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NBC's "Contender" Casualty
Mark Burnett and Sylvester Stallone are down one contender before their boxing reality show has aired its first episode.
Najai "Nitro" Turpin, a 23-year-old contestant on NBC's forthcoming Burnett-Stallone-produced The Contender, committed suicide Monday in Philadelphia. Police say he apparently shot himself in the head while sitting in a parked car with his girlfriend outside his gym at about 4 a.m.
NBC confirmed Turpin's death on Wednesday and announced that the show, which is also produced by DreamWorks' Jeffrey Katzenberg, would go on as scheduled Mar. 7.
"The episode in which he was most depicted will stand as a wonderful testament to who he was. It will not be changed," Burnett, whose credits include Survivor and The Apprentice, said in a network-released statement. Burnett referred to Turpin as "great fighter with tremendous heart and courage."
Although most of the action on the boxing show has already been shot, a planned live championship bout was set to take place in May. Burnett's statement seems to indicate that Turpin did not progress that far. NBC says the show will not have to be substantially revamped in the wake of Turpin's death.
Each episode of the show focuses on two fighters, their families and their hardships, and culminates in a boxing match between them. NBC says it will add a tribute to the episode featuring Turpin and will encourage viewers to donate money to a trust found for the boxer's two-year-old daughter, who is featured in the episode along with Turpin's girlfriend.
Turpin was a middleweight with a 13-1 record. In the premiere episode, Stallone describes Turpin as "a tough, punchy street kid from Philadelphia fighting for a better life for his family." His bio on The Contender Website says Turpin was "born and raised in the ghetto" and "just a few months ago, Najai was robbed at gunpoint and lost $900."
He finished taping The Contender last fall and returned to his hometown. Per his Contender contract, he was not permitted to box again until the show finished airing in May, but the show was paying him a $1,500 weekly stipend to continue his training.
NBC is banking on The Contender's success. Each of the show's 13 episodes is costing the network $2 million--a huge sum for a reality series.
Turpin's suicide is the latest trouble for the show, which was entangled this summer in a lawsuit skirmish with Fox's similarly themed The Next Great Champ. Burnett lost the initial court rounds trying to block Fox from airing the Oscar De La Hoya-hosted show, which quickly tanked in the ratings and was shunted off to the Fox Sports cable network.
Champ's demise had made NBC suits nervous about The Contender's prospects; now Turpin's suicide must have them on edge.
The New York Times reports that NBC executives did not believe Turpin's suicide had anything to do with the series. His manager, Percy Custus, tells MSNBC.com that Turpin "had a lot of stuff on his mind." Another Custus protégé, Ty Flowers, was killed in a drive-by in Philadelphia six months ago.
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