I watched J.Z. Knight's rise from the start and always felt she swiped the whole "Ramtha" scam from the role Barbara Harris played in Alfred Hitchcock's final film, Family Plot (1976). The timing would be right. In that role, Harris portrayed a con artist who "channeled" departed loved ones. Her form of delivery was very much like Knight's slightly later fraud performance. Ramtha, yeah, right. Give me a break.
A few times I have wondered what a Mad Max style cage fight between J.Z. Knight and Lency Spezzano would be like. Knight would summon Ramtha but Lenora would use her downloading/joining hypnotic stare while channeling Heaven's grace. In terms of financial profit, Knight wins. But in terms of winning the Oscar in the category of Hammy Performance, we have a real contest. Lenora might be in the bush league as a New Age con artist, but I think she could hold her own against J.Z. in the "best performance by a hammy actress" slot.
So how did J.Z. Knight manage to far eclipse her contemporary American New Age frauds the Spezzanos and their Spezzano and Associates Ltd. Psychology of Vision in terms of merchandising? That is a good topic for an academic thesis.