Much has been written about the media glamourising drugs. For some bizarre reason, this has been portrayed as being a bad thing. As though they shouldn’t be allowed to portray the truth that drugs make people cooler. To prove this point I’m going to tell you about my favourite Stars on Drugs. It’s when we see drugs in Showbiz that we really see how beautiful drugs are.
Ozzie Osbourne
Who can forget that moment in TV history when Ozzie sat on his couch, trying to make the remote work, incomprehensibly muttering at the TV? It was comic genius that could only have happened with the aid of drugs. Would any of us watch The Osbournes if it weren’t for the insane ramblings of “The Dad”? The drugs fried the few brain cells Ozzie was born with.
Those brain cells might have prevented his rise to the top. It’s his incredible stupidity that has charmed us all and made many of us aspire to have families just as dysfunctional as his. Now he’s an international TV star who can provide a free ride on his record label to his untalented daughter. Kelly Osbourne never uses drugs and so will remain a one-hit wonder. She will never unleash the true star within in the way that Ozzie has.
Judy Garland
A very beautiful woman. Made even more beautiful by the drugs. Can there be any greater tale of the love between one person and a myriad of poisons? She dedicated so much of her public and private life to drugs.
Who can forget that magical, blissful moment when Dorothy wanders through the field of (opium) poppies and falls into a deep slumber? This demonstrated to a generation of young children that if they needed to sleep that drugs could deliver rest to them quickly and effectively. Judy learned these lessons herself and became addicted to sleeping pills. In the mornings she gave herself a quick pep-up with benzadrine.
My favourite memories of childhood are watching The Wizard of Oz. Do you honestly think that movie would have been possible without the aid of amphetamines? The excited delight in the eyes of Dorothy could only be maintained through the strenuous filming hours with the drugs that were generously provided to her by MGM Studios. She began to develop gorgeous blue rings around her eyes.
Her erratic behaviour put Judy in the newspapers with sensational stories. She took stimulants to cause really exciting psychotic states that she could keep up through the night owing to her insomnia. She took barbiturates to give her headaches and fatigue. The combination of drugs she was taking led to hallucinations (which made for great stories) and shortness of breath and suicidal tendencies. My favourite story was when she threatened to throw herself out the window of her hotel if room service didn’t get her what she wanted. She said “Think of the headlines: “Dorothy kills herself at LA hotel”.” Now there’s a woman who knows how to create a good headline!
And all the while, she got rave reviews for her shows. So forget your troubles, come on, get happy, get high on drugs.
Elvis: The King of Sex, Drugs ‘n’ Rock ‘n’ Roll
Elvis stayed at the top of his game for over 40 years. No performer has been able to maintain that sort of status for so long because no performer has taken the amount of drugs he has. Although he died of heart failure caused by drugs, he took quite a bit of killing. The average new drug user might only be able to take one pill at a time. But Elvis worked at his drug habit. When he died, they found 14 prescription drugs in his system. But even that wasn’t enough. It was the chemical reactions between the combined drugs that created a further 22 chemicals in Elvis’ blood, and it was that that killed him. Now that’s impressive. The autopsy revealed he had advanced hardening of the arteries and an enlarged liver. His doctor dispensed 5,300 pills to Elvis during the final 6 months of his life. Something only a true Star could do.
The manner in which he was found is a true star going out in style. Elvis was found face down in his toilet, dressed in his jammies. He was crouched over his face and his tongue was dark and bloated. You see, even his tongue was larger than life! Elvis was a man who had a heart as big as Phar Lap’s. In fact, he died of an enlarged heart. Elvis’ corpse weighed in at over 250 pounds. That’s enough meat to feed the entire population of Somalia twice over!
To me, Elvis in the 70s epitomises the glamour of drug use. Just picture him up on stage, with all those sparkly sequins, pumped full of chemicals, sweating like a ... well, like a drug fiend, belting out the tunes that he can remember because the speed is helping his brain work properly. Elvis made fat crack addict look beautiful.
Jim Morrison
Morrison was one of the biggest rock stars of all time. His records sold millions. His concerts sold thousands. And he used the money well. On drugs. When Morrison died in Paris at the age of 27 from you guessed it, it was discovered he truly had lived the glamorous life of a rock n roller. Live fast, die young.
Morrison spent all his money while he was alive, so that they couldn’t afford to fly his body back to the US. It was just as well. His grave now lies in the same cemetery as that of Oscar Wilde and Edith Piaf. Yes, the home of glamorous graves. Wilde and Piaf’s graves take up larger areas than my garage.
Morrison’s grave on the other hand, is a little smaller, but still very glamorous. When I visited it, I wandered around the area the map said it was in for about ten minutes, unable to find it. When we got out the magnifying glass we could actually see Morrison’s grave. Buried away in a little corner, a pauper’s grave. Glamorous.
And who knows where Morrison would have got to if it weren’t for drugs. His lyrics talked about them or were psychotic ramblings induced by them. Take the concert where his mother and father attended and he yelled “fuck the mother, kill the father” for about 10 minutes! His date with fellow junkie Janis Joplin, left her in tears. That’s what made Morrison a star. He dared to go where no one else would.
Morrison brought witchcraft onto the international stage when he drank his wife’s blood at their wedding. How romantic! Two weeks later he divorced her and told her to get an abortion before riding off into the sunset.
Morrison once told his audience they were all a bunch of “fucking idiots” before pretending to fellate a band member and then exposing himself to them. Now that’s what I mean by a real stage entertainer!
Brian Wilson
Who can forget that performance last year at the Queen’s Jubilee? Brian stared blankly into space and performed one-part harmonies on all the Beach Boys classics. Without those drugs that rotted his brain, there’s no way Brian would have been able to do that. Brian was scared enough of the audience as it was. But thanks to the drugs, he never even knew they were there, and so they helped him get over his performance anxiety. Even better, he couldn’t tell how crap it sounded without the other members of the Beach Boys there. Actually, he didn’t realise they weren’t there. All thanks to drugs.
Sid Vicious & Nancy Spungen
These two are the most glamorous and my favourite Stars on Drugs. I like to think of Sid and Nancy as the Romeo and Juliet of our times. One was a star, the other a mere fan. Brought together by their love of heroin. Many criticised their love, saying they shouldn’t be together. When they couldn’t take it any more, they made a suicide pact. Or at least Sid thinks they did, but he was kind of smacked up when he stabbed Nancy in the stomach, so he may have just glamorously killed her. But don’t think Sid wouldn’t join his beloved in their pact just because he passed out on the drug. He was released from jail (for murder) so that he could drink of the poison, just like Romeo. The poison being Sid’s usual poison of choice, pure heroin. There has been a movie telling this romantic tale, and I’m amazed Baz Luhrmann hasn’t done a cheesy, over the top remake yet. Sid’s mother understood Sid’s value and was the person who bought Sid’s last ever dose for him.
Sid too knew how to entertain a crowd. Even before he joined the Pistols he reportedly blinded someone when he threw a beer bottle. Once he joined the group, he gained notoriety for his erratic behaviour. He attacked audience members with his bass guitar and cut himself. All this achieved before his death at the age of 21.
Nancy Spungen’s body was so poisoned with drugs that it decayed faster than a Maccas hamburger. Only 7 hours after her death, Nancy started decomposing. Heroin isn’t called that for no reason. Heroin saves us from all the dull things in life.
Please now join hands and sing:
Lean on drugs
when you’re not strong
and they’ll be your friend
They’ll help you carry on
For we know it won’t be long
til I’m gonna need some drugs to lean on
You just call on your dealer when you need cocaine
We all need some drugs to lean on.