Mariah Carey welcomes home Gaston family
Pop superstar Mariah Carey stepped out of a van, into a director's chair and waited Sunday for Finis Gaston and the niece and nephews he's been caring for to step out of a limousine on Sunday and see their new "Extreme Makeover: Home Edition" home.
"Extreme Makeover" may be a reality TV show, but as spectators found out Sunday, it's still a TV show and so trying to make a quality production was Job 1 for the production crew onhand Sunday in Pensacola. What did that mean? A lot of waiting for spectators and an almost eerie parade practice scene in which marching bands, cheerleaders and floats came down the street with no music.
But it also meant that the onlookers got to yell "Move that bus!" in a scene that will be played out as a special holiday episode of the popular TV show. And it meant they got to catch more than a glimpse of the show's star - Ty Pennington - and of Mariah Carey, who has more No. 1 hits than Michael Jackson and is second only to The Beatles in that category.
Carey stayed secreted in a commercial building near the build site at 1301 Rainbow Ave. in Pensacola, then was moved to the "Move that bus!" site just before the carefully rehearsed, but no less enthusiastic, band made its way down the street. When the doors of the white van she was in opened, thousands of onlookers, including member of the Fairhope High School cheerleading squad, screamed in excitement.
It was the crowning moment of a busy week for Frank Lott III and the whole Mobile-based Heritage Homes crew that made the home possible. "With Finis being a huge fan of Mariah Carey, it makes today that much more special," Lott said. "And for our team and all the volunteers, watching the family's reaction and seeing the final home lit up for Christmas was what we have been thinking about this whole week while we worked."
As for what the family got to see when they stepped inside the 3,600-square-foot home with 4 bedrooms, 3 bathrooms and a nursery will remain a relative secret until the show airs December 12. Lott told the Press-Register that he could say that one room in the house required extensive wiring and should be quite spectacular. That's a little surprising since show cast member Xzibit was not on the design team, which included Pennington (who split his time between this build and another one going on simultaneously in another state), Michael Maloney, Johnny Littlefield and Tracy Hutson.
Carey has a new holiday album coming out, which is part of the reason for her appearance at the "Extreme Makeover" reveal. The other reason is that she is the favorite singer of Gaston, a male cheerleader who was attending Alabama A&M in Huntsville, Alabama, when his mother died and he left school to take care of his niece and her children. (Alabama Live)
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