"Diff'rent Strokes" actor Gary Coleman dies

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"Diff'rent Strokes" actor Gary Coleman dies

Postby Kevin Mc » Fri May 28, 2010 9:09 pm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment_and_arts/10181246.stm

Used to love watching Diff'rent Strokes when I was a kid. Gary Coleman was very funny.

I had a crush on one of the main characters Kimberly. The actress who played her, Dana Plato died in 1999 after an overdose. I've just read that her son killed himself 2 days before the 11th anniversary of her death in May this year.

This is from the wiki on Dana Plato - she had an interview the day before she died:

Final interview and death

On May 7, 1999, Plato appeared on The Howard Stern Show, where she told Stern and Robin Quivers that she was engaged to 28-year-old Robert Menchaca, and that he was managing her career. She was frank about her situation, discussing her financial problems and past run-ins with the law. She admitted to being a recovering alcoholic/drug addict, but claimed that she had been sober for more than 10 years by that point, and was not using any drugs, with the exception of prescribed painkillers due to discomfort and pain from the recent extraction of her wisdom teeth. Many of her callers called her everything from a "has been" to an addict. She was referred to by one caller as an "ex-con lesbian drug addict with mental problems". This provoked a defiant Plato, as she offered to take a drug test on the air (and even placed a large wager on the results of the test to one particularly doubtful caller). Some callers, however, came to Plato's defense by consoling and complimenting her.[15]

After the first three negative calls, a caller named Julie told Plato that she looked and sounded great, and could not fathom why people were attacking her the way they were, and although they were cruel to her, she was supportive. Plato wept while offering her gratitude, as well to a later caller who claimed to be a recovering addict, and told her that he believed everything she said.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dana_Plato

Very sad.

RIP Gary
Kevin Mc
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