife as they engage in procreation with a vengeance.

And then there is the unexpected part of the story- a Mormon missionary kidnapped by a beautiful young American blonde and taken in a Devonshire cottage for sex. And it is all documented.

We lived near London when this story first broke. We returned to the US shortly thereafter and didn't follow it after we got home. I never realized what a big deal this scandal eventually became in the UK. The LDS Church was struggling with retention when we lived there and I have heard from friends there that things go worse after we left. With this story running for weeks in the Mirror and the Guardian, it is no wonder Mormonism took a hit in the UK in the late 1970's (at least it did in our former Stake there).

The 2010 film does not appear to be available on Netflix, but it is running on Showtime. If you have cable, it would definitely be worth your time to watch it, especially the first half. This documentary contains one of the best explanations of Mormonism for non-Mormons that I have even seen on film.

my old comment: viewtopic.php?p=522619#p522619
Daily Mail 12 th August 2011

warning: the picture fits to the OP... http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2011/08/ ... 34x535.jpg

Were you living in the England London South Mission area?

I met him the first time I entered the ELSM office, in Epsom, Surrey. He was working in the Mission Office. There is some footage of Kirk with Elder Minor, his companion at the time. Then, President Eyre walks in to the picture. It is shot outside the Epsom ward house. If I remember right, there are two short clips outside the chapel. I wonder how they got those for the movie?

I liked the film. I'v watched it over 10 times over the break, which just ended for me.


I was fascinated by the story. The APs would make jokes about him being tied up, but enjoying it, while we were working for the first two weeks of our missions in Epsom. He had just returned to work after the ordeal. Apparently, they talked -and joked- about it together at night after work. 4 APs living together with the office staff of two in one flat.

He was the nicest guy I met on my mission. Really. Easy-going. Didn't seem depressed at all, but he maybe was still shell-shocked?

gramps wrote:Were you living in the England London South Mission area?

I met him the first time I entered the ELSM office, in Epsom, Surrey. He was working in the Mission Office. There is some footage of Kirk with Elder Minor, his companion at the time. Then, President Eyre walks in to the picture. It is shot outside the Epsom ward house. If I remember right, there are two short clips outside the chapel. I wonder how they got those for the movie?

I liked the film. I'v watched it over 10 times over the break, which just ended for me.

I was fascinated by the story. The APs would make jokes about him being tied up, but enjoying it, while we were working for the first two weeks of our missions in Epsom. He had just returned to work after the ordeal. Apparently, they talked -and joked- about it together at night after work. 4 APs living together with the office staff of two in one flat.

He was the nicest guy I met on my mission. Really. Easy-going. Didn't seem depressed at all, but he maybe was still shell-shocked?

We lived in Clayhall in Essex. At that time (as I recall), Clayhall was in the Romford England Stake. We bought a semi-detached on Naseby Road and had a Mini, a VW bus and two kids. I rode the red line into London each day to work.

Interesting that you actually met this Elder Anderson. Did you find the documentary film accurate in terms of what you knew personally about the case?

I wondered about how they got the footage at the ward house as well. Pretty amazing that they could come up with that film given all the claims of "destroyed evidence" in the case.

As I said, we apparently missed all the fun. We read about the arrest but missed all of the drama of the court appearance, the scandalous photos in the tabloids, etc. (Nobody does a sex scandal like the British tabloids.)

ludwigm wrote:my old comment: http://www.mormondiscussions.com/phpBB3 ... 19#p522619
Daily Mail 12 th August 2011

warning: the picture fits to the OP... http://i.dailymail.co.uk/i/pix/2011/08/ ... 34x535.jpg

Ludwig,

The photo looks like a composite or at least heavily photo-shopped to me. This is what Ms. McKenney said that the tabloids did to make her look like a slut.

That photo would certainly seem to support her claim (IMHO).

Thanks for plugging this. I'm watching it on my computer as I type this...it's absolutely fascinating in a slow-motion-train-wreck sort of way.

DrW wrote:The photo looks like a composite or at least heavily photo-shopped to me.

This is the world we live in.

I believe only the photos I forged myself.

The photo didn't look obviously forged to me. Keep in mind this is from the days before Photoshop, so it woulda been done the old-fashioned way. What about it looks chopped to you?

In 1976, when Joyce Mckinney was so photogenic, you could go to your campus library and look in the card catalog under digital photography. You would come away with some references as to the speculation that this someday would be possible. In 1981, Sony came out with first analog electric camera, the Mavica. In 1988, Fuji introduced the first truly digital camera. In 1990, Photoshop 1.0 was introduced for the Macintosh.

Anyway, that photo in any blog would invite me to comment "I would % her." Photoshop or not.

In Hungarian, I have a dozen verb for that % character.
Please feel free to educate me the proper English verbs for %, (as far as it is translated correctly).