Celebrities whose final years ended in tawdry sorrow

Ivanka trump became a cab driver...

Jared turns tricks in Grand Central toilet stalls...

Melania was doing donkey shows in Amsterdam. Sad.

Scots actor Nicol Williamson "died in penury" in Belgium.

Jan Michael Vincent - so incredibly gorgeous back in the 80s - now not sure what else will go wrong for him, other than death?

Brenda Dickson, taking "baths" with paper towels in the sink at Target.

Jerry Lewis saved his own stool in Baggies.

Didn't Betty Hutton end up as a housekeeper in a convent or something?

Constance Smith

Sarah Jessica Parker went to the glue factory.

Sarah Sanders selling her body and drinking malt liquor.

Zora Neale Huston was buried in an unmarked grave until Alice Walker placed one there.

G remained a perennial Oscar loser.

Oprah Winfrey, fused to her Lay-Z-Boy, each rotting hand resting in a bucket of X-tra Crispy.

Bela Lugosi

cough:

Mary Wilson. ☹️

Barbara Eden, Barbara Feldon, Ice-T, Bai Ling, Stefanie Powers, Pauly Shore, Paul Sorvino, Jill St. John Loretty Swit, Robert Wagner, John Amos, Jimmie Walker

Margot Kidder

Dana Plato

Erin Moran

Sarah Jessica Parker is soon to be delivered to the knackery

Corey Haim. He had a hot ass but he couldn’t live forever.

Hedy Lamarr

Erin Moran died in an Indiana trailer park!

Gia Carangi

Gary Coleman

Troy Donahue was homeless for a time in the 80s and when he died he was living in a very basic, depressing 1 bed apartment in Santa Monica with barred windows. When I was waiting tables one of the busboys (who had no idea who he was) lived in his building and I thought it was an incredibly bleak way for a former ‘star’ to end up. In his heyday he had a gorgeous house in the Hollywood Hills, behind the Sunset Strip.

Margaux Hemingway

Jayne Mansfield

Linda Lovelace

Marilyn Chambers

Jean Seberg

George Reinholt

Mickey Rooney

Bela Lugosi

Tiny Tim

Lenny Bruce

Bob Crane

Jeanine Deckers (The Singing Nun)

Bobby Driscoll

Carl "Alfalfa" Switzer

Margot Hemingway

John Holmes

Shirley Hemphill

Paula Yates

Dick York

Not sure what has happened to Richard Simmons but he seems to have left the stage several years ago and no one (few) have seen him since, despite the podcast about it and his supposed calls and messages that he is "ok."

It's Hurston, r12.

William Holden.

George Sanders.

Trog

Liza...

Howard Hughes. All that money and talent, and he ended his life holed up in a hotel suite, wearing a empty Kleenex boxes for shoes.

Jean Seberg

Gail Russell

Errol Flynn

Mayo Methot

Gig Young

Sandra Dee

Billie Holiday

Hervé Villechaize

Johnny Depp

Lani O’Grady. I’d say Susan Richardson too but she’s still hanging on with us.

Donald J. Trump, playing out in real-time!

Barbara Hutton was a cleaning woman in a rectory.

[quote]Not sure what has happened to Richard Simmons but he seems to have left the stage several years ago and no one (few) have seen him since, despite the podcast about it and his supposed calls and messages that he is "ok."

I really think Richard Simmons is trans. In those Enquirer photos, he wasn't crossdressing to be wacky and entertaining. Plus there's gossip from escorts that he dresses up for sex.

Gloria Grahame

^ At first I thought that was Kathy Griffin

He's better looking than Kathy Griffin.

Joan Fontaine

Matthew Garber. His family “redid” his life story, claiming he got hepatitis from eating meat in India.. Claimed “by the time his father got him home from India the hepatitis affected his pancreas.” Yet at the time Garber showed up at a free hospital in London, his family hadn’t seen him for months and had no idea he was back in the U.K. or that he was ill. There was no published obituary anywhere (Disney Archives searched for an obituary for years). His brother didn’t go to his funeral and it’s questionable if there even was a funeral. He was cremated, but the brother had no idea what happened to his ashes. The family never told anyone at Disney about his death and it wasn’t until someone at Disney attempted to contact Garber years after his death for a proposed reunion of Disney stars that they found out he’d died.

It seems Garber’s family didn’t care much about him. I think it was his younger brother who rewrote the story of his death, to make his family appear less dysfunctional.

Who? ^

Anyone else see a touch of Bernadette Peters?

jan hooks. a very long story on her in grantland was spectacularly tragic.

well I think Jayne Mansfield was financially secure, or about there, but she died on the way to another strip club in the south headlining as a stripper. She had had 5 kids by then and was overweight. The car accident that killed her was horrific. Doesnt get too much worse than that.

reply 40........very very clever!

Matthew Garber was a child actor best known for [italic]Mary Poppins.[/italic]

Maggie McNamara spent the last15 years of her life working temp jobs as a typist.

Dorothy Dandridge

Poor Bernadette Peters...

I think Bob Crane and Gig Young own this thread.

Jayne Mansfield had a nightclub act at the time that she was killed, but I think it was singing rather than stripping. She was on her way to perform at the Gus Stevens Supper Club in Biloxi, Mississippi, which was swanky for the time.

r40 for wit and wisdom!

R18, huh?

Judy Garland, essentially homeless the last few years of her life, in debt far beyond her ability to pay off due to substance abuse.

Monty

Peter Lawford

Liza's OK. Despite all her health and other problems, she's living in a comfortable West Hollywood condo, is financially secure and has friends and family caring for and checking on her to make sure she doesn't go off the deep end.

But I'll add Truman Capote to the list. Died in a guest bedroom of Joanne Carson (an ex Mrs. Johnny) because no one else would take him in. Gore Vidal called it "a wise career move."

R58, Jayne was to fill in for fellow blonde bombshell, Mamie Van Doren, who was held up in New York doing a show and couldn't make her Biloxi engagement. Put the blame on Mamie.

I think of Anna Nicole Smith is a modern day tawdry death

Michael Avenatti.

from what I read on here, Janie Lane

Lindsay, selling her body to Russian oligarchs and rich Arabs in Dubai.

^ And trying to steal refugee children while babbling in fake Arabic.

This English comedian came to do Hollywood in the early 60s

Layne Staley, lead singer of Alice in Chains, went into a long terminal decline and the few who saw him in his last years said he looked like an 80-year-old, nearly toothless after years of opiate abuse. He was found in his apartment about 2 weeks after he'd died at age 34.

This thread is a real pick-me-up.

Yvette Vickers. 1950s bombshell B-movie and TV actress, Playboy playmate, romantic partner of actors Ralph Meeker, Jim Hutton, Lee Marvin, and Cary Grant, and magnate Howard Hughes. In 2011, her mummified body was discovered by a neighbor inside her decrepit secluded LA home, after she had not been seen for a while and her mail had been piling up outside. She had been dead for over a year.

[quote]Barbara Hutton was a cleaning woman in a rectory.

Hardly, dear.

Barbara Hutton, the Woolworth heiress. Somebody said that a picture of her in her later years should be in every home where its occupants envy the rich. She squandered a vast fortune and had very little cash left when she died although she did still have some of her expensive jewelry. She was a physical wreck and bedridden for some time before she died; one of her nurses said that one of her greatest joys was getting her ass wiped.

Brenda Frazier, the famous "Glamour Girl" debutante of the thirties. Although well off financially she basically rotted away in her apartment, bedridden, anorexic and bulimic, addicted to pills and booze. She was the subject of a Diane Arbus photo. Arbus was noted for taking pictures of "freaks" and the once famous and envied Glamour Girl certainly classified as one by then. The photo showed Frazier in bed; her face is made up, gaunt, and wrinkled, she's holding a cigarette and she has a kind of "waiting to die" expression on her face.

Gloria Morgan Vanderbilt. Married to Reggie Vanderbilt, it was supposed she was set for life, but he died broke and the only money she got came from the money left to her daughter Little Gloria, who later became the mother of Anderson Cooper. Slandered and disgraced during a tawdry custody battle for Little Gloria, her later years were marked by poverty and blindness. She had nothing to live on; Little Gloria, who came into her trust fund money was was filthy rich, didn't give a damn about her, so in order not to starve she sold her magnificent wedding ring from Reggie Vanderbilt and was helped financially by her twin sister Thelma. She gradually lost her sight due to glaucoma. Pictures of her in her later years show a prematurely aged, weary, defeated woman, quite a contrast from the years when she was considered to be "the world's most beautiful widow", as she was called after Vanderbilt's death.

Frances Farmer died August 1, 1970. Alone.

Brenda Frazier, the Paris Hilton of the late '30s

Brenda Frazier, dissipated

She looks a little fat ^

Anne Boleyn was a pre-internet celebrity who died accused of bedding her brother.

Marie Prevost. A huge star of the 1910s and 20s, she was a personal favorite of Ernst Lubitsch, who starred her in three films. Although she successfully transitioned to talkies, in the late 1920s in quick succession Warner's released her from her contract, her mother died and her marriage failed. She went from starring roles to supporting and then to bit player. Meanwhile she began binge drinking and eating. She was found dead in her apartment in 1937, still in her 30s, enormously fat with a net worth of $300. The cause of death was acute alcoholism and The Motion Picture Home was founded partly because of her story.

But the most delicious part of her story, never verified, was that when found, she had been partly eaten by her starving dog.

better link for above

Stevie Wright, Easybeats singer was a star in the 1960s died a poor heroin addict.

"Sarah Sanders selling her body and drinking malt liquor."

Was she selling her body for medical experiments? Are you talking about someone who isn't Sarah Huckabee Sanders

Brenda Frazier by Diane Arbus. I think it’s sympathetic.

I wonder what Arbus would make of the plastic surgery monstrosities of today.

Olivia de Havilland spent her last years launching nuisance suits.

Brenda Frazier was only 45 in those Diane Arbus photos.

[quote] Didn't Betty Hutton end up as a housekeeper in a convent or something?

She did hit rock bottom, but reinvigorated her career in later life

From the Times obituary:

At her lowest ebb, in 1974, Earl Wilson, the columnist, organized a benefit for [Hutton] in New York. “I haven’t got a cent,” said Ms. Hutton, who had earned $150,000 a week in her good years.

She found a way to cope with her problems in religion. She renewed her interest in Lutheranism, her original faith, then converted to Roman Catholicism. She regarded the Rev. Peter Maguire of St. Anthony’s Church in Portsmouth as primarily responsible for saving her life. During one of her many hospital stays, he talked her into working for St. Anthony’s. “No one had ever talked to me before,” she said.

She later resumed work as an actress, appearing in nightclubs and, briefly in 1980, in the Broadway musical “Annie.” “It’s groovy being a star again,” she said. “But I know how fast it can be over.”

Most of the heroin addicted deaths of musicians were in squalid living conditions.

Donald Trump Jr riding the subways of NYC carrying large pickle jars of his piss with him

R85, Ryan Murphy spent his last years fighting law suits.

"Brenda Frazier by Diane Arbus. I think it’s sympathetic."

You think that's "sympathetic?" Diane Arbus captured Brenda Frazier in all her freakish glory, but it sure doesn't seem "sympathetic" to me.

Well played, R90... I laughed out loud! x0

Crackhead drowned in a bathtub.

Matt Gunther

[quote]Jerry Lewis saved his own stool in Baggies.

Are they available on eBay?

R94, porn stars is its own 3 threads.

The worst of the tawdry sorrow is this one - a sad, propofol-addicted, nose-less pedophile waving his white baby over a balcony

Well, hello!

Oscar Wilde died broke, broken and mostly alone in Paris. His alleged final words were "Either that wallpaper goes or I do."

Amanda Blake, Miss Kitty of Gunsmoke. Several years after Gunsmoke ended, she was diagnosed with oral cancer. She was lucky in her surgery in that she was not rendered disfigured. A few years afterward, she divorced her 4th husband, who genuinely loved her. He was a wealthy man but after the divorced she had nothing. She went to work in a hair salon in Phoenix at their front desk.

She ended up marrying a gay man who was a politician in Phoenix. He was 9 years her junior and treated her badly. The worst thing he did to her was to give her HIV. She divorced him course.

She then went to live outside of Sacramento, CA for her last years. She moved into the guest house of a woman who had been an animal wrangler on Gunsmoke and had started a sanctuary for performing animals. Amanda died pretty close to penniless, depending on the kindness of friends. Not many knew she had AIDS as she told only the people she lived with a couple of other friends. She died of a heart attack as a result of liver failure (Hep C) resulting from AIDS.

While it's true that Barbara Hutton had little left of her fortune, she still had enough to hole away at the posh Beverly Wilshire Hotel, where she lived for the final years of her life, being cared for by very attentive staff.

R101 Hepatitis C liver failure is not caused by AIDS. Hepatitis C is a virus that over time causes damage to the liver. It also leads to liver cancer. Amanda Blake died of CMV hepatitis, which is AIDS related.

Matt Gunther wheeling himself up and down Santa Monica Blvd in the freezing cold. Such a sad sight to see in the youth obsessed healthy West Hollywood. Literally, everyone turned their back on him

That's lousy. While nothing justifies it, didn't he manage to alienate most people who knew him?

David Carradine died in a Bangkok hotel room closet, apparently from auto-erotic asphyxiation gone awry.

R106 That sounds more like tawdry ecstasy than tawdry sorrow.

Sunny Von Bulow

I died on assistance.

Olive Deering. If you were in the Broadway Theater District in the early 1980's, you already know how bad things got for Olive.

Ayn Rand, who life's work still fuels sociopathic opponents of the 'welfare state' (like Paul Ryan), lived on Social Security. Her cancer was treated by American taxpayers and Medicare.

R110 - can you tell more about Olive's tawdry final years? I only know she had cancer. I am always telling Charles Busch how he looks like her or vice versa.

Zsa Zsa Gabor

Dean Martin, eating at the Hamburger Hamlet on Sunset almost every night, alone. He was always forgetting where he put his teeth.

Kevin Sessums...looking for free lodging, free meals, free tickets, and free “whatever”...as he “aw shucks” his way thru “the rooms” blabbering on about grace and gratitude....catch his act on Facebook...it’s a real doozy

[quote]Barbara Eden, Barbara Feldon, Ice-T, Bai Ling, Stefanie Powers, Pauly Shore, Paul Sorvino, Jill St. John Loretty Swit, Robert Wagner, John Amos, Jimmie Walker

WTF are you talking about?! Most of these people are doing well and still alive. Some living off their TV show and other residuals.

The title of this thread is: Celebrities whose final years ENDED in tawdry sorrow

Ice-T is on L&O: Special Victims and drawing a nice hefty paycheck.

Does anyone comprehend what they are reading?

Vern Troyer (Mini-Me), suicide.

Bela Lugosi. Morphine addicted, impoverished and appearing in grad Z Ed Wood movies when he died.

Veronaca Lake. A well liked star who lost it all, probably because of alcohol.

Although she's not gone yet, I think Olivia Newton-Joh's life has a few tragic elements to it. Diagnosed with cancer, she claimed to be a "cancer thriver" and set up the Olivia Newton John Cancer Centre to aid in the healing of others. A strong believer in alternative therapies and the power of positive thinking , her cancer returned another two times and will most likely be the cause of her death, as it was of her sister and father.

Lots of sad, undeserved irony.

Shelley Duvall

Gary Coleman

But Olivia N-J is not dying a tawdry death. She isn't broke and she isn't alone.

Cancer often comes back years later. I agree she is probably at the end of her road.

R80: “the most delicious part.” Sick fuck.

Thanks for this thread. I've been googling people all night.

Jeanne Eagles

Susan Cabot, murdered by her son in their refuse-filled house.

Eagels^^^

Can I include Philip Seymour Hoffman? His decline was pretty rapid so more like final tawdry months. He got kicked out of home by his wife, though still allowed to see his children. Okay he was rich so he could afford his own apartment and he was still working though still had a scene to complete on the last Hunger Games film, and was planning to direct another film. But his drug habit did him in. Could he have gotten off it? Who knows but seems unlikely.

Fatty Arbuckle

Child actor Bobby Driscoll, listed in an earlier post (not mine), became a heroin addict in his teens, did a few stints in rehab and prison, joined and then left Andy Warhol's Factory, died penniless at 31, surrounded by empty beer bottles in an abandoned East Village tenement, with no identification. He was buried in an unmarked grave on Hart Island. When his mother came looking for him a few years later, a fingerprint match at NYPD tracked him down to his final resting place.

All these posts and no one has mentioned me, the epitome of tawdry sorrow?

Robert LaTourneaux, Cowboy from the original “The Boys in the Band.”

BITB co-star Cliff Gorman and his wife cared for LaTourneaux before he died of AIDS in 1986.

Marlene Dietrich spent the last 13 years of her life as a bedridden recluse in her hoarded Paris apartment, drinking and taking pills all day and refusing to see anyone except her daughter and very few other people. She refused to wash and pissed and shat in water pitchers and casserole dishes that were next to her bed.

Who is the one that choked on his dildo?

Troy Donahue

R116, R18 was listing the names of celebrities that have been relegated to the tawdry, sad ending/pathetic attempt at a career booster known as the Chiller Theatre Spooktacular sited in R16’s post.

I believe it is an autograph event.

[R134]

Albert Dekker?

Wikipedia entry on Dekker:

[quote] On May 5, 1968, Dekker was found dead in his Hollywood home by his fiancée, fashion model and future Love Boat creator Jeraldine Saunders. He was naked, kneeling in the bathtub, with a noose tightly wrapped around his neck and looped around the shower curtain rod. He was blindfolded, his wrists were handcuffed, there was a ball gag in his mouth, and two hypodermic needles were inserted in one arm. His body was covered in explicit words and drawings in red lipstick.[7]

[R138]

That seems to qualify as tawdry....

David Cassidy

R138 beat me to the very weird Albert Dekker story. I dont think they ever found his killer. Maybe they didnt want to?

Ramon Navarro

Greta Garbo

Phil Hartmann

Still trying to work out what "tawdry sorrow" might possibly mean. Such purple prose, apparently crafted without reference to a dictionary.....

^^ Reverend Mother from WHERE ANGELS GO, TROUBLE FOLLOWS.

High-class, comme il faut sorrow: Jackie Onassis dying of lymphoma in her 5th Ave apartment

Tawdry sorrow: Big Edie dying of pneumonia after falling at Grey Gardens

fail.

MRS. ALFRED STEEL

Joan Crawford's final years were isolated and lonely, but I wouldn't call them tawdry. She still had money and a nice apartment in NYC.

[quote] Lindsay, selling her body to Russian oligarchs and rich Arabs in Dubai.

Lohan or Graham. Always get the two confused.

"Who is the one that choked on his dildo?"

I think you're referring to Ramon Novarro, although the dildo bit is an urban legend. He was beaten to death by hustlers.

Someone mentioned Joan Fontaine but she left several million dollars to the SPCA. I doubt that is too tawdry.

If I may suggest a "saved by the bell" category it would include:

Huntington Hartford, the A+P heir, who went through a hundred million dollar fortune (back in the 1940s/50s/60s when that was real money). Turned out that he was the income beneficiary of a $5MM trust that he could never break and get the capital. It provided him a modestly comfortable end.

On a larger scale, Nelson Bunker Hunt, has a spectacular multi-billion dollar bankruptcy after he lost his Libyan oil fields and failed to corner the world silver market. Fortunately there was a hundred million trust from his father, H. L. Hunt, to support him for his last three decades.

Designer Nolan Miller of Dynasty (and The Comback ;-) ) fame.

Never came out. Lived with Candy and Aaron Spelling until he was kicked out after an argument with Candy and then passed away at the Motion Picture Home.

What in the world do you people think "tawdry" means?

Peter Arne - having sex with skeevy hustlers and homeless guys, one of whom murdered him

Louise Brooks, call girl:

For fuck's sake, people, just naming names doesn't help. Give us some detail on the depressing endgame.

Add Danny Lockin to the "killed by hustlers" club

[R141] Garbo DOES NOT deserve to be included here. She was filthy rich, had a fabulous Manhattan apartment and an amazing art collection. She was also much more sociable than legend has it. She just got old. Nothing sad or tawdry there - happens to the best of us.

Jack Kerouac died a lonely drunk.

Former Columbia head David Begelman’s suicide got tongues wagging around town. An extramarital affair, embezzlement scandal, forgery. Quite the comedown for those of us who knew him in his glory days.

Coleman Francis - actor and director.

From wiki - Francis died in California on January 15, 1973 at the age of 53. Though arteriosclerosis is listed as the official cause of death, Cardoza says Francis' body was found in the back of a station wagon at the Vine Street Ranch Market with "a plastic bag over his head and a tube going into his mouth or around his throat".

Anthony Newley moved in with his mother in FL and died of renal cancer at 67

Dudley Moore moved to NJ and lived with a pianist woman friend (not a girlfriend) when he could no longer care for himself. Eventually the woman bought the house next door and set Moore up there until he died of progressive supranuclear palsy at age 66.

Peter Cook also had a not-so-great end. He was hanging out with local derelicts and drank himself to death at 57, when he died of hemorrhage brought on by his alcoholism. Dudley Moore outlived him.

Kevin Sessums shot meth and ran nude up and down the wharf in Provincetown, in the dead of winter, screaming “I NEED TO GET FUCKED.....RIGHT NOW!!!” He wrote about this in his book that no one bought.

Ramon Navarro, Greta Garbo and Phil Harman did not spend their "final years" in "tawdry sorrow."

Although a film has-been, Ramon Navarro found work on television. He lived well. He did come to a bad end, murdered by a couple of male hustlers he'd hired for the night. He hired rent boys, but then a lot of wealthy older gay men did that and still do that.

Although elderly and alone, Greta Garbo lived in a beautiful apartment in New York. She was always being offered huge amounts of money to come out of retirement and her company was always sought after. She died of kidney disease in a hospital. Nothing very "tawdy" or "sorrowful" about that at all.

Phil Hartman was just a guy who made a very bad decision marrying a mentally ill cokehead. He was a popular guy and doing very well in his career when he was murdered by his insane wife.

Evelyn Nesbit

Norman Maine

I'm sure I am wrong, but wasn't the very talented Nell Carter living in a seedy apartment at the time of her death. I believe she has squandered her money?

Chris Farley was still at the top of his game but the way he died, was tawdry.

Sal Mineo - two time Supporting Actor Oscar nominee, once considered for the role of Fredo in THE GODFATHER. Career hit the skids in the late 60s and early 70s. Stabbed to death in an alley in WeHo behind his apartment building.

Anyone can be the victim of a crime! Why say that about Sal Minio?

Would some of ya'll go to the dictionary and look up "tawdry"? Looking at you, r168.

[quote] Phil Hartman was just a guy who made a very bad decision marrying a mentally ill cokehead. He was a popular guy and doing very well in his career when he was murdered by his insane wife.

She was his third wife. He was getting ready to divorce her and marry a fourth wife. It’s a numbers game. The more you marry, the more likely you will marry a nut

Who gives a shit whether the death was tawdry? I'm just interested in how they died.

Frankie Lymon

Belushi, shooting up with a skanked out groupie

John Entwistle. His death was posthumously cleaned up & the fake narrative was that he was with a female friend who called police and stayed with him until they arrived. The truth was that he was partying with two hookers, had a cocaine and sex induced heart attack and the two ladies stopped at the front desk of the hotel on the way out and asked them to call 911 for the guy in Room xxx and then disappeared.

"Tawdry Sorrow" would be a great drag queen name

R175, Peg Entwistle (1908--32), no relation to John I think, was mentioned in Hollywood Babylon. She jumped from the H of the Hollywood sign, to her death. Was briefly married to actor Robert Keith and was thus the stepmother of Brian Keith.

Amanda Blake was on Gunsmoke forever, where the fuck did all that money go?

She should’ve been rich as Croesus.

Exactly. The actor who played Doc took a lump sum of $1 million back in the 70s. That was big money.

[quote]Who is the one that choked on his dildo?

Think that was Ramon Novarro. I real that in one of Kenneth Anger's "Hollywood Babylon" books.

Ramon was killed by one of the hustlers he picked up, the hustler shoved the dildo down his throat.

Oh, for God's sake, the dildo supposedly shoved down Ramon Navarro's throat didn't exist. He was beaten so badly he choked on his own blood, but there was no dildo down his throat. That was just a fantasy of Kenneth Anger's. By the way, the non-existent dildo was quite special indeed, described as "a black lead Art Deco dildo (whoever heard of an "Art Deco" dildo?) embellished with Valentino's silver signature." The dildo was supposedly a thoughtful gift Rudy had given his dear friend Ramon. Navarro supposedly kept it in a "bedroom shrine" to Rudy Valentino, whose memory he "cherished." Navarro barely knew Valentino. Kenneth Anger has (he's still alive at age 91) a very vivid imagination.

R180, I think the dildo part has been debunked as one of Ken's many "elaborations."

Johnny Depp

Walter Winchell: nasty gossip columnist who colluded with Joe McCarthy among committing other offenses. So reviled that no one attended his funeral.

.Tawdry Sorrow .... a stripper in her bad final years

[quote] was thus the stepmother of Brian Keit

Wow. So that means Brian Keith’s stepmother, Brian Keith and Brian Keith’s daughter we’re suicides

[R186] Now that's tawdry.

The scandal plagued and drug addicted silent screen stars Mabel Norman and Barbara La Marr. Both died prematurely of tuberculosis.

Country music star Mindy McCready, who finally succeeded at blowing her brains out in 2013... after years of endless suicide attempts, drug and alcohol abuse, overdoses, rehab, arrests, domestic violence, and child custody disputes.

Gram Parson's death and what happened to his remains was pretty tawdry. Too long for me to type it all out, so just read it here......

Olive Thomas

Bobby Harron

R189 That’s what Melanie Griffith should have looked like. She’s very Tippi-esque.

👏 ❤️r12

David Ruffin from the Temptations

[R189] That's an unusually violent method of suicide for a woman. Women usually choose death by overdose.

Character actor Albert Salmi - killed his wife, then killed himself

Lisa Robin Kelly. From pretty blonde ingenue on "That '70s Show" to hardened junkie with a long rap sheet that included DUI, assault, and felony corporal injury. She checked into rehab and died there of an overdose.

R10 Ann Coulter was right behind her.

Edie Sedgwick...

Anissa Jones. Cursed with a horrid stage mother, she was enrolled in dance classes at the age of two and got into commercials at age six. At age eight she got a starring role on a sappy tv show called "Family Affair." She played little Buffy, a rather embarrassing role that required her to lug around an old lady doll named Mrs. Beasley until she was 13 years old. After the series ended she tried to go to school and have a normal life but her parents were in a bitter custody battle over her and her brother. She lived with her father until his death, then moved in with a friend while her brother lived with their mother. She started skipping school and was reported as a runaway by her mother; she was arrested and sent to juvenile hall for many months before being returned to her mother. She started shoplifting and taking drugs. She worked in a donut shop. She never finished high school. When she turned 18 she came into her Family Affair trust fund money and went to live in an apartment with her brother. She started partying and drugging with a vengeance. After a night of partying with her new boyfriend and others she was found dead in a bedroom in a house belonging to the father of a 14 year old friend. She was 18 years old. The cause of death was a massive drug overdose; cocaine, PCP, quaaludes and Seconal were found in her body during the autopsy. The coroner who examined her reported she died from one of the most severe drug overdoses he had ever seen. Jones had no funeral. She was cremated, and her ashes were scattered over the Pacific Ocean. Her brother died some years later at age 24, also of a drug overdose. This has to be one of the saddest Hollywood stories of all time.

Rodney Harvey. Hot Bruce Weber-Calvin Klein model turned actor turned junkie. Arrested many times for drug possession. Died of a heroin-cocaine overdose at the low income Barbizon Hotel Apartments in Los Angeles.

[R200] Jesus, that's horrible. I'm opposed to child actors in most cases. Better to let them wait until they're 18. Otherwise the family dynamics are completely screwed up, with the parents being dependent on the child for their financial well-being.

R184: There was one mourner at Winchell's funeral, his daughter, Walda.

It is believed that there would have been a few others, but she wanted to be the only one and, as she was in charge of the funeral arrangements, she deliberately didn't tell anyone.

I think it was Red Skelton who said of the huge crowd at Harry Cohn's funeral: "That just goes to show that if you give people what they want, they'll come out for it."

R186, when Brian shot himself at 75, he was still mourning his daughter's recent suicide. He also had cancer and emphysema, having been a heavy smoker. When there's illness involved, I think that changes the picture. Apparently Maureen O'Hara claimed it was an accident.

His father Robert Keith played in Written on the Wind as the father who,dies of a heart attack while Dorothy Malone wantonly mambos to her best supporting actress Oscar. Keith was with Brando in The Wild One and Guys and Dolls, and then Brian was with Brando in Reflections in a Golden Eye, as the army officer who is screwing Liz Taylor, Brando's wife.

Max Wright - the dad from "Alf"

R206, there was nothing but ONE paragraph about Max Wright and certainly nothing about his "seedy porn past". What a useless waste of time, with a very deceiving headline, yet none of that info was in the actual 'article'. Wow, a few photos of him looking sad and old.

I got more from WIKI: "He was married to Linda Ybarrondo from 1965 until her death in 2017. The couple had two children, Ben and Daisy. In 1995, he was diagnosed with lymphoma, which was successfully treated and remains in remission. In January 2000, Wright was arrested for drunken driving in Los Angeles. At the time he was appearing on The Norm Show. Wright had another DUI arrest in 2003. In May 2018 he was reported to be living in Germany and in a relationship with a German male."

Still think Garland owns this thread- the last years of her life were harrowing- her family abandoned her as well because she was so crazed. She bounced from crazy person to but job until she wore them out, which did not take long. Doors slammed at any hotel she tried to book. She even sang for an hour at a small Upper East Side gay bar for cash one night. Imagine that- great talent of her time. I rank her high because she was one of the greatest stars ever- in all manner of entertainment and talent on an awesome scale. Thus her fall was far. Michael Jackson still had $. Judy had nothing- not even clothes.

Here you go.

Florence Ballard

Eric "Stumpy Joe" Childs. Choked on vomit.

Not his own.

One of those posts at R209's link, from October 2009:

"I am a professional bartender and at times I get lucky and work some pretty big celebrity parties. Well, about 5 years ago I got to do a who's who Hollywood director, producer and writer party. Max Wright's story of how he was on top of the world and lost it all. I was working the bar and apparently a couple of Hollywood big wigs kept slamming shots and were trading these Hollywood horror stories.

Apparently, Barry Williams went partying with Max Wright and they got a hotel room and Barry passed out. Well, when he woke up Max Wright was mounting Barry and had an elaborate video set-up and was camcording the whole sexual escapade. Barry got pissed off after Max Wright finished off on Barry's back.

Well, old Max fired up his crack pipe and shared it with Barry and calmed him down so guess what Barry passed out again. Well, Barry wakes up again and now there is a homeless guy mounting him from behind with Max Wright mounting the homeless guy in some crazy daisy-chain with Barry as the bottom man and the homeless guy in the middle.

Barry gets pissed and starts yelling at Max Wright, but old Max says, "It's o.k. he's a former 70's gay porn star named Ramon." So the homeless guy finishes off in Barry. Then Max Wright finishes off in Barry's face for a video money shot. Well, the video ended there because Barry ran out of the hotel room with his pants around his ankles screaming at Max and Ramon that he was not a "crack whore."

Now the one Hollywood big wig said the videotape of the whole ordeal had been uploaded to the internet. The Hollywood big wig said that he saw a crude copy of the videotape for the first time at a party hosted by Richard Simmons the exercise guru years ago. That was all I heard then they both stumbled out to the pool and that was it. I have not watched the Brady Bunch T.V. show since that party I worked."

Wow, such utter insanity. If another person says crack isn't immediately addicting, they are fucking clueless morons. I know two middle class people who became crack addicts. Neither was working in a creative field where they were exposed to a lot of drugs. One, was a female professor friend's husband and the other the longtime BF of a work colleague, think he was an accountant. Thankfully, both got over their addictions.

Whatever you're smoking, lay off it.

Things were kinda rough for Gloria Grahame. David Niven had a wasting disease--ALS?

[quote]Whatever you're smoking, lay off it.

WTF are YOU talking about?

Crack IS immediately addicting. Anyone I've heard about who smoked crack became addicted immediately.

I knew a guy who was engaged to a woman whose sister was a regular on several popular network and cable TV shows in the 80s & 90s. The sister’s accountant put her money in the bank and put her on a monthly budget. He advised her to buy real estate in California. He had been an accountant in Hollywood for years & had seen people who were regulars on TV series squander their money on partying, behaving as if the money would never run out. Then their show got cancelled and they never got another acting job. He told her, “You have about a dozen years to make good money. If you’re lucky, you can extend your career, but that’s not likely.” (She was pretty - not beautiful or stately looking. Just sort of cute-sexy-pretty, which tends not to age well or transition to grandma roles)).

He was right. She had a great run for 11 years and today she is financially secure because she didn’t blow her money. Her sister however, never made it as an actress and lives with roommates in a NYC apartment at age 60.

Well, she's a cunt for not offering the sister a room.

You guys are going to like this story. I Live in Florida. At one point I was renting a condo and was friendly with the land ladies. I was invited over for Easter. I went to their house out in the country - in a swampy - woody area. When I drove up to the house it was the most unusual thing - there was extensive fencing - I mean it looked like Jursiac Park stuff. It seemed very odd. Also this house had bars on the windows - it was modern architecture so it did not scream out as odd - the house was very unique. Well we are visiting inside and I am commenting on the house which has a great layout. She said yeah, when we saw this house we had to have it but it was a lot of work to clean it up with all the tiger pee and what not. Excuse me? Tiger pee? Oh yes you see it turns out this was the winter residence of some Vegas act couple. It turns out the man and his wife brought in a young tiger keeper and some kind of strange 3 some situation got going. Eventually and mysteriously the young tiger keeper was killed when a gate was left open and one of the tigers got him. Only a few weeks later the woman in her mourning was "careless" with the tigers and also lost her life to them. What a weird strange story out in the middle of nowhere rural Florida. So my Landlady friends got this house at quite a bargain because nobody wanted to buy a place were tigers had killed a couple of people and the smell of them lingered in the property. So all that fencing and bars on the window served a real purpose. Another VERY interesting factoid is that somehow this tiger trainer was friends with Liza and she spent considerable time out at this place "drying out" ~ I spent some time really pondering that - what a very strange life some people have.

From the Orlando Sentinel: NEWBERRY - Six weeks after killing its trainer, a 400-pound white Bengal tiger mauled and killed one of its owners. Doris Guay was leading 3-year-old Jupiter back into its pen Friday when she began to hand-feed chicken necks to the tiger. That's when the cat lunged without warning and bit her neck, authorities said. 'This was a completely unprovoked attack,' said Alachua County Sheriff's Office Sgt. Jim Troiano. 'It was an accident.' Paramedics said Guay died instantly. The cat was shot to death 15 feet from where it had killed its trainer Charles Edward Lizza on Oct. 8. The woman's husband, Ron Guay, who also owned the tiger, was standing nearby during both attacks. He gave authorities permission to shoot the animal.

There was some speculation that husband Ron was lose with the cage doors or that the wife had actually committed death by tiger.

The animal died after the first shot, but to ensure the safety of deputies and paramedics entering the compound, two more rounds were fired into the animal, Troiano said.

Marilyn Chambers died from a stroke at age 56 in her trailer home in Canyon Country, California.

A little clip of the Cat Dancers before the unfortunate threesome incident.

Too bad those fuckers weren't offed as kids.

John Gilbert was a huge silents star and died at 36 of a heart attack, from alcoholism.

Let's put a spin on this most interesting thread.

Considering the star working today, who do you think will have a death to equal the ones mentioned here?

Depp, obviously.

Oops, starS

Cute child star Scotty Beckett died at 38. Some mystery surrounding the death, but it was likely from an overdose.

R224 Lindsey Lohan

Demi Lovato

Demi Moore

Ben Affleck

r224 Ben Affleck. An alcoholic recluse who dies from the disease.

R224, Zooey Deschanel.

Weiner is going to gift us with several more gross & shameful events.

Ashamed to have laughed at several of the comments here.

I respectfully submit Dare Wright. Perhaps not a “celebrity”, but her children’s books were quite beloved. I think she should be better-known here - a DL icon - as she was quite fabulous in her earlier life. More on that in a moment.

She died penniless, a ward of the state, after being bedridden for years. Before her hospitalization, she lived in squalor, inviting homeless people to drink with her in her apartment just steps from New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art. The elderly author had been raped and beaten by one of her “friends”.

Dare was the daughter of a pushy portrait artist of some repute. She and her mother had a strange relationship, sleeping in the same bed as adults, very reminiscent of the Edith Beales. Dare was attractive and stylish beyond belief, with a beautiful physique. She made her own clothing, gorgeous ensembles she sewed herself. She was a mode and photographer. She had many suitors, but remained virginal and emotionally stunted; she seemed to have been in love with her brother (who was also quite beautiful; I’ve posted a photo of them together) her entire life.

The Wrights lived a rather bohemian and creative life. Dare was a gifted photographer, and created the “Lonely Doll” series, which was very popular in the 1950’s (even in the 70s I had a copy of the book). She went on to create more books, whose stories were illustrated by her haunting photos.

I’d urge everyone to read her life story. She was just fabulous, but came to a very sad end.

R231

Fascinating. Thank you.

Glenn Quinn from "Roseanne" and "Angel" was a homeless and drug addicted during his final years. He died of a heroin overdose while crashing at a friend's house in North Hollywood. You would think an actor from two successful shows would have money for a decent home, but apparently he squandered it all on drugs and booze. His partner at Goldfinger nightclub bought him out for begging for money from customers and staff.

Lara Flynn Boyle will join this illustrious company soon, I fear.

Lovely actress Helen Wood. Former violin prodigy and a big upcoming star of the 1950s. Was Debbie Reynolds co-star in "Give a Girl a Break". Also an acclaimed dancer and singer on Broadway and in Las Vegas. Stared in several high profile porn movies in the mid-70s, including Deep Throat under the name of Dolly Sharp. Left the entertainment business entirely in mid 70s in search of an honest life and drifted through towns working as a waitress until she passed away from cervical cancer.

R233, I winced when the Becky character referred to Mark’s death on the recent episode of “The Conners”. He was so handsome, and I loved the moments when he slipped and his native accent came through.

It was the first episode I’ve seen, and I won’t be seeing another (not because of that, though). Painful.

Famous 60s fashion designer Ossie Clark died aged 54 after being stabbed to death in his council flat by a 28 year-old former male lover.

Mabel King, Momma on WHATS HAPPENING, DIED broke and legless. She was morbidly obese and was a diabetic. The doctor had to amputate her legs. She outlived her son, who was a drug addicted loser and would break into her house and rob her blind. She couldn’t get out of bed to stop him either.

Didn’t David Carradine and Michael Hutchence allegedly die from autoerotic asphyxiation? One of them had a broomstick in their rectum...ewwww.

[post redacted because linking to dailymail.co.uk clearly indicates that the poster is either a troll or an idiot (probably both, honestly.) Our advice is that you just ignore this poster but whatever you do, don't click on any link to this putrid rag.]

Damn, what a depressing thread.

As only DL can do!

George Raft

"His estate consisted of a $10,000 insurance policy and some furniture. In the last years of his life he had mainly lived on $800 a month, a combination of social security and his pension. He was interred in Forest Lawn – Hollywood Hills Cemetery in Los Angeles. Raft's personal effects, wardrobe, etc., were sold by means of a simple classified advertisement, listing the lot for $800 in Hemming's Motor News in the fall of 1981."

Silent film star Olive Borden. For a while she was one of Hollywood's highest paid stars: $1,500 a week in 1925. Worked with John Ford. Starred in a number of films with George O'Brien to whom she was romantically kinked.

[quote]One of them had a broomstick in their rectum

Useful idea for an edgy update for that family board game 'Cluedo.'

Colonel Mustard dead in the library with a broomstick up his rectum.

R231, thanks for posting that fascinating information about Dare Wright. I hadn't heard of her and am absolutely riveted by her story. I love the photos of her with her mother. She reminds me of a good friend and former actress (just local plays) and photo stylist who never had children. In her 70s now and living the good life in Mexico, but beautiful and stylish and stunning, as was her mother, a former model in the 1950s who was still having her afternoon cocktails and wearing lipstick and stilettos into her 90s.

Mabel King from What’s Happenin and The Wiz fam:

[quote] In 1986, King lost one of her toes due to diabetes. In 1989, King suffered a stroke and entered the Motion Picture & Television Country House and Hospital in Woodland Hills, California. King also battled diabetes, and eventually lost both of her legs and an arm to the disease. Her only child, a son, Larry (who was the eldest son of singer/songwriter Larry Banks) died in 1996.[9] Mabel died on November 9, 1999 at age 66.

Florence Lawrence, sometimes called the first movie star, took ant poison in the 30s, long after her career ended. William Mann wrote a very lively novelization of her life called "The Biograph Girl" (that had been her studio).

R242 Didnt Raft commit suicide?

Never heard that. But he did give Bankhead a dose that almost killed her, in the 30s. Recovering after surgery, she said to her doctor, "I bet you think I've learned my lesson. Well I haven't."

Dana Play-doh

That was so witty, r250.

I don't think Lindsay Lohan will OD. I think she'll be gruesomely and mysteriously murdered by one of her 'benefactors,' and we'll never find out who did it or why.

R224 Lens Dunham.

Suicide as the ultimate act of attention-whoring.

No, r253, she won't suicide unless she can figure out some way to come back and read all her press.

Dare Wright was no celebrity. And she wasn't "fabulous." She WAS very strange. Described by her friends as "a pixie" or "a sprite" living in a "fairytale," she was ruined by her possessive mother Edie. Some said their relationship was akin to a dragon guarding the castle where the beautiful princess was imprisoned. She was photographed hundreds of time in various costumes, playing dress-up even as an adult. Her biographer said she was "posing, always posing...but for whom?" For her mother, the person who "owned" her, who else? She also posed nude in photos taken by her mother. Was their relationship incestuous? Maybe. People said that the two of them seemed more like a lesbian couple than a mother and daughter. Maybe Edie convinced Dare it would be better if they satisfied their sexual needs with each other, rather than become involved with a man. At any rate, Dare was completely frigid and couldn't even stand for a man to kiss her. It think it's highly likely that Dare Wright's mother was the only lover she ever had (not counting the man who raped her when she was an old woman." There was also incestuous feelings between Dare and her brother Blaine. They talked about getting married...to each other. I don't think their relationship ever became sexual, though. She was too much under Edie's control.

And Dare Wright didn't live in "squalor" in her later years. She lived in a nice apartment and had friends looking in on her, but frequently acted like a bag lady, hanging out with homeless people and inviting them back to her apartment. She would sometimes sleep on a park bench ia public park. And of course she ended up being raped by one of the homeless men she befriended. I don't think she was destitute, either. Her mother left her a substantial inheritance. But she did end up dying in a hospital after a long illness, with a teddy bear in each arm and her hair in it's trademark ponytail.

By the way, "The Lonely Doll" is considered by some to be a "dark and terrifying" tale unsuitable for children, "the creepiest children's book." The scene where the doll Edith is being spanked by Mr. Bear was described by a New Yorker article thus: "bent over his knee, her skirt hiked up, and his furry paw suspended in the air, aiming for her bottom, an air of eroticism suddenly intrudes on the tale of innocent playtime. The figures’ blank faces lend the picture a twinge of horror; Little Bear, watching, throws up his arms in shock, the only expression of emotion in the scene." Yes, it is very disturbing. But then the whole story of Dare Wright is very disturbing, VERY.

Here’s the photo described in R255's post.

Nick Adams died in his 30s,possibly of an overdose, though there were murder rumors.

He anyone mentioned Marvin Gaye, murdered by his cross-dressing father? Drug addict, crazy and ended up millions in debt.

R235 Helen Wood's (Dolly Sharp) story is fascinating and extremely tragic. This piece from The Rialto Report gives all the details, including clips from her mainstream films:

R50, thanks for the heads up on that article. While not tawdry, Jan Hooks final days are indeed sad. She truly was one of SNL's best of all time. She made me laugh so many times, she will be in my memory until my own end.

Once gorgeous AMG model turned porn star turned mainstream film actor Sonny Landham lost a leg and eventually died penniless in a nursing home in Kentucky.

Susan Tyrrell seemed to have the support of her niece in her final years but she had lost both legs below the knees from essential thrombocytosis. Johnny Depp had a benefit at the Viper Room to help defray her medical bills.

Christine Keeler.

Lena Zavaroni. She was the Scottish child singing star, the "little girl with the big voice", rather like Judy Garland. She was on a British talent show called "Opportunity Knocks" and won on the show a recording breaking five weeks in a row. At ten years old she was the youngest recording artist to have an album in the top ten of the UK album chart. Her album had a big hit, a version of an execrable song entitled "Ma! "He's Making Eyes At Me"." The album featured her singing hoary old standards like "Swinging On A Star" and "Rock a Bye Your Baby With A Dixie Melody." It also included wildly inappropriate songs for a child to be singing like " Help Me Make It Through The Night" and "River Deep, Mountain High."

For a while she was a big deal, appearing on tv in Britain constantly. She sang at a Hollywood charity show with Frank Sinatra and Lucille Ball in 1974; Ball supposedly told her "You’re special. Very special and very, very good." She was on the Carol Burnett show and the Tonight Show with Johnny Carson and the Jerry Lewis MDA telethon. She performed at the White House. But her record didn't sell in the U. S.; it bombed on the charts and she never really made it in America.

She had an awful female manager who treated her as a commodity and not a human being. She became anorexic and bulimic. Her variety show style of singing and performing eventually lost its appeal and her career waned. In 1989 she married but it was a disaster and lasted only 18 months. That same year her mother committed died of a drug overdose and all her show business mementos were lost in a fire.

She must have made a lot of money in her heyday, but the unscrupulous manager must have made off with it, because she eventually came to be "living on the dole", that is on public assistance. She was arrested for shoplifting a package of jelly, but the charges were dropped. She hoped for a career comeback but was severely ill with anorexia and mental problems. She underwent surgery to get rid of the "static" in her head; the operation was similar to a lobotomy. Three weeks after the operation, she developed a chest infection and died from bronchial pneumonia. She was 35 years old.

I don't think she was ever really taken very seriously as a singer. As a child she was regarded as kind of any annoying novelty act and that kind of stayed with her as she grew older. But there's a video of her on YouTube singing a Neil Sedaka song called "Going Nowhere." It shows that she did have real talent. She sings the song as though she's living it. It's riveting.

The story of Estelle Bennett (The Ronettes) is quite a sad one. After the breakup of the group she was kind of exiled from the business and had no friends or connections. At the end of her life she ended up destitute and homeless in New York, she was riddled with colon cancer and other illnesses, and had suffered in isolation from anorexia and schizophrenia for DECADES after the group broke up. Supposedly she would go up to people on the street and tell them the Ronettes were performing that night. It was kept quiet in the press but her body was discovered some time after she had passed.

Her last public appearance was at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame ceremony where the group was inducted. She was too frail to actually sing with them (or even lip sync), but mustered up two sentences (at 7:46 in the clip). Poor thing seems quite mentally fragile.

"Going Nowhere"

Little Joanie Cunningham died broke in a trailer park.

[R267] White privilege did her in.

Kevin Sessums hinting for free tickets on facebook....eating a veggie wrap for two meals (!!)....staring at the crook in guy’s arms....wondering....

Chris Farley choking on his own vomit in a cheap hotel.

What about the broke actress that vomited and drown in the toilet?

R271, that actress was supposedly Lupe Velez, but that death scenario was just another Kenneth Anger fabrication.

R125... Lol.. me too. Shelley Duvall is still alive, btw.

Silent screen star, Ramon Navarro..

Chris Farley died tawdry not in a cheap hotel but in his high rise condo in the John Hancock tower in Chicago

R272, yes. Also, Jayne Mansfield was not decapitated in the,fatal car crash.

I'm shocked that 274 replies in, no one mentioned Sam Cooke.

SAM tawdry sorrow COOKE?

Jan Hooks's final years weren't tawdry. She was a recluse.

Charlie Sheen isn’t dead yet, but the day’s young.

I'm very sad to add this: though he's not dead yet, Michael York has contracted a very rare skin disease called amyloidosis.

I wouldn't have brought it up, but he went public with it himself.

[quote]Michael York has contracted a very rare skin disease called amyloidosis.

It’s not a skin disease. It’s caused by production of abnormal proteins, and often leads to heart and kidney failure.

r278 ummm....yeah. That's kind of the definition of a tawdry end. He was killed in an apparent robbery set-up by a hooker and a hotel manager. Cooke allegedly discovered he'd been robbed (he was drunk at the time) and confronted the hotel manager, who said she shot him in self-defense when he became violent. While many people question the self defense theory, it was a horrible death-he was shot in the heart.

Sad, and an awful blow to music, but he had that driven side of him that lived on the edge.

Most people don’t choke on their vomit. What happens is that they die and their various sphincters stop working and if they’re lying down, fluid will come out of the stomach and travel down to the esophagus, nose and mouth. The dark fluid coming out of Farley’s mouth in his death photo is acidic stomach fluid which escaped after his death. Anyone who has had GERD understands how this can happen.

It’s was usually uneducated orderlies who hoisted dead bodies onto stretchers to be wheeled out of the home who started saying people choked on their vomit, because they saw stomach contents coming out of the body’s mouth and didn’t understand that it was postmortem

It was a tawdry scene when he died but Sam Cooke's final years were NOT ones of "tawdry sorrow." He was a big star, rich, hugely popular; at his funeral 200,000 fans lined up for more than four city blocks to view his body. It's hard to understand how he could be so foolish as to pick up some cheap hooker, which led to his getting shot by some brain dead hotel manager. I guess he just wanted to get some pussy. Still, you'd think he would have tried to do better than some trashy hooker. What a waste his death was. He was so handsome and talented.

Nobody's mentioned Elvis Presley yet?

That model Gia.

r208, Garland was merely an addict who could sing. For me, tawdry is a mixture of scandalous and tacky.

r215, I saw a docu on crack in the mid-80s, The journalist asked the people when they became addicted, they all said, "the 1st time they exhaled." I never tried it.

r226, Scotty Beckett was a has-been by 1950. He played Elizabeth Taylor's teenage brother in "Date With Cynthia" in the late 40s. He also had a smart mouth, that got him involved in a fight, and he died from his injuries.

r260, her "video will" as Bette Davis is unforgettable.

^^Ronald Colman sent me a DEAD OWL!

[quote]For me, tawdry is a mixture of scandalous and tacky.

What about Cole Porter? Once the toast of Paris and New York, in his last years he became a recluse in his Waldorf Towers apartment. He was reduced to begging for sexual favors from horse-hung Jack Cassidy, who would literally make Porter crawl across the floor to reach him.

Or what about Jack Cassidy himself? He spent his later years suffering from bipolar disorder, variously scandalizing the neighbors by watering his garden stark naked and insisting to his ex-wife Shirley Jones that he was Jesus Christ. Blind drunk one night, he dropped a lit cigarette on a Naugahyde couch and incinerated himself

James Stacy

Jack Cassidy was so torched he had to be identified by dental records. The fire was so hot his skull exploded.

Linda Darnell

Olivia de Havilland suing Ryan Murphy.

R290, nothing is tawdry as long as you've got money.

After losing all her fortune on lawsuits to do with her fraudulent and faulty scam, GOOP, the actress Gwyneth Paltrow was a waitress at Jerry's Famous Deli in Studio City, where she expired one night after a dinner shift serving brisket and mashed potatoes to old jews.

"My God, working for a living is fucking HARD!" were her last words.

R214 Niven had a wasting disease since birth. He was always an effete skinny runt.

I hear that the Scot Billy Connolly is afflicted with dementia and Parkinsons and shaking away in Florida.

Chris Penn's death was no accidental overdose or heart attack, based on his final years.

Broadway Star Ann Pennington:

She began her career on Broadway as a member of the chorus in The Red Widow (1911) starring Raymond Hitchcock. Her debut in the Ziegfeld Follies was in 1913, where she quickly established herself as one Ziegfeld's top attractions.

With dimpled knees and long dark red hair, the petite, pretty, charming, and often scantly-clad Pennington stood a mere 4' 10" tall and wore only a size 1½ shoe. Because of her diminutive stature, she was referred to as "Penny" by her friends and colleagues. Her nickname for herself was "Tiny".

During her years in the Ziegfeld Follies she appeared alongside the likes of Bert Williams, Eddie Cantor, Will Rogers, Fanny Brice (who became her closest friend), Marilyn Miller, and W. C. Fields. She switched back and forth between George White's Scandals and the Follies more than once, earning a salary of $1000 per week well before the 1920s, and continued to moonlight in the early New York film industry. She also frequented Harlem in its jazz heyday.

In the 1926 edition of George White's Scandals, Pennington introduced the African American-influenced Black Bottom dance to America at large with her partner, the eccentric dancer Tom Patricola. First popularized in New York by the African American show "Dinaah": that had been staged in Harlem in 1924, after Pennington performed the Black Bottom on Broadway, the dance became was a national phenomenon, overtaking The Charleston in popularity.

George Gershwin was her rehearsal pianist and wrote several songs for her. Cole Porter, Ray Henderson, Joe Burke, Oscar Levant and Edward Ward all wrote for her shows, The New Yorkers (1931) being her last great show for Porter. She could sing as well as dance, as evinced by her recording of "Believe Me" (1930).

No films of her signature dance routines have been preserved, with the possible exception of the "Snake-Hips" number which occurs in "Happy Days" (1929). Her key dances in "Gold Diggers on Broadway" (1929) remain lost. Some of her scenes from "Tanned Legs" still survive, but her role in "The Great Ziegfeld," while still listed in some inventories, was in fact cut before release. She was also listed as a star in the 1929 Warner Brothers showcase movie "Show of Shows" but her routines were never filmed, perhaps because her main song and dance number "Believe Me" was commandeered by one of Warners' rising stars Irene Bordoni. Ann did however get to perform "Believe Me" in the 1930 movie "Hello Baby!", which is still in print, and sang and danced "You're responsible" in "Tanned Legs" (for which movie she features in uncredited cartoon form on the posters and sheet music).

The New York Times (November 5, 1971) noted:

She liked practical jokes. Once, when a man she didn't particularly like, telephoned, asking, "Is this Miss Pennington?" she replied, "This ain't me." Her dressing room door bore a sign, "For Men Only."

She was until the late 1920s chaperoned at performances by her mother. She was noted for a quick and witty personality, but was said to be shy off stage and easily embarrassed, and in her latter years was loath to discuss her early life.

Pennington was romantically linked to several men during her lifetime, and at one time or another was allegedly engaged to boxer Jack Dempsey, theatrical producer and early dance partner George White, actor Buster West, and musician Brooke Johns. None of these romances lasted and Pennington never married. She never spoke on record about any of her engagements, whether to confirm or deny them.

Ann Pennington never settled in one place for very long. She lived mostly in hotels in New York apart from some years in California as the constant companion of Fanny Brice, whom she had helped out at least once with loans and gifts of jewelry. Ann was noted for her generosity and many of her loans were never repaid; however most of her huge earnings were wiped out over the years by betting at the racetrack, decades of hotel bills, and gifts to charities and churches.

(more)

Cole Porter, once the toast of the town with the gay set, died alone and unloved in a hospital in Santa Monica. Ca.

A nurse was quoted as saying that he never received a visitor or a phone call while sick and dying.

This after spending thousands on elaborate parties and treating others.

Fair weather friends: cant live with em, cant live without em.

After her years on stage and screen ended, Pennington toured in vaudeville. She retired from performing in the 1940s. She last appeared on stage in a benefit show for the armed forces in 1946. She had a committed work ethic, and worked wherever the opportunity arose, although as she aged and tastes changed, she ended her stage days in shabby theaters with low ranked dance companies. Home movie footage of her "Snake Hips" dance at the 1939 World's Fair survive, but is more memorable for her enthusiasm than her star quality in her fading years.

Ann Pennington died of a stroke in New York City on November 4, 1971, aged 77. She had lived alone on welfare for many years in New York hotels overlooking 42nd Street. She was badly affected by arthritis. She was sometimes recognised shuffling along Broadway as a faded superstar of a world long past – but she was also mugged in her old age on one of her daily walks to a diner. She is buried in the Valhallia Cemetery in New York. No family were known to have attended her funeral, which was paid for by the Actors Benevolent guild.

A few years before her death, she was asked what had been the greatest reward from her years of stardom, and her reply was "in living, honey".

[quote] Her biographer said she was "posing, always posing...but for whom?"

Voila! That will be the title of my memoir.

R297, as a young man David Niven was healthy enough to graduate from the Sandhurst Military Academy, and do two tours of duty in the British Army, the second one being WWII. He stayed continuously employed for the next thirty years, in an industry that requires actors to pass the film's insurance company physical exams before they can get hired.

ALS didn't begin to slow him down until the 1980s, but it killed him fairly quickly when it did. He was working regularly in 1979, and dead in 1983.

R301, she sounds like a Real Trooper and all-around great gal.

Sid & Nancy

"Scotty Beckett was a has-been by 1950."

Weren't we all!

The entire lives of Sid Vicious and Nancy Spungen were nothing but "tawdry sorrow."

I think Whitney Houston's long decline was pretty tawdry. Her longtime chauffeur described having to drive her down to the rough streets of Compton so she could score some crack. He also witnessed Whitney and Bobby Brown freebasing in the back seat with young Bobbi Kristina present, and on one occasion witnessed Whitney and Bobby getting it on with another big-named soul diva in the limo. And of course, at her death, she had numerous drugs in her system: cocaine, marijuana, Xanax, etc.

R281 Oh dear. Michael York's condition is very obvious now.

He'd only get stage work now.

My dentist in NY claimed that Houston was a patient of his. He loved her, hated Brown. I once asked him how things could get so bad for her and he said that people didn't want to lose their revenue source. That's awful, but also shortsighted, since they did.

Among the definitions of tawdry: gaudy, cheap, shameful, indecent.

Gia Carangi is definitely up there - tawdry, sordid and sad. And so young.

R261 I briefly knew Sonny Landham in 1999 while he was in-between movies. He had rented an office in the building where I worked and we had several good conversations. This was before all the terrible troubles of his later years started and he was still in good health and looked great. I have never met anyone who exuded so much charisma! He really looked like a movie star. It's true he had a reputation as a violent, dangerous man but I found him to be a nice, decent guy. However, he definitely was a guy you would not want to cross. But he told me of growing up in Florida as a half Cherokee/half Seminole and starting out in the movie business as a stuntman. I didn't know about his porno past until a few years later. I once read somewhere that his friend Sylvester Stallone got him into that. Anyway the last time I saw Sonny the Columbine shootings had just happened and he was quite upset about it and worried for his own daughter. Then he just disappeared and it wasn't until a few years later that I found out he had went to prison and then moved to Kentucky where he ran (unsuccessfully) for Governor. He was a nice guy. And he was the real thing - a genuine tough guy. Nothing phony about him.

......

Has Amy Winehouse been mentioned?

Some stars can end in a tawdry personal way but still be professionally healthy. I would say Whitney was one like that since at the time she was ready for a comeback, staying at the Beverly Hills Hotel for the Grammy Awards. Phil Hoffman is another. Maybe their drug taking was just to relax but it ended up ruining them.

Is poverty absolutely necessary to die in tawdry sorrow?

Both Elvis and Judy died on the toilet.

There's a lesson there.

So did the producer Don Simpson

R315, it was the Beverly Hilton Hotel, and Clive Davis had paid for Whitney's and her crew's accommodations since she was broke.

Once again, I thank you for this thread.

How could Whitney have been broke and left $20 million to her daughter as well as the townhouse in Roswell where she had been living?

R312 I also have a friend who worked with Sonny during his porn days and similarly said he was a great guy. My friend was devastated to learn what had become of him and how he had died.

Link to Sonny’s porn?

R324 Here's a link to one of his 70s porn movies.

Idiot R135. That’s not THE Troy Donahue.

Has Dick York of Bewitched been mentioned in this thread? I remember reading he owned real estate (an apt building) from his Bewitched earnings, wasn't that an asset that could have provided him income AND a place to live? I never understood why fans questioned why Elizabeth Montgomery did come to his financial aid. He was a former co-worker of 20 years a prior and apparently she wanted him fired even earlier than when he left. Didn't he have children that could have helped?

^^^ "didn't", why Liz Montgomery didn't come to his aid is what I meant.

She was being witchy.

There are stories that allege Dick York wanted a relationship with EM and didn't handle rejection from her well. She WAS married after all.

His addiction to pain killers didn't help matters. Allegedly, he said things to her at the end of his time on the show that burned bridges.

It's a shame, he was very talented but the chemistry between them was him looking for more IRL than she could give.

I've lived a Tawdry life!

That rots about Cole Porter. Was he nasty?

Phil Spector.

Captain Kangeroo. Meth addiction.

t'll be interesting to see what's in store for Angus T. Jones, the kid on Two and a Half Men.

Jessica Simpson ended up in retail sales.

R326 That's the final years ended in tawdry sorrow Troy Donahue.

Anita Ekberg - ran out of money.

I saw Phillip Seymour Hoffman in the west village two days before he died. He looked like death warmed over. I said to my boyfriend, "He looks like he's got one foot in the grave jesus ..."

Things hadn't been going well for him for some time.

Tawdry?

Elvis and Judy AND Vivien Leigh died on the toilet.

Being married never stopped Elizabeth Montgomery.

Vivien Leigh was on her way to the toilet.

Serious question - how could someone as rich and who had access to top medical care such as Vivien Leigh die from tuberculosis in 1967? It was a treatable illness by then.

R342 Did Vivien catch this recurring disease before 1946?

Wiki says the 'development of the antibiotic streptomycin In 1946 made effective treatment and cure of TB a reality'.

Dorothy Comingore who played Orson Welles's second wife Susan in Citizen Kane. She ended up being blacklisted due to her Communist sympathies and the fact that she portrayed the Marion Davies character in Citizen Kane just a little too well. Don't piss off Hearst, you'll lose.

She became an alcoholic and lost custody of her children after being charged with "solicitation" - possibly a set up. The charges were dropped, but she was committed to a state mental hospital for two years. Yikes.

She ended up dying at only 58, and living in seclusion with 10 cats, 2 dogs, and her postman husband. Truly a tragic ending and a little too close to how she ended up in the movie Citizen Kane.

A link to the article on Jan Hooks. Good read.

^ The world did not appreciate Jan Hooks enough while she was alive.

The Bette Davis will reading skit is a perfect showcase to her talent. She nails the late-stage Davis but rather than seeming mean, it comes out a celebration of Davis’s larger-than-life persona.

R87

Yikes, I was certain that was Harpo Marx momentarily.

R339 - did Philip look thinner? There was a still from his never-aired pilot for Happyish where he seemed to be thinner and I wondered if that was due to the drug usage.

I WILL OWN THIS THREAD!

How are they treating you in the slammer?

Jan Hooks as the ancient, post-stroke Bette Davis was one of the funniest celebrity impersonations ever.

R259. Tragic no doubt, but Dolly Sharp actually seems to be having a very good time in her scenes.

Almost all the original child actors in The Little Rascals lived sad lives and died young & tragically.

Robert Blake.

Bob Crane and his huge cock.

Damn, that's thick 'n meaty.

Hogan had a hero of his own.

Ray Sharkey.

I don't know if anyone cares, but Dick York, in his pre-TV Broadway days, replaced Albert Salmi in Bus Stop in the cowboy lead.

And Cole Porter was not nasty at the end, but rather destroyed because of the amputated leg. It is said that he never played the piano after that, and was steadily drinking himself to death to find peace at last. His friends abandoned him because he would invite them to dinner but say absolutely nothing. He would just drink and drink. The dinners became too awful to tolerate.

But he didn't become an evil bitch or anything like that. And the Jack Cassidy thing--if it even happened--would have been long before, in the 1940s, when Cassidy was a chorus boy. After Wish You Were Here, when he played the lead, in 1951 0r '52, he wouldn't have been escorting anymore.

That Bob Crane movie with Greg Kinnear and Willem Dafoe was damn creepy. The entire vibe was so odd and just plain off putting.

It's amazing how many celebrities lead weirdo secret lives which are usually totally at odds with their public images.

R291 Holy fuck, I just read the wiki on James Stacy. What a fucking disaster. He's hard to beat in this list.

Ross AlexandeR

Susan Peters

Suzanne Ball

Brad Renfro

Barbara Bates

Dorothy Dell

Wally Reid

Nell Carter

Margaux Hemingway

Instead of just listing names, what about a sentence or two laying out some specifics? Or is that too tiring?

I agree R371. I haven't heard of half of these 'celebrities'.

R367, Dorothy Dell died in a car accident when her career was in an upswing. Nothing tawdry about it.

Interestingly, she was once linked romantically to Carole Lombard's beau, Russ Colombo (who died 3 months after Dorothy). And, she died just before the start of production on "Now and Forever," and was replaced by Paramount newcomer, Carole Lombard.

Wow, I had no idea Thora Birch’s parents were porn makers. It’s in the comments section of the Dolly Sharp story.

Dorothy Dandridge wins

Suzan Ball at R364 didn't die a tawdry death, but she did have a sad story. She was a '50s starlet who was Lucille Ball's second cousin. In 1953 she injured her right knee while shooting a dance number, then she injured it again in a car accident, and then she learned that she had bone cancer. In 1954 doctors amputated her right leg, but the cancer spread to her lungs and by 1955 she was dead. She was 21.

Before she died she married actor Richard Long, who died relatively young himself of heart disease.

[quote]Before she died she married actor Richard Long, who died relatively young himself of heart disease.

Alcoholism. I did the TV show Thicker Than Water with him. He was a drunk.

^ Are you an actor or were you in the crew, working behind the scenes? Any other interesting stories?

R378, can't be more specific or I would out myself. No real dirt. Long was a drunk. Harris was cold and aloof. Jerry Paris was sleepwalking though directing (More interested in Happy Days).

So surprised about Susan Peters. I wouldn't have even known who she was except for just seeing "Random Harvest" the other night on TCM. So sad.

Lazy gays, a link to evidence of a tawdry end would be more illuminating than a photo of someone most of us have never heard of.

The story is the point of the thread.

R374 Yes, Thora's mom is Carol Connors, who was in "Deep Throat" and "The Erotic Adventures of Candy," among other adult films of the 70s and 80s. She was also the buxom blonde who introduced Chuck Barris on the Gong Show every week.

Thora's dad, Jack Birch, was also in "Deep Throat" and other adult features of the era. He's apparently a deranged, abusive man, who is alleged to have molested Thora as a young girl. He's also generally seen as the person who killed her once burgeoning career. As her manager, he would come to movie sets and behave like a monster, so much so that producers just stopped hiring Thora because they couldn't deal with her dad.

R379 sorry to hear that. He was an incredibly handsome actor. He was great in the Big Valley. Was he a jerk or just a drunk?

I loved him in Nanny and the Professor too. I didn't know he was a drunk either. He came off as so together.

I liked Richard Long, too. Didn't know that about him.

Jack Kerouac died of alcoholism and was still living with his mom despite having money and a wife.

Tom Petty, died of organ failure and combining way too many drugs.

Most people in porn especially the fools who believe it is a lifelong career or that they will become rich and famous from it.

He was my favorite of the four Barkley brothers.

Dorothy Dandridge. She had the worst taste in men, which didn't help.

Baseball player Glenn Burke, one of the first pro athletes to come out as gay. Contracted AIDS, had a drug/drink problem and died living on his sister's couch or something.

The poster upthread who mentioned Ray Sharkey wins this round.

In addition to several movie roles, Sharkey was incredibly charismatic in his role as Sonny Steelgrave in the TV hit Wiseguy. But he was his own worst enemy. Drugs and arrests galore. (In fact, he was supposedly hired for the David Addison role in “Moonlighting,” but his drug abuse and unreliability led them to replace him with Bruce Willis). He ultimately contracted AIDS, which he passed along to his girlfriend, Elena Monica (daughter of Corbett Monica of the old Joey Bishop Show). Apparently he claimed he was “cured” or something and didn’t tell his partner he was infected. He died of the disease in 1993.

If all that’s not bad enough, his daughter was arrested a few years ago on a murder charge. Even death couldn’t shake the curse.

R355 Bob Crane was not cut and was an exhibitionist who was murdered.

R379 is full of shit. Julie Harris was never cold and aloof.

Danish glamour model, Gwili Andre was brought to Hollywood from her native Copenhagen to be the next Garbo. She was signed to a contract with RKO and fast tracked into leading lady roles. But alas, the poor girl couldn't act! "Stiff, colorless, and completely talentless," sniffed one critic. She was reduced to supporting roles before being tossed aside by Hollywood altogether. Unable to jump start her career, she turned to alcohol and lost custody of her only son, Peter. In 1959, she died in a house fire in her modest Venice apartment, alone. Her neighbors had no idea of her Hollywood past.

Gwili's untimely death was sensationalized by Kenneth Anger, who fabricated a story that she had gathered her publicity stills and mementos into a pile, set them on fire and jumped into the pyre. In truth, her body was found sprawled on the bathroom floor, dead from smoke inhalation.

She has a bit part at the start of "A Woman's Face" (c.1940) in the roadhouse scene, as a lesbian dancer.

Gay actor Dick Kallman was murdered by robbers who broke into his apartment

That isn’t tawdry ^ just sad.

Wow, growing up in the 70s Hollywood Babylon was my gayling bible. But so many of these threads call out Kenneth Anger for fabricating or elaborating on the stories he told. Can no one be trusted for tawdry details? I will say because of another thread I was drawn back to one of the most captivating images from the book, the car wreck photos of Jane Mansfield’ vehicular demise showing her dead dog, giant whiskey bottles and a clump of blonde hair amongst the twisted metal wreckage. Looking for the image I stumbled across an article that said she had four dogs in the car and two died and two lived and were taken to a animal shelter. Then it came out that that the dog breeder in England had never been paid for two of the dogs and was seeking reimbursement.

"...never been paid..."

Now THAT is tawdry.

Dick Kallman was given the same award in the same year that Helen Wood (Dolly Sharp) received as one of the “most prominent personalities of the stage” in 1952. He & Wood had been both been in “Seventeen.” As pointed out before, Audrey Hepburn also received the same award that year.

R373, according to wiki, Dorothy Dell, in her short life, had several close calls. I think she had survived a bad car accident, iirc, and when she had declined a party on Harry Richman's yacht, the girl who went instead died in an explosion on the boat. Also, Carole Lombard, who had a connection to her, died in a plane crash and had herself survived a bad car accident when she was about 19. There was a scar from that on her left cheek that is faintly visible in some photos. When your time is up...

[R383] [R384] [R385]

Richard Long wasn't just a drunk. he was married to Mara Corday. There's a story out there where she and her husband were at a party. He wanted to leave early, she wanted to stay. When she got home later that night, he was waiting for her and beat her and nearly strangled her.

He was not a good guy.

R382 I heard about thora having financial disputes with her parents, but nothing about being abused. Where did you hear this? That's nuts if true, I wondered why she went off the radar after such a promising beginning.

The above-mentioned Albert Salmi, who was married for a while to Peggy Ann Garner, suffered from severe depression and at 62 shot and killed his estranged second wife and himself.

Sadly, I will own this thread.

R382 There have been rumors from industry insiders, co-stars, and friends that Jack Birch sexually abused both Thora and her brother, Bolt. Bolt Birch was also on track to have an acting career, having appeared in a number of small roles. But because of father Jack, his career stalled, too.

OK, from my experience, Long was a quiet drunk. Very nice, but tended to retreat to his dressing room and drink. I find it hard to believe that he was abusive, but drunks can be surprising.

Julie Harris was indeed cold and aloof on this set. She clearly did not want to be there. But, the feeling on the set was that everyone wanted to be somewhere else. She also retreated to her dressing room and came out only to shoot the scenes. In general, it was not a happy set. Her behavior might be different in a different environment.

[R405]

I've been trying to find the interview concerning Long beating her one night. No success so far, but here's something form Corday's wiki entry that may be related to that incident:

From wiki: Richard was arrested in 1961 after an altercation with Corday in their home after learning she posed naked for Playboy. A pictorial their three children would be shamed and embarrassed of. Richard's brother in law actor Marshall Thompson bailed him out, taking him to his home where the Long family held an intervention with hope Richard would finalize a divorce.

Sadly the toxic relationship continued.

The Curse of the original Little Rascals cast

Not tawdry but sad how Bobby Buntrock from Hazel died, young and in car accident. I don't know if the stories of the accident having anything to do with his mother's death are true or not. I do remember reading Whitney Blake who played his mom on Hazel didn't even know of his death til years later when she was asked in an interview.

I think the death Anissa Jones of Family Affair has already been mentioned upthread, so tragic.

The case of Matthew Garber seems tragic. After his films for Disney I read he got into hard drugs and that was the cause of death at the age of 21 in 1977. Even his friend and Co star Karen Dotrice said she didn't keep in touch and wished she had. Sounds to me like he was left quite isolated.

Thora Birch's parents being porn stars has been known since it was exposed by one of Tabloids when American Beauty came out and was big. She was NOT happy about that and refuses to discuss that with anyone.

Her dad was a control freak, but Thora was difficult too. She was supposed to have played Tammy Metzler in Election, but was so difficult, they canned her very early on in filming and recast.

Bolt is too homely (he looks like his dad a lot) and not talented enough to make it as an actor today.

Thora was a very good actress. Loved her in Ghost World.

It's funny. Of all the tawdriness in the thread, of much bigger stars, the one that gets me is Richard Long. I had no idea. I used to watch Big Valley in repeats after school. I loved that show. It's in my top five of favorites. I so wanted to be taken away from the turmoil and be a Barkley.

[quote] Oscar Wilde died broke, broken and mostly alone in Paris.

Homophobia killed him. The workhouse he was sentenced to for years, ruined his health. He died not long after he was released.

The movie about Bob Crane, 'Auto Focus", was pretty good, although Greg Kinnear (he played Crane) was a million times more appealing than the smarmy, smirking Bob Crane ever was. Crane was indeed what's known as a "sex addict" and when he was introduced to videotape by his sleazy friend John Henry Carpenter (played by Willem DaFoe) he became addicted to filming his sex escapades. Crane was bludgeoned to death in a hotel room, but his murder remains unsolved. Who killed him? Well, it could have been a lot of people. No doubt he made a lot of enemies doing what he did. He was not exactly discreet.

"Hollywood Babylon" was a mixture of fact and fiction, as all gossip tends to be. I was about 12 or 13 when I first read it; I found it highly entertaining. And the photos were certainly morbidly fascinating. There are quite a few death photos; Rudolph Valentino in his coffin (looking like a painted mannequin), Paul Bern nude and dead of self-inflicted gunshot wound, Thelma Todd dead in her car,possibly murdered. Lupe Velez in her coffin, the dead body of Lana Turner's lover Johnny Stompanato. There's also a full page photo of Marilyn Monroe with the caption "Marilyn's Big Sleep." It doesn't say so, but it looks like a death photo; she's in bed, her hair looks tangled and unkempt and her lips are drawn back from her teeth like the lips of a corpse.

You can Google Marilyn Monroe's death photos and post-autopsy photos. They're pretty gruesome.

Keep it coming! Great thread. Reminder to some here: you do not have to manually add the brackets. They system automatically does.

Doing it manually is the fun part!

R413 As for Oscar Wilde, he was comforted in his dying days by his two loyal friends Reggie Turner and Robbie Ross. Ross was Wilde's literary executor and when he died his ashes were interred with Wilde in the tomb in Pere Lachaise cemetary. Ironically the shabby hotel room with the infamous wallpaper is part of a luxury boutique hotel in Paris.

Bill Cosby wins this. He's lost everything and is still alive, old, in prison and ugly as sin.

He destroyed a stellar career that no one challenged. He was well-protected in Hollywood by phonies who knew he was a rapist for decades.

His downfall was remarkable and it was due to the insistent claims made by women who had little or no cache in this world. Some of these were laughed off, but they kept talking.

Cosby was protected by illuminati Hollywood and he lost.

It's all coming down folks.

^ I agreed with you until you brought in that "illuminati" nonsense

R381

Maybe you're the lazy one; too lazy to look them up and uh, where does the postline state that you're obliged to write a fucking novel ?

R422 No one is asking you to write a novel you millennial asshole. Just squeeze out a sentence as to why we should be intrigued enough to dig further.

[R422] is in danger of coming to a tawdry sad end!

r423 is one of those eldergays who uses "millennial" to bash anyone he doesn't like because he is jealous of people under the age of 90. I notice a lot of Republicans use the "participation trophy" talking point - did you get that one from Fox News?

Madonna

"Whitney Houston's Last Performance: An Impromptu Duet with Kelly Price"

Madonna

"Amy Winehouse's Last Days"

"Commercial Alka Seltzer w Otis Campbell"

Well fuck. I have to say Madonna is a good one to add to this list, and I never thought that would ever be a thing back in the day. I hope she pull it together but I rather doubt it. Too long with paid fiends and fuck folk make an addictive sad joke.

R408, It wasn't your typical car accident. Buntrock drove off a bridge and into a body of water. He was unable to free himself from the vehicle and drowned.

[r383] [R384] [R385]

I finally found a reference to the incident where Corday claimed Long beat and tried to strangle her. It's not the interview I read years ago, but it mentions the incident specifically.

"21 April 61 her husband is arrested in Hollywood when she tells police he beat and kicked her and tried to strangle her. She claims he had been drinking" "23 April 61 refuses to sign a battery complaint against Long, and he's released from jail on $250 bail "

Years ago I was watching an old ‘Ma and Pa Kettle’ short on TV, and Richard Long was in a scene playing their eldest son who had gone away to college. Long had apparently just had some extensive dental work done because it was obvious that he was in pain and it was difficult for him to talk.

he sure was cute before the booze

No bad-mouthing Jarrod Barkley!

His quote:

Let's just say I found her a little distant. I hardly got to know her. We had dinner a couple of times, but she only spoke about work. I didn't find her easy to work with, but it's not her job to make it easy for me.

^ Oops, r437 was posted in the wrong thread. Sorry.

One of his early roles was in the thriller "The Stranger," with Orson Welles and Loretta Young.

R437 and R438, well, now that you posted that comment, we want to know whom you’re talking about!

[R440]

My money is not on Shelley Winters.

R440 He's talking about the late Dick Long (he of the fat face and pomaded hair)

Most here must know, Whitney Blake was the mom of DL icon Meredith Baxter-Birney.

James Murray, star of King Vidor’s classic 1928 silent film, “The Crowd.” If you haven’t seen see, see it. Its depiction of modern life and the illusion of the American dream is way ahead of its time. Murray played the lead role to great acclaim. Eight years later, a destitute alcoholic and a panhandler, he committed suicide.

“By 1934, Murray was out of work and panhandling on the street. Around that time, director King Vidor was casting his upcoming film, Our Daily Bread. He immediately thought of Murray and set out to find him. Upon discovering a much heavier and unkempt Murray begging for money on the street, Vidor bought Murray a drink and offered him the lead role in Our Daily Bread, provided he pull himself together. Murray turned Vidor down stating, "Just because I stop you on the street and try to borrow a buck you think you can tell me what to do. As far as I am concerned, you know what you can do with your lousy part."[5]”

"Cosby was protected by illuminati Hollywood and he lost."

Thank u, NEXT.

what's that r104? What's THAT story?

Definitely qualifying as a celebrity for his time, Stephen Foster was one of the most prolific song writers ever, but lived before copyrighting of music was standard and always struggled financially. He abandoned his wife and child and moved to NYC, possibly because he was in love with fellow composer George Cooper. There he died from a drunken fall injuring his head in a 25 center a night boarding house on the Bowery. He languished for days at the rat infested Bellevue Hospital and there was only 38 cents in his wallet and a scrap of paper with the unfinished lyric “dear friends and gentle hearts.” Two months later his song Beautiful Dreamer, with the lyric “awake unto me” was published.

I keep researching, but I just can’t find the story and the name of some one I recall. I thought it was Tina Chow, but it isn’t. But there was a fashion icon of the 80s and 90s who had a famous husband. She had I think Bipolar illness and I thought had also contracted HIV. She ended up homeless on the streets of New York City, and I recall a NYT article about how her children would see her as a bag lady on the street when they went to school. Does this ring a bell with anyone?

Tina Chow. see link

What's not tawdry is Olivia deHavilland, who is STILL ALIVE at 101, and living well in Paris.

We were in Paris just last week, and saw Mr. Wilde's grave. People left lipstick kisses on his tomb which were started to degrade the stone, so a plexiglass wall has been placed around it, for safe kissing.

^^^ That still pales in comparison to what they did to Jim Morrisons grave, did you see it there too? Fitting into this thread, the graves of Amedeo Modigliani and Jean Hebuterne are there also. He drank himself to death and used drugs, which already exacerbated his TB which killed him. She was eight months pregnant and committed suicide by jumping out the window a day later. They left another child behind. Initially kept apart in death, they were finally reunited and are side by side. Her marker read “Devoted companion to the extreme sacrifice.”

R448's post reminded me of Carolyn Reybold, a top model of the '50s, who was Grace Kelly's best friend and bridesmaid. They had met when both were young single ladies staying at the Barbizon in NYC. They became best buds, shared clothes, double-dated, and went to the opera and movies together. Grace introduced Carolyn to ad exec Malcolm Reybold, whom Carolyn married in 1949. Years later, Grace confessed to Carolyn that she had had an affair with her husband and begged forgiveness. Anyway, years later, after losing a daughter to a car accident, then her husband to divorce, Carolyn's mental state spiraled out of control and she ended up living on the streets of New York. A surviving daughter, Nyna, tried to get her into a home, but Carolyn preferred an unencumbered life on the streets. When Carolyn died of cancer in a nursing home in 2009, there were no more friends or family, save Nyna, to mourn.

Richard Long was the poor man's Gig Young.

In that photo above, Richard Long looks like the Corey Haim of his time, with that arrogant sneering lip curl.

I never liked Richard Long.

Jean Seberg, plucked from obscurity by Otto Preminger to star in SAINT JOAN; despite continued negative reviews, continued acting in films, including BREATHLESS and BONJOUR TRISTESSE. Moved to France, where she had better success. Married a French director, Romain Gary. In the 70s, became blacklisted and investigated by the FBI, ostensibly for her support of the Black Panthers. Made a few films in the late 60s, most notably PAINT YOUR WAGON and AIRPORT, but spent most of her time in France. Plagued by mental illness, alcohol and pill addictions, ended up as a suicide at age 40, with her decomposed body found in her car wrapped in a blanket.

And have we not mentioned PETER LAWFORD? MGM actor, brother in law of JFK, later a member of Sinatra's Rat Pack. Years of substance abuse and embarrassing TV appearances late in life, died at only 61. Buried in Westwood Cemetery but had to be carted out of there due to nonpayment of fees - ashes were scattered over the Pacific. His lookalike son Christopher struggled with substance abuse for years, but eventually recovered, only to die at 63 from an apparent heart attack after doing hot yoga.

Dirk Shafer. Playgirl centerfold Man of the Year who came out as gay, made a documentary about it and went on to make the circuit party film Circuit released in 2001. Found dead in his Honda Civic at 52 with cocaine and meth in his system on a West Hollywood street.

That Kony guy.

A celebrity one day; nude in San Diego the next.

Gig Young was the poor man's Gig Young.

Gig Young was the name of the character Byron Barr played in "The Gay Sisters" (yes). The studio gave him that name. He was a gorgeous young man.

Mel Brooks cast Gig in Blazing Saddles but Gig started spewing green stuff in his scene so he was out.

Cynthia Myers?

Heisman winner Rashaan Salaam

R462, how did Cynthia Myers’s life end in tawdry sorrow?

I see, R337. Well, THAT Troy Donahue - who wasn’t THE Troy Donahue - wasn’t a “celebrity.”

R465 = Delusional Queen

Brittany Murphy (actress). Died at home in 2009, age 32. Husband Simon Monjack died at home the same year, age 40.

Brittany Murphy is a good one.

Roger C. Carmel was a very popular sit character player for years. He was fired from The Mothers-in-Law series in 1968, the year before it was cancelled. It was widely reported that the actor (at age 54) committed suicide on November 11, 1986 - from an overdose of aspirin or from congestive heart failure, but everyone in Hollywood knew he was a coke head.

Rumor has it that Roger C. Carmel died of a crack cocaine overdose while romping with a young male prostitute. Friends found him at home in bed surrounded by cocaine paraphernalia .An 'aspirin overdose' story was released to protect the client's image as much as possible.

John Drew Barrymore was the son of famous actor John Barrymore, as well as being Drew Barrymore's father. Coming from a family of famous actors did not sit well with John. Throughout his life he was compared with his father and grandfather.

After years of struggling in less than stellar roles, Barrymore gave up on acting and started to drift throughout the world. He was known to disappear for months at a time only to pop up in jail for drug abuse and public drunkenness. He succumbed to cancer in 2004.

Wow . I never knew Drew Barrymore’s father was so handsome . How sad of a life .

Drew Barrymore's paternal grandmother was Dolores Costello, a real beauty of the silent era. Costello's life ended in somewhat sad circumstances as a recluse.

R448 are you thinking of that soho boutique owner who ended up a useless junkie living on the subway tracks in a hobo encampment??

R&B legend Jackie Wilson

Wow, R469, I didn’t know that. How tragique. He was in two iconic Star Trek episodes...

Norma Desmond

Sarah Jessica Parker had to enter the Kentucky Derby.

She used the name "Oatsie", though, to avoid exposure.

r245 thanks for posting that fascinating information about Dare Wright. I hadn't heard of her and am absolutely riveted by her story. I love the photos of her with her mother.

The weird thing about Dare Wright was that she remained a virgin all her life. She was a successful model, and many men were interested in her, but she just somehow couldn't connect with men (or women) on an adult level, sexually or emotionally. Her existence just became incredibly stagnant.

I don't know what happened to her early on or if it was her overly close, co-dependent relationship with her mother that fucked her up...but there was something very wrong.

[quote]r316 Is poverty absolutely necessary to die in tawdry sorrow?

No. The famous agent Myron Selznick left all his holdings to his daughter Joan in 1944, who became an alcoholic recluse in Laguna Beach. When they found her dead at age 60 the garbage in her house was knee high, with many bundles of money and uncashed checks lying around the place. She owned many properties, including the land Neiman Marcus sits on.

She had not left her house for a decade.

What was tawdry about the last years of Dolores Costello (Drew Barrymore's grandma)? I searched online and found nothing.

Get on back of the fucking line!

There whole life was tawdry R481.

*Their

Aldo Ray. Reduced to doing a non-sexual role in a porn flick.

Edgar Allan Poe

British Broadway actor, George Rose, most famously known for the Mystery of Drood, was tortured for hours and murdered by his 17 year old adopted Dominican Repulic son and his biological father. They claimed he and the boy had been lovers for years since he was 14, but Rose had developed an attraction for another boy and was going to disinherited him. Maybe Rackoff Senior dodged a bullet with his adopted son.

This is a long thread and I am new to it. Has anyone mentioned Dorothy Parker?

The famous female wit of the Algonquin Round Table spent her last years in an alcoholic haze, living in a hotel for single women in NYC. Her place was a hovel. She kept her beloved dogs cooped with her and she was careless about cleaning up when they shat indoors. Well-meaning friends wrote checks to help support her. Other well-meaning friends would notice such checks strewn about, not cashed.

I love this thread.

"On May 5, 1968, Dekker was found dead in his Hollywood home by his fiancée, fashion model and future Love Boat creator Jeraldine Saunders. He was naked, kneeling in the bathtub, with a noose tightly wrapped around his neck and looped around the shower curtain rod. He was blindfolded, his wrists were handcuffed, there was a ball gag in his mouth, and two hypodermic needles were inserted in one arm. His body was covered in explicit words and drawings in red lipstick.[7]"

I hate when that happens.

Somebody is warped by a murder and then they create "Love Boat."

Like we all have to suffer for it.

R487 Parker wrote a play called "Ladies of the Corridor," based on her experiences there.

I loved Dorothy Parker's alleged usual reaction to whenever her phone rang or someone knocked on her hotel room door:

"What fresh hell can this be?"

One of her constant gentleman callers in her final years was Gloria Vanderbilt's husband, Wyatt, who was also the father of Anderson Cooper and his suicidal brother.

George Rose wins

What about that ANTM has-been Jael Strauss. She just died last week, so it's fresh. Plus, she's hardly a celebrity.

Marlene Dietrich's last years as a bedridden recluse were quite sad.

Lens Dunham. Tawdry - yes. Sorrow? Meh.

It’s probably been mentioned already, but actor Barry Evans did not end well. He was very popular as a young sitcom star in the UK — Doctor in the House & Mind Your Language. He hit the skids and wound up dead from a head wound and alcohol poisoning in his home. He had reported his car stolen and when police came to tell him they’d recovered his car the next day, he was dead. There were several unsavory young men who liked to hang out & drink with him. One was charged with attempted murder but was let go for lack of evidence

He was cute as a young man but did not age well at all. He’d been abandoned at an orphanage as a baby & grew up in it. Can’t have been an easy life. Probably seemed like a miracle when he became famous — overcoming odds and all that — but when he aged he just didn’t have the same youthful buoyancy and he looked tired and wrung out.

Those orphanages were notorious for sexual abuse of the children in them

Dame Edna Everidge

R496, thank you for that post. I always liked his performances.

Gay music producer Joe Meek

That Aubrey chick who fucked DT Jr

covid19

Judy Garland and Jack Kerouac were both born in 1922. Both died in 1969, of either alcoholism or drugs. Both achieved fame and success, yet neither lived past 47.

My 1989 Oscars was the best Oscars ever!

r340 Just the one, dear?