Published: March 09, 2008 01:57 am      

‘You’re the happy dude on TV’

‘Extreme Makeover’ featuring Turners to be aired tonight

FAIRMONT — Recently when Richard Turner was shopping at Gabriel Bros., a man recognized him and said, “You’re the happy dude on TV.”

“That was so funny,” Turner chuckled. “I couldn’t help but laugh. His girlfriend was with him and she started cracking up. You could tell that guy was excited for me.”

So far, Turner has just been the “happy dude” regionally, but the entire nation will get the opportunity to see him and his family during one of the most joyous times of their lives, when a show documenting the construction of their new home on Montgomery Avenue in Fairmont airs tonight.

More than three months ago in late November, the family got a surprise at their front door from TV host Ty Pennington of the ABC reality show “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition.” Pennington stood outside with a bullhorn and shouted, “Good morning, Turner family!”

Local media captured the ensuing jubilation as Turner and his family — wife Angie and kids Desmond, Teresa, Layton, Tyron and Michael — reacted with glee at the news that their 600-square foot house would be demolished to make room for a 2,800-square foot home with four bedrooms and three bathrooms.

“It just blew me away,” Richard Turner said.

The show will air at 8 p.m. today on ABC. However, WBOY-TV, the Clarksburg-based NBC affiliate, will present a show at 7 p.m. show called “Behind the Build” and then will present the episode at 8 p.m.

“Since there isn’t an actual ABC affiliate in this market — everyone gets it out of Pittsburgh — we saw it as an opportunity, so we purchased it,” said WBOY news director Aaron Williams. “We worked out a deal with ABC to air the actual episode for people around here who might not have cable and only get us and channel 5. We wanted to make sure everyone around here could see the episode.”

The station also bought rights to some West Virginia University football games that aired last fall, Williams said.

“That set the table for doing something like this,” Williams said.

The show will be presented live from the I-79 Technology Center in Fairmont at exit 132 of Interstate 79. That will be the site of the official viewing party for volunteers and others associated with the week-long build, which was headed by Bridgeport-based Huffman Corp.

WBOY’s Karen Kiley and Sarah Kapis will host the party and introduce segments showing coverage of the build, Williams said. Kiley also has taken a tour of the house and footage from that will air on the news at 11 p.m. after the show airs.

“ABC is very strict and we can’t show any video from inside the house until the episode airs,” Williams said.

Festivities will begin at 6:30 p.m. and the Turners are expected to make an appearance around 7 p.m. before going back home to watch the episode from their new home, while those attending the party will watch at the center’s 9x16-foot projection screen, said Fairmont Deputy Mayor John Dahlia, who acted as a press liaison during the shoot.

The thought of watching the show has Richard and Angie Turner both excited and anxious.

“I’m very nervous knowing that the whole world is going to be watching me on television, me and my family,” Richard said. “Once the show airs, more and more people are going to be staring down and looking at me. It’s just weird. I feel like a mini-celebrity.”

It was Angie Turner’s idea to apply for the show, and the application process was daunting, they both said.

“My wife went online and it was a 30-page application she filled out,” Richard said. “Just that alone, some people might go on there and be like, ‘This is too much.’ That showed that she really believed in the show. I know myself, if I looked at that, I would have been like, ‘No way.’”

Just over a year ago, the family made a videotape in February 2007 and sent it in to be considered for the show, in which Pennington and a team of designers and carpenters demolish an existing house and, in about a week, construct a dream home tailored to that family’s tastes and hobbies.

“We joked around when we did the tape,” Angie said. “They contacted us in September and came and visited us and told us they were considering us.”

A three-month background check then took place. “We felt like we were getting hired for the White House,” Angie said. “We also found out the day we won that someone had been following us around for three months.”

The family had to dig up documents, including the deed to the house, which had been built by Angie Turner’s family and given to her when she was 18 years old. They also had to deal with a lien that had been placed on the house because of a 20-year-old phone bill incurred by another member of the family, Richard said.

“It wasn’t easy,” Angie said. “They don’t just show up with a bullhorn. I’m glad we went through it, but a few times, we wanted to give up and throw in the towel.”

The attention the family has received also has provided for some challenging moments. “It can be good and bad,” Angie said. “Our children in school are more scrutinized. When you are in the spotlight, people look at you and try to find things. That’s been interesting, that part.”

Weather and location made the 96-hour build difficult for the construction crew and hundreds of volunteers, too. Show producers said the location — atop a hill accessible by narrow, twisty roads — was the most difficult they ever had encountered, and the weather during the early December project ranged from rain and cold to snow and more cold.

The Turner family spent the week in warmer climes at Disney World, where a guide had planned their activities and took them to the front of the ride lines. They were given two Disney World Visa cards and told to buy all the food and souvenirs that they wanted.

“We ate really well and we saw shows, like the “Lion King” show,” Angie said.

While at Disney World, the family learned about the first of several gifts from the community — WVU scholarships for the kids. “We can’t thank Mike Garrison enough,” Angie said.

When they returned, Pennington and the designers staged a big reveal featuring the construction crew, volunteers and community members that rode shuttles to the site.

“It was overwhelming,” Richard said. “I knew they build a house for you, but I didn’t think it was going to be that big. It blew me away. All my emotions just ran wild. I was really, really blown away.”

Angie was pleased with how the interior designers captured the family’s taste. “The colors that are in the house, my daughter and I were talking the day before coming back about those colors being our favorite colors,” she said. “We were talking about fashion.”

Designers took elements of the old house — such as roosters on the wall in the kitchen — and “put a touch of that” into the decor, Angie said.

The family has been enjoying all the room in their new home. In the old house, Michael and Tyron slept on bunk beds and Desmond slept on a mattress on the floor after Michael, Richard Turner’s cousin, came to live with the family.

“It’s been wonderful just to have room and space for the kids not to be all bunched up,” Richard said. “We don’t have to wait on each other. We’ve got three full bathrooms. It’s been a wonderful feeling for the kids to have their own space.”

Angie noted that she initially had some trepidation about letting the old house go because she had inherited it.

“I would do it a million times if I had to,” she said. “I felt like this was our blessing. I know there are more needy people. We’ve been blessed and put in this position so we can help other people. We don’t take anything for granted and we’re very humbled.”

E-mail Mary Wade Burnside at mwburnside@timeswv.com.