Andrew Jenks Uncovers More Bizarre Mysteries in New Podcast Season
*By Max Godnick*
Why did Dave Chappelle walk away from a $50 million contract and move to Africa? Why do music superstars keep dying at age 27? And did anyone ever get to the bottom of the [Balloon Boy](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQ8i8coWGyc) hoax?
Documentarian Andrew Jenks's podcast, "What Really Happened?" is returning for a second season to answer those questions and more of pop culture's most confounding mysteries. The show's first season focused on other bizarre events like Chris Christie's [Bridgegate](https://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/christie-bridge-scandal/bridgegate-scandal-ex-christie-allies-bill-baroni-bridget-kelly-get-n739941) scandal, Michael Jordan's early retirement, and Britney Spears's very-public breakdown and head-shaving incident in 2007.
"I'm trying to tell the best campfire story that I can," Jenks said Wednesday in an interview on Cheddar.
The filmmaker gained fame as host of MTV's "World of Jenks" and as the director of a handful of ESPN documentaries, including "The Zen of Bobby V" and the 30 for 30 short "Posterized."
He said the idea for his podcast came while he developed a documentary about Muhammad Ali reportedly talking a man out of suicide in 1981.
That film never came to fruition, but the strong idea caught the attention of Dwayne "the Rock" Johnson and his production company Seven Bucks.
"The Rock likes things big," Jenks said, noting that it was Johnson who suggested the idea might work best in a podcast format.
"You don't say no to what The Rock thinks."
The idea proved to be a hit, and eventually the show landed at #1 on the Apple Podcast charts.
In the second season premiere, Jenks explores the rationale behind Venus Williams [forfeiting](https://www.nytimes.com/2001/03/18/sports/tennis-serena-williams-wins-as-the-boos-pour-down.html) a 2001 match against her sister Serena just four minutes before it was scheduled to take place. The incident caused some to speculate that the pair's father Richard orchestrated the whole thing to manipulate the results of the tournament.
"It's B.S.," Jenks said of the conspiracy theory. "She was injured."
Another episode unpacks the sudden [hearing issues](https://www.nytimes.com/2018/09/01/science/sonic-attack-cuba-microwave.html) that American diplomats stationed in Cuba began experiencing in 2016. Commonly described as "sonic attacks," the phenomenon led to the medical examination of 21 U.S. officials and prompted Jenks to interview neurologists, members of the CIA, the Cuban Ambassador, and acoustic weapons experts.
"A 'sonic attack' is a fabricated, made-up term that scientists have historically always dismissed," he said.
Jenks would not reveal what (or who) he believes to be the true culprit ー but he did offer a clue.
"When it smells and kind of acts and looks like Vladimir Putin, a lot of the time, it is Vladimir Putin."
For full interview [click here](https://cheddar.com/videos/andrew-jenks-solves-worlds-greatest-pop-culture-mysteries).
Catching you up on today's entertainment headlines with the Tribeca Film Festival has kicked off in NYC, "Black Adam," starring Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson dropped its first full trailer, the musical "Come From Away" based on a true story set during 9/11 will be closing on Broadway this October, and more.
Survivors of Larry Nassar, including Olympian Simone Biles, are seeking $1 billion in damages from the FBI due to its failure to investigate the former gymnastics team doctor convicted of committing years of serial sexual abuse of minors. Jack Queen, a senior reporter at Law360, joined Cheddar News to break down the legal grounds of this case. "This is one of the biggest black eyes that the Bureau has faced in generations, quite frankly, and the FBI has taken full responsibility and admitted that it completely botched this investigation," he said. "So, there's a lot of pressure to settle."
The Elevate Prize Foundation is donating $10,000 to different grassroots organizations based on a theme every month to help scale their work, focusing on a different theme each time. Upcoming prizes will help uplift an organization supporting the LGBTQ community and one mobilizing to help end gun violence. The foundation's CEO Carolina Garcia Jayaram joined Cheddar to discuss the initiative and why it's important to uplift these grassroots organizations. "We are identifying social entrepreneurs around the world to help them scale their work. but the ultimate purpose of that is to create the first-ever fanbase for good," she said. "We're trying to make good famous and by inspiring people to think about the role they can play in doing good in the world."
With real estate being a largely male-dominated industry, Stephanie Shojaee, vice president and chief marketing officer at development company Shoma Group, joined Cheddar News to discuss how she took on the gender gap for women to achieve leadership roles, starting at her own company. “It's been very important to teach all the women that work here, especially the younger ones, that they shouldn't change themselves," she said. "You need to be happy with who you are and just keep breaking barriers."
We are already starting to feel the effects of summer. Heat waves in Texas and California are already sending temperatures soaring. That could spell trouble for the nation's power supply. there are new concerns about outages in many areas of the country. Cheddar's Shannon Lanier explains the two main causes of blackouts, and what states are doing to keep the lights on and the air conditioning running.
If you have been on the road this past year, you've probably seen more accidents on the road than you ever have. You're not wrong. Traffic fatalities are not only increasing they are hitting historic highs. Almost 43,000 people died in motor vehicle accidents in 2021. Cheddar's Shannon Lanier investigates - and finds out why.
U.S. stocks close Tuesday at session highs after a subpar start to the trading day. Tim Chubb, Chief Investment Officer at the wealth advisory firm, Girard, joins Cheddar News' Closing Bell to discuss. 'We're starting to see the moderation of three core things -- we've seen the moderation of prices, we've seen the moderation of wage growth we've seen in the labor market, and we've also seen a moderation of job openings,' he says.
The victims from the USA gymnastics sexual abuse scandal continue to seek justice. Survivors of Larry Nassar are seeking more than one-billion dollars from the FBI for failing to stop the convicted sports doctor when the agency first received allegations. According to a report released by the Justice Department's Inspector General, FBI agents knew
in July of 2015 that Nassar was accused of abusing gymnasts; however, Nassar wasn't arrested until December of 2016. The group that filed the claim includes Olympic medalist Simone Biles and around 90 other women. Louise Radnofsky, sports reporter at The Wall Street Journal, joins Cheddar News' Closing Bell to discuss.
Tattoo artist Katrina "Kat Tat" Jackson, famous for starring in the VH1 hit series "Black Ink Crew: Chicago," is also the first Black woman to own a tattoo shop in Beverly Hills. She joined Cheddar News to discuss her trailblazing work, the stigma BIPOC tattoo artists face in the industry, and the way the space has changed for artists of color since her start. "In the beginning, I remember walking into a tattoo shop just like, hey, I wanna learn, I wanna be a tattoo artist and kind of just being laughed at, not taken seriously," she said. "Even with the tattoo conventions, a lot of African American tattoo artists were almost scared to go to conventions because it's not a welcoming environment."
