EVENING UPDATE: Sad news, guys. Patrick Swayze died today at age 57, after a nearly two year fight with pancreatic cancer. From People:
“Patrick Swayze passed away peacefully today with family at his side after facing the challenges of his illness for the last 20 months,” his rep tells PEOPLE in a statement.
A gifted dancer, a rugged outdoorsman, a romantic leading man and a loving husband, Swayze was also, as his brother Don put it, “a warrior” in his cancer fight.
Patrick Swayze was the son of a choreographer and he trained at the Joffrey Ballet School, he performed on Broadway, he appeared in over 30 feature films, he met his wife when he was 19 and she was 15 and they were together for nearly 40 years, he flew his own planes, he owned and operated a ranch outside of Los Angeles, and he starred in a television series whilst undergoing chemotherapy for one of the most painful forms of cancer. He is possibly most famous for his roles in Dirty Dancing and Ghost, but let’s get serious here. His real legacy is as follows:
Although it’s been rumored that she’s been on her deathbed for weeks, actress Farrah Fawcett was read her last rights Wednesday night. The NY Daily News reports
A priest was summoned [last night] to the Los Angeles hospital where the 62-year-old is being treated.
Those keeping vigil in the intensive care unit included longtime love Ryan O’Neal, who has been with [her] constantly since she was hospitalized two weeks ago.
The actress was diagnosed with [anal] cancer in 2006.
Risk factors for anal cancer include having multiple sex partners, engaging in anal sex and smoking cigarettes, so by all accounts I should have been dead five years ago. I guess I’m what you’d call a “miracle of science.” You have to admit, it sounds a whole lot better than “dirty no-good whore.” My mom doesn’t know what the hell she’s talking about.
UPDATE I:People Magazine is reporting that Farrah died at 9:28 a.m. PST this morning at St. John’s Heath Center in Santa Monica. Our condolences to her family.
UPDATE II: Astute reader Helluvadrug pointed out that half of these pictures are actually Bo Derek. In my defense, the pictures are 30 years old and really grainy and I’ve been drinking since 9 a.m. And they still have boobs, so don’t yell at me. I hate it when we fight like this.
UPDATE III: Couldn’t find her 1978 Playboy spread any effing where, so here’s her 1997 Playboy shoot instead. You can still see Bo Derek nekkid after the jump.
While Farrah Fawcett, who is currently enduring her second bout with colorectal cancer, lapsed into unconsciousness at a Los Angeles hospital last night, her son was busy getting busted for smuggling meth onto jail property. It’s what any dying mother would want, really. The NY Daily News says
A cancer-stricken [and unconscious] Farrah Fawcett was fighting for her life Sunday night as relatives gathered at her bedside. The former “Charlie’s Angels” star, now 62, has been in an undisclosed hospital since Thursday.
Adding to the family drama was yesterday’s arrest of her son Redmond O’Neal on charges he tried to smuggle drugs into a county jail. O’Neal, 24, was busted when he drove a friend to [visit a buddy currently incarcerated in] a detention facility in Santa Clarita, Calif., and guards found drugs on him at a checkpoint.
I can’t think of anything more appropriate to do while your mother’s on her deathbed. Getting arrested for soliciting sex from an underage transvestite or plowing through a sidewalk full of orphans piss-drunk and high is a close second. It sure beats the hell out of flowers and prayers, anyway. Why does everything have to be so goddamn clichéd?
UPDATE:People Magazine says Farrah is now awake and doing better, while her son remains an insufferable douche.
UPDATE II: It was heroin and Xanax that the insufferable douche was caught with, not meth. Yeeeah regrets the error and Ryan O’Neal’s facial hair.
Oscar-winning actor Paul Newman succumbed to cancer this past Friday at his home in Connecticut. The philanthropist, World War II veteran and devoted family man was 83 years old. The Vice President of Newman’s charity “Newman’s Own” released the following statement after his passing:
Paul Newman’s love was his family and friends, and his heart and soul were dedicated to helping make the world a better place for all.
He quietly devoted himself to [those less fortunate with the creation of] Newman’s Own, donating all the profits and royalties he earned to thousands of charities around the world, a total which now exceeds $250 million.
He was especially committed to the thousands of children with life-threatening conditions served by the Hole in the Wall Camps, which he helped start over 20 years ago. He saw the Camps as places where kids could escape the fear, pain and isolation of their conditions. Through the Camps, well over 135,000 children have had the chance to experience what childhood was meant to be.
In Paul’s words: “I wanted to acknowledge luck; the chance and benevolence of it in my life, and the brutality of it in the lives of others, who might not be allowed the good fortune of a lifetime to correct it.”
Paul took advantage of what life offered him, and while personally reluctant to acknowledge that he was doing anything special, he forever changed the lives of many with his generosity, humor, and humanness. His legacy lives on in the charities he supported and the Hole in the Wall Camps, for which he cared so much.
You don’t find people much better than that right there. The world was a better place for him having been in it. If more celebrities were like him, I’d be out of a job. Rest in peace, Mr. Newman.
