Very Emotionally Involving
Entertainment Writer, reality TV junkie, a storyteller
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FEB
27
2008
Celebrity Rehab —
I just had to remember to set my TiVo for Celebrity Rehab, a new show on VH-1 featuring celebrities going through a very public rehab for a variety of addictions, being helped by Dr. Drew Pinsky. This show was obviously one I needed to see, as a person that loves all entertainment, and enjoys watching what make people tick. It was a few weeks into the season, and I'd missed a few episodes, so I downloaded them off iTunes to catch up. After watching just a few, I was hooked and finally remembered to set my TiVo up.Dr. Drew has brought some well-known celebrities into a rehab facility. He's brought someone he was introduced to on Celebrity Fit Club, Jeff Conaway. With a back injury he's had since the filming of Grease, he started on pain meds and it went from there. The bad part is he's now addicted to booze, painkillers, and cocaine, yet still lives in pain on a daily basis. Daniel Baldwin's substance abuse addiction had come to light on Fit Club as well.
Joining them are ex-Surreal Life stars Chyna and Brigette Nelson known for their boozing, although Chyna doesn't think she has a problem, inviting the question of why she's there. Also, Jessica Sierra, who is more well-known for her troubles post-American Idol than she is for her singing, and Mary Carey, a porn star who needs to drop that whole created persona, and some lesser known stars, such as Jaimee Foxworth from Family Matters, addicted to pot and also doing porn now, Ricco Suave Rodriguez, UFC Champion, and Seth Binzer, frontman for the band Crazy Town.
Right out of the gate, the show on Celebrity Rehab was engaging, as every one of these people came into Rehab stoned, except fro Chyna, who thinks she can stop whenever she wants, and Daniel who had been sober for several months. We get to see them all going though withdrawal, with the worst being everything out of Jeff. It's shocking seeing him strolling through the doors in a wheelchair and seeing in his clip package his girlfriend holding the dollar bill up to his nose to help abuse him. In just the first 24 hours, he was sent to the hospital with severe problems. It's hard for him since he needs the meds because he's in pain, but he uses that as a crutch.
With every week that goes by, these celebrities that would have had nothing to do with each other outside the house, save for a few of them, begin to grow close, like a mini community, and depend on each other for their sobriety. It's not long before we start to see all the emotional family problems that started these stars out on their roads to addiction. Jeff suffered through torture as a preschooler and sexual exploitation as a grade schooler, so his addiction problems aren't necessarily rooted in his back injury. Both Mary and Jessica had mothers who were absent because of their own addictions, and that causes Brigette to think differently of her own life as an addicted mother.
It does make you wonder how the show ends, as we know filming has already been completed, and Jessica is already in jail again after a drunken evening of abusing a cop, but Dr. Drew has talked about it since, and it seems to think it was something taken out of proportion. Either way, she's pregnant and in jail now, so while she's being forced into sobriety now, she'll be able to continue that path and the things she learned from Dr. Drew after the show.
It's not too late to get into Celebrity Rehab. VH-1 is notorious for repeating whole seasons of shows in marathons, and as mentioned before, it's available for download on iTunes. If you're a celebrity watcher and/or enjoy studying people and figuring out their lives, this is a show not to miss. Each and every episode, the things discovered and the paths these addicts take just continues to draw me in even more.
Celebrity Rehab is recommended by LauraBelle
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