First the Fireworks, then the Milli Vanilli Chinese Girl, and now . . . Matt Lauer?

We can’t claim to be surprised by this rumor about Olympics coverage.

The fake fireworks and lip-synching Chinese girl didn’t escape our notice, so hats off to Frank Coffey and the Goodfellas at eTrueSports (yes, we’re the only ones who call them that; no, we haven’t the slightest notion why) for going the extra step. Their heads-up journalism added this little nugget to Beijing’s optical illusion repertoire.

Like The Fireworks, Like The Kid Singer, Was Matt Lauer Fake?

“He’s All Too Real,” says NBC Spokesman

New York – Following news that the Olympic Opening Ceremony’s fireworks and signature song were both faked, NBC is denying a report that event co-host, Matt Lauer was, in fact, a CGI-created version of himself.

Celebrity blog TMZ broke the story shortly after London’s Telegraph newspaper revealed that the spectacular “live” fireworks NBC aired during the Olympic Opening Ceremony were, in fact, computer generated graphics. In other words, they were phony.

Then came news that the lovely Chinese child supposedly singing Ode To the Motherland was miming, a replacement for the real singer whose buck-teeth were deemed by Chinese officials as too unattractive to appear on television. Further fakery.

That got the TMZ folks thinking about Mr. Lauer performance co-anchoring the Opening Ceremonies.

“We analyzed ‘Lauer’s’ speech and movement and found them to be oddly wooden, even for him,” said a TMZ spokesman. “When we compared ‘Lauer’s’ routine to Disney’s WALL-E, we found eerie similarities.”

Further TMZ examination suggested that the life-like “Matt Lauer” – watched by the largest audience in television history, over 4 billion worldwide – was modeled with Houdini software, rendered in Pixar’s RenderMan software program, and was literally a cartoon.

In other words, like the fireworks, like the kid singer, Matt Lauer was fake.

“We believe the purported Matt Lauer figure on American’s television screens during last Friday’s Opening Ceremonies was animated,” said the TMZ spokesman. “If so, this may be the biggest hoax in American media history.”

An NBC statement made clear the network was not denying that Lauer is animated – as in “endowed with life or the qualities of life” – pointing out these are qualities the Today co-host “often evidences on weekday mornings” – but, rather, denying that on Friday night the Matt Lauer the world saw was an animated cartoon figure.

“Trust me, he’s all too real,” said an NBC official who asked not to be identified.

“I am full of vigor and spirit,” said Lauer in a statement also denying the report. “Just ask the craft service people about trying to stop me from grabbing extra donuts.”