death (464 posts)

Michael Jackson's not the only fallen star with a posthumous project out this week. (Just the only one competing against unrealistically high expectations.)

Just a few months after Modest Mouse released Heath Ledger's music video directorial debut, his directorial finale made its way online this week, courtesy of London rapper and Ledger childhood friend No Fixed Abode.

According to the rapper, the Oscar winner filmed the three-and-a-half minute opus in his garage in Sydney in the months before his death in January 2008. The video, which features some slightly Joker-esque makeup, was also included in a tribute to Ledger shown during the Rome Film Festival earlier this month.

"The idea was to keep it very artistic which is what we did," the rapper, who also goes by N'fa, said. "Heath directed really well…and I know that Heath was happy with the work.

"Everyday I count my blessings that I got to have him direct this piece of art. It was a song I was proud to have written but I never expected to have such an immense video made for it. I'd known Heath since we were very young and he was always a creative kind of guy and, in many ways, ahead of the curve. When he had the idea about doing this video I had no question about it.

"Thank you very much Heath for all your help, I wish you were here."

Meanwhile, Ledger's final film, The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus, will open in limited release on Dec. 25.

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There's the family we were born with and the family we find along the way. Bruce Springsteen has both.

And tonight, his show with the E Street Band in Kansas City, Mo., was "unavoidably cancelled" following a death in Springsteen's "immediate family," according to a statement on the rocker's website.

No further details were available, but local police told the K.C. Star that they are investigating the circumstances surrounding the death this afternoon of a member of Springsteen's road crew.

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Kevin Mazur/Getty Images; Jim Spellman/Getty Images

Celebrity deaths can be tragic.

Or they can be tragically ridiculous.

Thanks to the Interwebs, fake celebrity deaths have been running rampant. Kanye West supposedly lost his life in a car crash this week, while Zach Braff recently had to create a video to prove he was still kicking despite tales of a fatal pill-popping episode.

And by now we know that any star rumored to have fallen off a cliff in New Zealand is more likely to have slipped into an Internet hoax. The Kauri Cliffs have supposedly taken Natalie Portman, Jeff Goldblum, Tom Cruise and Tom Hanks from us.

Some have died at the hands of Twitter and Wikipedia, while others have met dramatic driving demises. Needless to say, not all false death alarms were created equal. Some are definitely more believable than others.

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Get the scoop on all the celebs who survived their own supposed deaths in our Alive & Kicking gallery!

Count your legends while they last.

Iconic funnyman Soupy Sales (totally not his real name), perhaps best known for the thousands of pies he took to the face during his 30-plus years on TV and radio, died Thursday at a hospice in the Bronx. He was 83 and had been in bad health for some time, according to longtime friend and former manager Dave Usher.

The rubberfaced slapstick specialist, whom Howard Stern has namechecked as one of his comedic heroes, started hosting the kids show Lunch With Soupy Sales in the 1959, a combination of puppetry, skits and physical comedy that usually resulted in Sales being hit with a pie in the face.

Just as Sesame Street transcends age groups, Sales made his kids show adult friendly by featuring celebs like Tony Curtis and Shirley MacLaine and any other good-natured star willing to take a pie to the punim.

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AP Photo/Kris Ingraham

John Travolta's peace of mind is now in the hands of a dozen Bahamians.

The jury is expected to begin deliberations today in the case of two locals who allegedly targeted Travolta and Kelly Preston with a $25 million extortion scheme following the death of son Jett.

Exactly one month after the trial began, closing arguments wrapped up in Nassau court this morning. The Travoltas were not present, having long since departed from the island (and absconded to England with Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes for a Scientology bonanza) after the actor's emotional testimony was complete.

Former Sen. Pleasant Bridgewater and ambulance driver Tarino Lightbourne have both pleaded not guilty.

The defense implored the jury to "set my people free," floating the theory during the trial that Travolta's attorney, with "evil in his heart," had come to the Bahamas with a plan to "corner" and "set up" the defendants.

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AP Photo/Houston Chronicle, Pool Photographer

Michael Jackson's comeback may have been a career killer for Dr. Conrad Murray.

The Nevada-based cardiologist hasn't been able to practice medicine since getting sucked up in the postmortem Jackson saga and that's why he now looks like a deadbeat, according to Murray's attorney.

"One of the reasons he went to work for Michael Jackson was to pay this off," lawyer Chris Aaron tells E! News, referring to the more than $13,000 in support payments he owes the mother of one of his children.

Not only did Murray never get paid for the weeks he spent as Jackson's personal physician, but all the media scrutiny has made him persona non grata in the public eye.

Murray missed a hearing on the child-support issue on Oct. 7 and a bench warrant was issued for his arrest. Aaron, who's repping the doc in these family matters, said his client's absence from the hearing was a simple oversight.

"Normally, he has a staff," Aaron said. "With everything going on, he's been in California, he's been having to go back and forth, and it just slipped through the cracks."

There is quite a bit going on.

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We were happy to hear yesterday from Larry Birkhead that Dannielynn is now a healthy and happy 3-year-old.

Considering all the pills Anna Nicole Smith was popping while pregnant, it's a minor miracle.

At least that's how a psychaitrist who treated Smith told it today on the stand in the hearing to determine whether Smith sidekick Howard K. Stern and two physicians will go to trial for enabling the former Playmate's substance abuse that led to her 2007 death.

For a second day, Dr. Natalie Maulin testified that she attempted to wean an addled, pregnant Smith off prescription painkillers, only to be rebuffed by the onetime E! star.

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Prince Williams/Getty Images; Fulton aCounty Jail

We doubt this will sit well with The Real Housewives of Atlanta.

Frederick Richardson, the man accused in the slaying of A.J. Jewell, the on-off fiancé of Housewives star Kandi Burruss, was released from Atlanta's Fulton County Jail early Tuesday.

Richardson was sprung after posting $10,000 bond. While that may seem low, Magistrate Judge Karen Woodson said it was fitting with the crime, especially after an initial coroner's report suggested the blood disorder sickle-cell anemia may have been a factor in Jewell's death.

Richardson was taken into custody following an Oct. 2 brawl in the parking lot of Body Tap, an ATL strip club coowned by Jewell, and charged with voluntary manslaughter. According to police, Richards, a club employee, got into a slugfest with his boss. Jewell sustained a severe blow to the head and died several hours later.

No word yet on when Richardson is due back in court.

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Get inside scoop on the Real Housewives of Atlanta every week from Bethenny Frankel.

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It was a send-off fit for any boy bander.

The life of Boyzone singer Stephen Gately was celebrated in a Dublin, Ireland funeral on Saturday, as fellow bandmates and over 3,000 fans gathered to remember the star.

Fans listened in on speakers outside of the church as remaining Boyzone members Ronan Keating, Keith Duffy, Shane Lync and Mikey Graham paid tribute to Gately, performing and speaking about the tragic loss during the service and acting as pallbearers.

The four also stayed in the church with their friend's body the night before the funeral.

Following the service, Boyzone tweeted info about a Gately memorial started by his husband Andrew Cowles. All funds will go directly to the late star's charity, Caudwell Children.

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Too many lives have been cut short over the years.

AP Photo

Drugs are bad. But not that bad, at least not for Billy Mays.

Despite an initial autopsy report indicating that cocaine played a significant role in the super-pitchman's unexpected death last June, an independent evaluation, carried out by a doctor hired by the Mays family, now claims that while the nose candy may have been present in Mays' system, it had absolutely nothing to do with his premature demise.

Dr. William Manion issued a six-page report on his findings contradicting Florida's Hillsborough County medical examiner, who said that Mays died of heart disease and that his cocaine use was a contributing factor.

According to Manion, the county coroner was only partly right.

"It is my opinion to a reasonable degree of medical certainty that cocaine was not a significant contributing factor to the death of the late Williams Darrell Mays," he said, going on to say that Mays' nasal passages had neither deteriorated nor shown any damage typical of a chronic cocaine user, and that nothing in his "medical, social or professional history" suggested such behavior.

Of course, it's of note that Manion did not actually conduct an autopsy of his own and admittedly has yet to even physically examine the body. His findings, instead, were based on a review of the report issued by the medical examiner's office.

Which, apparently, is good enough for the Mays family.

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The preliminary autopsy results are in, and there was a surprising finding regarding the slaying of Real Housewives of Atlanta's Ashley "A.J." Jewell.

Dr. Kelly Rose of the Fulton County Medical Examiner's Office tells E! News that Kandi Burruss' on-off fiancé may have suffered from the blood disorder sickle-cellaAnemia, which could have contributed to his death during a bar fight outside an Atlanta strip club.

"Preliminary results are suggestive of [sickle-cell]," said Rose.

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