Brittany Murphy’s widower was found dead yesterday in their Hollywood home. Simon Monjack, a British screenwriter, is being said to have died of “natural” causes at age 39. This could be true– he may have slipped in the shower, or suffered some other freaky, tragic, natural incident. But all I can think about is the massive pile of prescription meds that was found at their house 5 months ago when Brittany died.
I’m not a huge fan of Monjack’s work. I never saw Factory Girl, and don’t really have the inclination to, but over the past couple years it’s been feeling a bit how it must have in the 70′s when every few months another artist died of a drug overdose. It’s tragic to loose them, especially if their contribution has been personally touching, but also because in many ways, celebrities are just a public test group for the way our whole culture is acting. Lots of couples cheat on each other, and lots of people die of drug overdoses. And it looks like now, as of 2002, prescription drug overdoses have started outnumbering deaths from heroin and cocaine.
Here’s a quick look at a few of the public deaths from the 70’s and 80’s versus now:
Sid Vicious: Feb 1st 1979. Vicious died from heroin his mother had delivered to a party that was celebrating his having made bail. He had been sober for four months. A suicide note was later found by his mother in the jacket of the pocket he was wearing. This has to count as one of the most depressing celebrity deaths of all-time.
Janis Joplin: October 4th 1970. Joplin died at the Landmark Hotel in Los Angeles the night before she was supposed to go into Sunset Sound Studios to prepare the vocals for the track “Buried Alive in the Blues.” At least the illicit drug deaths always seemed to contain a potent, often poetic lack of irony.
Jim Morrison- July 3rd 1971. Morrison was found dead in the bathtub of his Paris apartment. At first officials reported “natural causes”, but Pamela Courson, his long-time girl who was with him at the time, said it was a heroin overdose… as bathtub deaths tend to be.
John Belushi: March 5th 1982. One of the funniest guys ever died of a speedball given to him Cathy Smith at Chateau Marmont. She guiltily admitted to literally shooting him up in an interview, and afterwards got charged with involuntary manslaughter.
And more recently:
Anna Nicole Smith: Feb 8th 2007. After starring in one of the most successful diet pill campaigns in history, Smith died in Florida at age 39 with 11 prescription drugs in her blood.
Corey Haim: March 10th 2010. Haim died at 38 with Vicodin, Valium and Soma among the drugs he took. He was found at the Oakwood apartments in Burbank California. For anyone who has never been, the Oakwoods is possibly the most anti-poetic death site in all of LA.
Heath Ledger: January 22nd 2008. Heath Ledger died at 28 in his SoHo apartment, overdosing on Oxycodone, Hydrocodone, Diazepam, Temazepam, Alprazolam, and Doxylamine.
Michael Jackson: June 25th 2009. Jackson is the only celebrity in this article whose death has its own Wikipedia page. He died of cardiac arrest in a Hollywood home he was renting while rehearsing for his ‘This is It’ tour. Diprivan, which he was taking for insomnia was found in his bloodstream, making his death the most hard-core prescription O.D. of a celebrity todate.
Does overdosing on prescribed drugs count as a natural cause? Dying from something ending in “pro” or “done” definitely seems less scandalous than from a speedball and a liter of red wine. I remember being relieved when it was announced that Heath Ledger didn’t have heroin flushed through his bloodstream. It seemed less tragic, less suicidal. A doctor had found it necessary that he have the meds, and he kind of had the flu at the time. Maybe he wasn’t keeping track of how often he was taking them? I get it. I’ve never done heroin, but one time my doctor accidentally gave me two prescriptions for 40 vicodin, and I TOTALLY filled them both and took it all. It’s a very effective killer of both physical and psychological pain, and keeping track of the hour isn’t top priority when you’re high. I mean medicated. Whatever.
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