You know it’s true

Rob Pilatus, left, and Fab Morvan show off Grammys.
 Milli Vanilli on film (read on to see videos)

A Las Vegas woman who forced the Milli Vanilli scandal to go public hopes a planned film “will be some kind of vindication.”

Jodie Rocco and her twin sister, Linda, were backup singers for the German-produced dance-pop duo that was stripped of a best new artist Grammy in February 1990 when the lip-synching scam was exposed.

Rocco, a public relations executive for nightclubs.com, said she gave Frank Farian, a powerful German music producer, an ultimatum at the time: Confess to the scheme, or she would blow the whistle.

Farian called a news conference and acknowledged the fraud but has “continued to lie and cover up,” Rocco said.

She said in an interview Sunday that it is the first time she has divulged her role in exposing the scandal.

Milli Vanilli sold 30 million singles and 11 million albums before the con job was revealed. It turned out that Fab Morvan and Rob Pilatus were models who couldn’t sing. Pilatus died of a combination of drugs and alcohol in April 1998.

Through digital trickery in the recording studio, Farian produced three No. 1 hits, “Girl You Know It’s True,” “Baby Don’t Forget My Number” and “Blame It on the Rain.”

Girl You Know It’s True

Baby Don’t Forget My Number

Blame It on the Rain

Digital fakery “was commonplace at the time,” said Rocco, who moved from Germany to Las Vegas in 1990.

She and her sister received about $100,000 each for their efforts on all the projects. Asked what she thought she was cheated out of, Rocco said “between $8 (million) to $9 million,” if given a standard 1 percent to 2 percent of the net earnings.

News Source: Review Journal