Doug Henning wore a costume like the one Will Ferrell’s character wore in "Elf" while meeting his father face to face for the first time last week at Boston’s Logan Airport. He even broke into the same awkward song from the 2003 movie. “When he came out of the airport, he probably thought I was a lunatic,” said Henning, 43, of Eliot, Maine. “It was a really good way to break the ice.” His biological father didn’t get the joke because he hadn’t seen the movie, but still gave his son a big hug. Henning said he was raised by “amazing” adoptive parents but he was excited when cousins he met through ancestry.com helped to put him in touch with his biological father.
Just like "Elf," the father didn’t know about his son. The two met on Zoom and Henning’s dad was able to fly to Boston for Thanksgiving. His father gained a son and became a grandfather. Henning is the first of the father’s children to become a parent.