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Five or six times a week, week in and week out, stretching now into year in and year out, somebody calls Dawn Jenkins' cell phone and asks to speak to God.
It's not a hoax. It's not somebody trying to drive Jenkins crazy, although she acknowledges it might be having that effect.
The St. Petersburg resident is the victim of a bad decision by a very big and important movie maker. Universal Studios used Jenkins' number in the 2003 Jim Carrey hit, Bruce Almighty. In fiction, it was supposed to be God's phone number. In reality, Universal thought it was nobody's phone number.
Universal was wrong.
"It's gotten to the point that if Caller ID comes up "Private Number' or "Private Caller,' I just let it go to voice mail," Jenkins said.
The St. Petersburg Times originally spoke with Jenkins shortly after the movie came out. Back then she was getting 15 to 20 calls an hour from people asking for God. The calls have decreased, but not disappeared.
"Why this is still going on two years after the movie came out, I don't know. I don't even ask people any more why they're calling. I don't have time. I've had two calls for God already today, and it isn't even 2 o'clock."
The problem could have been avoided. Telephone companies and state and federal agencies that issue personal numbers for everything from aircraft registrations to Social Security cards and driver's licenses set aside numerical combinations that are not to be issued to anyone.
It is specifically done so that movie makers, television producers and novelists can use official-sounding numbers without legal ramification.
Perhaps no show on television uses more aircraft than the Fox thriller, 24. The planes and helicopters often are flown by nefarious characters for illegal purposes. If tail numbers matched up with real aircraft, trouble could ensue.
"All TV shows use one of several companies that specialize in keeping the shows out of trouble, in terms of using names, phone numbers, etc., that might result in lawsuits," said Bob Cochran, one of the creators and co-executive producer of 24.
In Cochran's case, the company is Act One, and the script analyst is Ray Felipe.
http://www.sptimes.com/2005/07/22/Southpinellas/Phone_number_brings_a.shtml
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