The 'Borat 2' babysitter says she only made $3,600 for being tricked in the film. Now, she's unemployed and feels 'betrayed.'
- The pastor of Jeanise Jones, the fan-favorite babysitter from "Borat 2," made a GoFundMe to support her as she's unemployed during the pandemic.
- Jones, 62, said she was told by the "Borat" filmmakers that her role was to teach Tutar, the fictional daughter of Sacha Baron Cohen's infamous Borat character, that women had the same rights as men.
- But Tutar and Borat were both fictional characters, and Jones said she felt deceived.
- In an interview with Insider, her pastor, Derrick Scobey, said that he started the GoFundMe because it's his responsibility as Jones' pastor to help her.
A woman who served as a moral compass in "Borat 2" sequel only made $3,600 for the film and is now out of work amid the pandemic, according to an interview she gave in Showbiz411.
Jeanise Jones, 62, played the babysitter in "Borat Subsequent Moviefilm," released Friday, the sequel to Sacha Baron Cohen's 2006 mockumentary, "Borat." In her role in what she thought was a documentary, Jones was asked to babysit Tutar, the 15-year-old daughter of Baron Cohen's infamous Borat Sagdiyev character.
According to a GoFundMe campaign that says it was started by her pastor, Jones prayed for Tutar — who told Jones that she thought women couldn't drive and that she needed to get breast enhancement surgery in order to get a husband — believing she and her problems were real.
In reality, though, Borat and his daughter were fictional, with Tutar played by 24-year-old actress Maria Bakalova.
"Jeanise is nowhere near gullible. In fact, none of us are," Derrick Scobey, Jones' pastor at the Ebenezer Baptist Church in Oklahoma City, told Insider in an interview. But, he said, "we are very open people."
Jones is featured in several scenes throughout the movie, including a moment towards the end that the film that purportedly took place during the COVID-19 pandemic. Jones drove Tutar to what she believed was an appointment for breast enhancement surgery and gave the girl an inspirational speech about how she was beautiful just the way she was.
In a Facebook post on Sunday, Jones said that she did not "know this was a satirical comedy movie and that I was being 'setup.'" In an interview with the New York Post, Jones said she felt "betrayed"
Scobey said on the fundraising page that "Borat" producers had approached him in search of a "'Black Grandmother' for a small role in a 'documentary,'" and Jones was cast in the role. All along, he said, they believed this was a real documentary about Borat and his daughter.
"The joke is on us/Jeanise and that's no problem," the GoFundMe said. Jones shared the GoFundMe page on her Facebook on Monday.
In his interview with Insider, Scobey called the film a "farce" and said that it's his responsibility as Jones' pastor to help her.
"As her pastor who loves her and is going to protect her … this money is for her. This is to help her, this is to help her family, especially during Covid," Scobey said, adding that he wanted to give Jones' fans "a vehicle to say thank you in a tangible way."
The GoFundMe page has amassed 225 donations totaling $6,121 as of Tuesday morning, three days after it was posted.
In an interview with entertainment blog Showbiz411, Jones said she was only paid $3,600 for appearing in the film. She said she received $600 for the first stage of filming and $3,000 for the last stage and never heard from the crew after.
Now, she says, she's found herself unemployed in the pandemic.
Tweet Embed://twitter.com/mims/statuses/1319792843855024129?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
I employ a babysitter in US&A, but since I did not have a baby for her to sit on, instead she take care of my daughter pic.twitter.com/LMmP9jazuc
Jones told Showbiz411 that the crew told her the supposed-documentary was about families "who didn't have any rights" and that she completely believed the girl she thought she was helping was 15.
Jones said that her church had been praying for the girl, too. "We were praying for this girl and what was going to happen to her," she said, according to Showtime411.
Other people featured in "Borat," including Rudy Giuliani, have taken issue with the content of the film. In a lawsuit that has since been dismissed by a Georgia judge, the family of Judith Dim Evans, a Holocaust survivor who educates Borat about Judaism and anti-Semitism in the film but died before the movie came out, alleged that Evans had no knowledge of her scene's intended purpose.
- Read more:
- Sacha Baron Cohen says he spent 5 days in character while living with conspiracy theorists for 'Borat 2'
- Trump responds to second 'Borat' film, where a deleted scene shows the film's actress at the White House, calling Sacha Baron Cohen 'a creep'
- 'No need for security checks or COVID tests': 'Borat' star meets Donald Trump Jr. and visits White House in deleted scenes
- Sacha Baron Cohen pushes back on Rudy Giuliani calling his scene in 'Borat 2' a 'complete fabrication': 'He did what he did'