Gary (2024) Movie Script
There are
certain performers that are given to us,
to change our lives,
to make us happy.
And I think that Gary Coleman
was one of them.
Stand up so Arnie-poo
can knock you down.
Name me
another child actor that was like him.
The kid was a true star.
Whatchu talkin' about, Willis?
Unfortunately, all of
that got snatched from poor Gary.
Why do so many child stars
end up broke or broken?
Gary felt completely abandoned by
the people who were closest to him.
Whether it was his parents
or former business people.
He'd earned
over $18 million as an actor...
and most of the money was
going to people that weren't Gary.
It really devastated him.
He didn't trust people anymore.
Former child
actor Gary Coleman faces assault charges.
It's little wonder that Gary spent
so much time escaping reality.
He liked outer space because
it was just a way of hoping
and dreaming about that better
future that Gar wanted to live in.
My prayer was that he would
meet somebody that loved him.
I love you.
Their relationship was tumultuous.
Raging, yelling and demeaning.
- I
- slapped him a couple of times.
I mean, nothing major,
nothing like red flag.
Former child star, Gary Coleman
died in a Utah hospital on Friday
after suffering a brain
hemorrhage. He was 42.
I think everybody felt that the death
of Gary Coleman was suspicious.
You said, "I've
had a lot of people sit there and say,
"'Yeah, she pushed him.'"
I would never hurt
my husband. Ever.
I really wanted some answers.
Why did his life have to end
this way?
Celebrity's always a burden.
You're stuck with it for life.
You're gonna die a celebrity.
How do you like all the shade
and shit I'm throwing at people?
I don't like to be ugly.
But like, for this documentary,
this is probably the last
that I can actually speak truth.
And you know, because I've
had a lot to absorb over the years.
I was in bed.
And Gary was already downstairs.
And to me it sounded like pans
that hit the floor.
I got out of bed and I went downstairs
and there he was laying down...
on the floor...
with blood around his head.
I did not want to intervene
with where all the blood was
because I knew help was coming.
I mean, blood doesn't really freak
me out. It was just the amount of it.
I met Gary while he was filming
the movie Church Ball,
and It was here behind us.
So I was waiting for, you know,
the person in charge
for the extras, the director,
whatever, and the door opened,
and it was Gary.
He's like, "You're too cute to
be here. You should go home."
And I was like, "Oh. No, I'm just
trying to see what's going on here."
I wanted to be an extra
possibly.
And he was like, "If anyone says
anything, say Gary Coleman sent you,"
and he let me in.
Guys, beers on me!
I just sat up on the
bleachers and he worked his way up
and then asked for my number.
I didn't think that he was
going to call me at all.
And I was really shocked to hear
the voicemail the next day.
What's the worst
that could happen?
He actually brought me
Olive Garden takeout,
which was really sweet.
I was like, "Okay, is this too
good to be true, or is this real?"
I actually went back with him to his
hotel that he was staying in Provo.
It was really cool. We just
started talking and watched TV
or played a couple
of video games.
It was basically just
get-to-know-you kind of a thing.
I honestly didn't know who he was
at all. I never sawDiff'rent Strokes.
And he started to tell me
about his life
and everything
that had happened.
And I mean, it's pretty rough.
Are you okay
to take the gum out?
Or I can stick it behind my ear.
Gary was born in 1968.
He was always an entertainer.
Even as a youngster.
We were shopping
for school clothes
and they were doing like a
fashion show,
and they were showing
all the children's fashions.
And he was like...
"I can do that?"
I wrote a letter to the
coordinator of the program
if she allowed little boys
to model clothes.
And that Fall, I was modelling
clothes on a little runway.
The manager of the mall
saw a lot of the shows
and said, "That kid has talent.
He should have an agent.'"
And he gave my parents a card
to an agent in Chicago.
Gary's parents
brought him into the agency.
He was only about eight
years old, seven, actually.
And he wore
a three-piece suit...
and had a high-pitched voice.
I collected bears, and he
was knocking them off my shelf.
He had a great laugh.
And I knew that he was
a tremendous talent.
The thing that really
started the wheel rolling really fast
is the Harris Bank commercial.
Well, it's that time of the year
when you can get a Hubert doll
at the Harris Bank.
Just open a savings account
with $200 or more.
Or add $200 dollars to a
savings account you already have.
Huby, the Huby doll...
Oh, my God, where did
you get this? This is amazing.
It's not a bear,
but it's all right.
You can never have
too many Hubert dolls 'cause...
you can
never save too much money!
We made the Norman
Lear producers aware of that commercial.
My name is Norman Lear.
Norman Lear was a big shot
producer back in the 1970s.
And he was sending
a scout around
and when Gary got to the
audition, he was there for three hours
and he was reading
with everybody.
The casting director said to me,
"You know, he's a superb talent.
"He's got a tremendous timing."
And insisted that Lear see him.
I was told to
come up and meet this young man
who came bouncing
out of his office and was
just a ball of energy
and funny and adorable.
He was put under contract immediately.
And he was doing appearances
because we were
beginning to build him.
Hey, look here, Mama.
Let me tell you something.
We're gonna settle this thing
right here and now.
It like hit the roof.
"Who is this kid?"
Chicago's answer to
the neutron bomb.
At your service.
Hello, totem pole.
Everybody wanted
to see Gary Coleman.
Gary, I'd like you to meet
Miss Florida Evans.
Hey, Flo!
I thought, "Hey, this is
a whole new adventure.
"This is cool. This is
fun. And wait a minute,
"I get paid for this?"
That kind of thing.
Never in my wildest dreams
had I ever thought
it could get bigger than that.
I was told they had a
script for a show calledDiff'rent Strokes.
And they asked Conrad Bain to
be the father of these two young kids
that were orphans
that he took in.
Ah-ha! You're here.
Welcome, gentlemen.
How about that, Willis?
Downtown two minutes
and already we're gentlemen.
Come in, come in.
Oops, shoot, sorry.
Sorry.
My clumsy feet, get in the way.
All right.
I got clumsy feet, so.
The very first time
that I met Gary,
I was like,
"This ain't no little kid."
"This is not a little kid."
Because he was so smart.
He was so ingenious
and just funny.
Be careful of my goldfish.
His name is Abraham
I've never seen
a black goldfish before.
That's okay. He never saw a
rich white man before either.
He was cute and he played games.
He joked with everybody. He'd
always hide stuff from people.
And then he would always come
in my room and steal my combs
because he was like, "That
hurts. That hurts." I was like, "Well,
"it's going to hurt worse
if you don't sit still."
We happened to be in my garage,
which is one of the storage spaces
that I I have for a lot
of Gary's memorabilia,
that Gary collected
throughout his life and career.
I've got photos.
We have awards.
This is Gary's...
venerable...
show jacket from
Diff'rent Strokes.
Can you believe
how small he was?
It takes me back for sure.
No question.
My mother needed to get to
set to audit one of the teachers.
She suggested that I come along
because she heard there was this new
sensational kid named Gary Coleman
that she was very eager to meet.
And I accompanied her
to the set.
He was a mere 10 years old
and I was 14 years old.
And we became
true childhood friends.
I knew upon the first take,
something was different.
I had never, ever seen
a kid that was so dynamic.
There was a meteor that had landed
unlike anything I had ever seen before
in the constellation
of child stars.
Everything's gonna
be okay, honey.
Arnold and Willis will come
and tell me what it's all about.
Here they come now.
- Hi, guys.
- Hi, Dad. Hi Julie.
We are in stage 17 where
Diff'rent Strokes was shot.
How do you do? I'm happy Willis.
And I'm delirious Arnold.
It was so much fun working with
Gary. We were thick as thieves, man.
Big brother, little brother,
we did everything together.
This is Dana Plato.
She's the girl in the show.
Me and Gary Coleman and Dana
Plato, who played Kimberly in the show,
we hung out together and
we had a great time, you know.
I'm only 13 years old
and he's only 10, I think.
We used to build
the most amazing spaceships.
- I'm fixing his lasers.
- He put lasers on, that's the problem.
I got two lasers in the front
already. He needs some lasers.
Kids, we're gonna shoot the second
show. We need you on stage, please.
Okay.
All through here was the
audience and over here was the set.
And we had, let's see,
the living room was right here.
This is dancing.
And this was our bedroom.
- Arnold, are you in there?
- No, I'm not in there.
And this was the kitchen.
- Well, if it isn't sleeping beauty.
- You mean sleeping ugly.
Diff'rent Strokes
was a groundbreaking show.
It was a new thing to see
blended families on TV.
I never had
a white grandma before.
It was the first time we've
seen a white man adopt two Black kids.
For some white
people, the show was unfavorable.
They didn't like it and they were
angry with what it was showing.
I don't understand.
Why is a person's color
such a big deal to some people?
Sometimes I think if the
whole world was the same color,
some people would still find
something to hate each other for.
There were some complaints
from Black people, too.
They thought that Conrad Bain was
being the white savior of Black kids.
I am going to open up
a whole new world for you.
It wasn't that there was
a white savior there.
It was just a man...
trying to save two kids from
ending up being on the streets.
I am going to see that you have the
same advantages that I had growing up.
No matter the hate mail from both sides,
we knew what we were doing were right,
and the thing that our show
proved was love conquers all.
Ebony and Ivory
Live together
in perfect harmony
It was a celebration.
You could feel it.
The audience loved Gary.
He stole the show.
- You think we'll hit it big?
- Yeah, but don't worry, Willis.
If you get rich and famous,
you'll always be a nobody to me.
He was a big man
in this little kid's body.
Some of the things that he would
say and the way he would say things,
that's how grown men
would say it.
And it was very comical.
And the audience loved him.
They loved him.
Suddenly Gary
is on the cover of everything.
Black magazines,
white magazines, teen magazines.
I mean, he's everywhere.
How about a picture
of your kid for the paper?
I think I can force myself
to be on the front page.
Gary's catchphrase was,
"Whatchu talkin' about?"
Whatchu talkin' about,
Kimberley?
I think it came accidentally.
Whatchu talkin' about, Mr. D?
But they had him saying it
three times a show.
Whatchu talkin' about, Willis?
Gary attracted star names...
Mrs. Reagan, I didn't know
that you knew Mr. Drummond?
I don't.
...like Nancy Reagan.
I'm really here to see Arnold.
Whatchu talkin' about,
Mrs. Reagan?
Mr. T, who was very popular
at the time.
Well, what do we have here?
And Muhammad Ali.
Could I ask a favor while I've
still got breath in my little lungs?
Yeah, what is it?
Could you autograph
a picture for me?
- Be glad to.
- Here's a pen.
He appeared in six
movies for NBC and two feature films.
Satellites are launched and we are
ready to button up and get some rest
You are a real genius.
Actually, they call it
severely gifted.
But it's no big deal.
I remember asking him, "How do
you act? How do you know this?"
And he says, "When the
director tells me to laugh, I laugh.
"And when the director
tells me to cry, I cry."
And yet he'd be home at night,
watching his episode ofDiff'rent Strokes
taking notes
on his performance.
Arnold, you look very handsome.
Yes, I do.
Along with being
a genius comedic actor,
Gary had a really vivid,
creative imagination.
And you would often find him
writing fictional stories,
and doodling the characters
in a notebook.
He loved outer space.
He would write the lines and
he would draw these characters.
He would tell me, he says
someday the people were going to be
just like the people
in Outer Space.
He had this affinity
towards that...
to the point that I called the showBuck
Rogers that was on TV here for years,
I said, "Gary loves your
show and he wants to be on it."
And they put him on
in two minutes.
Gary Coleman
rockets into the 25th century...
as the president of a distant
planet, trapped on a world
where only Buck Rogers
can save him.
I did have a front row
seat in the rise of Gary's success.
I was Gary's best friend,
like his brother,
but little did we all know that there
was a much more challenging story
that we would all soon
come to learn.
At about...
two years old, Gary
started to run a temperature.
And that's when they found out
that he had this
congenital kidney defect.
One kidney was
pretty much atrophied,
and the other kidney
was functioning,
but not really...
properly.
It was really, really tough.
But when he was five and a half,
we got the news that
they had a kidney for him.
Two weeks after he had his surgery,
he was standing on his head and I said,
"Oh my God, don't do that." And
he said, "I'm okay."
So, he had a spirit about him
that, "I'm going to master this.
"I'm going to do
what I want to do, regardless."
Even when I was five
I was the "do or die,"
'"never say die," the tenacious, "I'll
be back'," you know, kind of person.
That was the kind of kid I was.
This is the Gary that
the world came to know and love.
And if you look very
specifically...
at his size, this was brought on
by the immunosuppressant drugs
from his first kidney transplant
when he was five.
The drugs stunted his growth.
How tall am I going to be? 6'3"?
Six two?
Six one?
It looks like you're going to
grow to be about five feet tall.
Whatchu talkin' about, Doctor?
The immunosuppressant drugs
brought about the fullness in his face.
You've got the cutest, fattest
little cheeks I've ever seen.
Ironically, it was his
diminutive size.
And the fullness in his cheeks that
created Gary Coleman as we know him.
You're just a sweetie pie.
I was told...
that the prognosis was,
if Gary were lucky,
he would live to the age of 12,
and at that point would require
another kidney transplant.
So, it's an amazing
psychological dynamic
to consider about someone
who was so successful...
and so full of life,
who fundamentally never
knew what it was
to be fully healthy.
Yeah, he told me, he's like, "Yeah, I
had a kidney transplant when I was five."
It was a whole new ballpark for me that,
something I just was very unfamiliar with.
I just wanted him
happy, healthy,
and just with me.
The thing that
I liked about Gary the most
was he treated me like a queen.
He made my life change in so
many awesome, drastic ways.
Go to Disneyland, all the
things that you think of as a kid
that you want to do,
you never think that that those things
are going to happen or be fulfilled.
And he made all that happen
and then some.
You know, that meant a lot to me
because I never
felt important...
as a child.
I never felt like
I got that love
that every human deserves,
growing up.
I feel like I got my childhood
stripped from me at an early age
because I lost my mom.
And I was always just somebody
that needed someone.
All I know is that I love you.
And nobody can put
a price on true love.
You can't.
Watch the mic!
I'm now aware of you!
I'm a Utah agent.
When do I get somebody as
big as Gary Coleman come in?
It doesn't happen.
But it was a joy to me
to be able to help them both.
The only thing that mattered
to Gary was Shannon.
That's all he wanted...
was to find somebody
who he could love.
And Shannon just needed love.
Our wedding was amazing.
We went on a helicopter ride,
and we went up to the Valley of Fire
and we got married
on the most beautiful mountain.
I, Gary, take you Shannon.
I, Gary, take you Shannon.
- To be my wife.
- To be my wife.
I was like, "This is the
most beautiful place
"that anybody could have
a wedding ceremony."
It was great.
I will be faithful to you.
I will, and have been
faithful to you.
I will be honest with you.
I will be honest with you,
and I have been.
I will stand by your side.
I will stand by your side
through whatever it takes.
My prayer was that he would
meet somebody that loved him...
Gary, place this
on your lady's finger.
...and somebody that he loved,
who could encourage him
mentally, physically, spiritually,
and in any other way, you know.
I love you.
But that wasn't the case.
Dion, turn around,
so I can get your open eyes.
You're shooting it
against the window.
By 1983, Gary was 15 and
really at the height of his success.
Alright,
enough that. Let me eat my bread.
He had a team around him
that became more like
a family after a while.
He had myself as his agent.
And my responsibility was
his theatrical representation
in negotiating his contracts.
Do you remember
the name of your card?
Ace of Hearts.
- Are you sure?
- Yeah.
He had a
lawyer, he had a publicist.
And then he had Anita de Thomas,
which was the business manager...
- Anita?
- What?
- Where are you?
- I'm right here.
...whose job it was
to manage their money.
Yeah, perfect!
The Colemans
became his managers.
Most children are not
the employers of their parents.
The atmosphere changed
on the set when Mr. Coleman showed up
and I remember the first thing
I heard from him was,
"Look out! Look out!
The star is here."
And Gary came in on top
of some bodyguard's shoulders.
And I looked at Conrad
and he looked at me
and he was like, "Okay,
this is gonna change things."
Nobody wanted Willie on the set.
Because he created havoc.
He'd be standing there.
So, everybody knew that
Willie was there.
He was very vocal
about the fact that his son
was the star of the show.
Gary went from
being cute to ugly.
He picked up all the ugliness
of his dad,
telling people,
"Who do you think I am?
"I run this show."
One day, he said, "Come
here, JoAnn, let me slap you."
I was like, "Slap me?"
I said, "Boy, if you slap me,
"it'll be the end of Diff'rent
Strokesbecause I will beat your ass."
And then he became sick again.
The kidney that had
been transplanted
was absorbed by the body.
And so, from December 31st
of 1985
until his death, Gary lived
with not a single kidney
in his body.
He then started on dialysis,
which is going to the hospital
three times a week
and sitting at the machine
three to four hours at a time,
while every drop of your blood
is cycled through a machine,
cleansing the blood.
And it is very oppressive
for most people.
I can recall
showing up to set one day,
and Gary was in the middle
of a scene,
completed the scene,
bent over and threw up.
He spent a lot of time with me.
So the producers were like,
"Well, JoAnn, how is Gary doing?"
I said, "Gary is sick."
The studio said, "Okay,
"let's go down for two days
until Gary is feeling better."
Willie was huffing and puffing,
and he said, "Who the
hell do you think you are?
"Why did you have them
cancel the show?"
I said, "Because they asked me
how Gary was feeling,
"and I told them
he didn't feel good.
"So, sorry if I pissed you off."
I remember the time
when Gary was throwing up.
I overheard Willie,
you know, saying,
"You got to get out there and
you got to work. You know?
"You got people that
depending on you.
"You gotta get out there
and do what you gotta do."
I never saw it. As a matter
of fact, I saw the opposite.
There was one occasion when
Gary was invited to Australia,
for tons of money to do
television shows.
And Willie Coleman says,
"No, he's not going
"because we don't think
he's feeling well these days."
And we turned down a fortune.
When Gary was 17,
as well as his poor health,
he was not comfortable
with the fact that the character
of Arnold Jackson
was not aging at the same pace
that Gary Coleman was aging.
Don't worry. You get ready,
I'll drop you off at school.
Okay, Dad. Thanks.
They didn't want to change him.
I mean, he was, you know,
"We have a golden goose!"
He's the golden goose.
He was.
And then that caused him
pain, emotionally, I'm sure.
- Are they maturing you
in the show? - Not much.
Are you complaining?
Like you know?
- Of course.
- Yeah.
Not much I can do about it yet.
He was just a meal ticket.
That's how he felt.
"I'm just making money,
but I'm not happy."
He wasn't happy.
They didn't think that Gary
was happy in the character anymore.
And I think it ran its course.
I bet you're all wondering
what I'm doing here.
Yeah. Now beat it.
The ratings were declining.
I mean, how many times can you
deal with the same kind of jokes
or the same kind of energy?
Well, I've had it. I'm quitting.
I'm out of here.
When Diff'rent Strokes
was canceled in 1986
Gary was 18
and he was exhausted.
He was spent.
He retreated.
He went into a very deep
depression for months.
In fact, he vowed never to work
again in the entertainment business.
And no one would accept that.
Not his parents, not an agent, not
a business manager, not a lawyer.
And, in fact,
there was a very dynamic,
concerted effort to put him
back to work
as soon as possible.
Which was primarily spearheaded
by his agent, Vic Perillo.
The agent that I had all
during Diff'rent Strokes
didn't pressure me until later
when I wanted to quit.
When Strokeswent off the air,
there were projects,
three of them that I
developed for them, you know.
With Gary on
the scene, a crook shouldn't be
He played a little detective,
and they shot the pilot
up in Canada.
Gary resented that
they were still
pursuing opportunities for him
when he was clearly expressive
about not wanting to do anything
in the entertainment business.
He would say to me,
"Why are they doing this?
"Why isn't anybody
listening to me?"
About a year later, I was at home
and about 10:30 my phone rang.
And it was Gary.
He said, "Well,
I just wanted to call you
"to say goodbye.
"I cannot take this anymore.
"It's not worth living.
"I'm gonna kill myself."
I raced over in the deepest fear
that anybody could imagine
not knowing what
I was going to find.
But he was sitting alone
with a keyboard.
And he was just tapping
single notes at a time.
We sat and we cried.
And I held him
and comforted him.
And just let him weep.
And I concluded, you know,
"You don't deserve this.
"You don't deserve
to go through this.
"And you do deserve to
take a break. To get away,
"to unfamiliar people,
unfamiliar places."
And that was when the
discussion came up about Hawaii.
You're getting everything
I already got.
We jumped on a plane
and off to Hawaii we went.
He began to ask very specific
questions about his money.
What did I know?
I very clearly expressed to him
that I felt that some of his
businesspeople in his life
were completely insincere,
that they were duplicitous
with him.
Because I heard very frequently,
"Gary's a little jerk.
"Thank God he pays us
a great salary."
Just horrible things
that left nothing
to the imagination
about how they really felt.
I wasn't getting it.
I just wasn't getting it,
until I finally just said,
You know,
"Enough of all you people.
"I'm sick of all you people.
"I don't want to hear
from any more of you people.
"I want an accounting.
I want it now."
Eventually, it came
to a point where
Gary terminated
his business relationship
with his entire team of handlers
and his parents.
I kind of expected
the call to come in,
because he was letting
everybody go.
He let Anita de Thomas go.
He let his publicists go.
And then I was the last.
I said, "Gary, this isn't
going to be good for you
"and it's not going to be good
for me."
There was a silence at the
end of the phone, you know.
I'm sure he was
influenced by people
to get Mrs. de Thomas away
from the finances
and get us away from him.
Dion will always be
my lifelong mentor,
a lifesaver more than twice.
And he's the one that opened
my eyes to the rest of my life.
Right.
I think that Dion had a wonderful
relationship with Gary at the beginning.
But I think that he convinced himself
that Gary needed people around him
that would take care of him
and that we were all beasts.
And it couldn't be
the farthest from the truth.
- To Dion.
- To Gary.
- Best friends.
- Best friends.
- Best luck. Best Money.
- Ha. Scary.
I became Gary's business manager
in late 1987.
I think even Dion
was inspired to say,
"Hey, listen, you're hanging
out with a big child star.
"Why don't you move in
and become his manager."
I did not have
any intention of riding
the coattails of Gary Coleman,
and I didn't need to.
I came from a family
that was successful.
I didn't need Gary for money.
I received the job
based upon the trust
that was well established
in my relationship with him.
That was not part of a long term
plan, and it scared me out of my mind.
I'm glad we pulled it off.
I hope you're happy.
Maybe we should
do this again next year.
And I'll pay for it.
Maybe. Bye.
For two years,
there were deep investigations
into Gary's finances.
When I first met Gary,
it was at an invitation,
to become part of the legal team
that was investigating his finances
and his business relationships
with his entire management team.
What we found out almost immediately
was that he'd earned over $18,000,000
in fees as an actor, and most of the money
was going to people that weren't Gary.
His parents became
his personal managers
and took the biggest cut, 20%.
His agent, Vic Perillo, 10%.
His business manager, Anita
de Thomas, was taking 5%.
His two lawyers
were taking 7.5%.
So even before taxes, almost half of
Gary Coleman's earnings were gone.
These were professional fees,
which were industry standard and legal.
One piece was supposed
to be set aside for Gary Coleman alone.
California law required that 25% of
his income go into a blocked account.
The blocked account
is administered by the court.
And it's supposed to just go
into a standard savings account
and just sits there
until he turns 18.
But what our
investigation showed
was that, again and again, Anita
de Thomas and the Colemans
would go into court and petition to
have large sums of Gary's money
taken out of the safe, blocked
accounts and placed into investments.
Millions were put
into complex real estate deals.
An office building in Denver,
this strip mall in Colorado Springs,
and this building
in Salt Lake City.
All of the investments failed.
Every investment was
100% loss. All gone.
Sue Coleman
put her trust in people
that were representing Gary,
like Anita de Thomas.
So if they said, "This is
a good investment for him
"and this is a good investment
for him," she took their word for it.
And then we discovered
something even worse.
There was a series
of loans and overpayments
from the blocked account
that went to the parents
and Anita de Thomas,
who said, "Oh, no,
"that was a gift.
"Gary never meant us
to pay that back.
"It was always a gift."
It's even worse than that.
They took money
out of the blocked account
and placed it into a
pension fund in Gary's name.
And then dissolved
the pension fund,
and took $770,000 of what
had been Gary's money
and gave it to themselves as
recipients of the pension fund.
Is that legal?
No, it's not legal.
I mean, none of this is legal.
I mean,
certainly none of it is moral.
It's a direct lift of money
from Gary
to themselves.
I was not aware that money
was going to be taken
out of his blocked account to
be put into a pension plan for us.
Did you get paid
the three quarters of a million?
Not that we know of.
We went over to
his parents' house together,
and began to explain
the findings.
It rolled right off of them
like water off of a duck's back.
At one point, Willie said,
"We are your parents.
"Absolutely nothing is wrong
with your business affairs.
"Nothing at all."
Gary felt not only betrayed
but completely abandoned
by the people
who were closest to him,
his parents.
Gary was left with no choice
but to file a lawsuit against
his then business manager,
Anita De Thomas,
and his parents, Willie and Sue.
As the litigation progressed,
Willie and Sue felt
that it was necessary
to file a petition
to have him conserved.
Gary was 22.
The Colemans made representations
to the court that Gary could not handle
his own business affairs,
that the court should intervene.
And that's a very ugly thing
to do to your child in public.
My concern was that
with his medical condition
and all the things
that goes on with him
that can affect
the way he thinks.
And then to have people zeroing
in on him and confusing him,
I'm just concerned that
he'd... do things irrationally.
The conservatorship case
is a very concerted
and expensive attempt
to hide the truth
because the public is told
that Gary can't handle himself.
Okay. And If he can't
handle himself,
then the lawsuits
and investigations
against them end.
Gary was absolutely livid.
He was embarrassed
that someone would make
such a claim before the world.
There was the first hearing
with Judge Martha Goldin.
The parents remained
on one side of the courtroom,
and Gary was on the opposite side.
And this judge was savvy enough
to call Gary back
into her chambers
and have
a private meeting with him.
And she emerged
to scold his parents.
Mr. Coleman does not come close
to requiring a conservator.
Thank you, Your Honor.
Where do you think
things went wrong between you and Gary?
I don't think anything has gone
wrong between me and Gary.
Do you feel he's just receiving poor
advice? Is that what you're saying?
That's my opinion.
After nearly three full years
of litigation,
Gary went back into court.
When we finally
got to the trial,
the judge did everything
the judge could do,
which was find that $1.3 million had
been taken out of the accounts falsely
and was therefore owed.
And that was his judgement.
A California judge
bought Coleman's argument
that the 25-year-old actor's
parents and business advisers
skimmed some of his earnings.
The court said the money
that had been appropriated
for our pension,
for our savings should be
returned to him.
And I said, "Rather than
go through this...
"take it."
During the courts
and in interviews afterwards,
the parents would say...
"I'm not a bookkeeper,
"I was not an accountant.
"I didn't handle any finances
or anything.
"All we did was sign documents
and gave our approval."
At the beginning, it's a couple
of befuddled people from Chicago
who didn't know how to handle
the sharp business managers
that you run across in LA,
but at the end,
I just cannot imagine
how you cannot notice
all the money being drained
out of the accounts and gone,
especially when you're getting it.
I do believe that they became aware
that, "Yes, some things were really wrong.
"But we didn't deliberately
engage in this behavior
"to consciously
and deliberately harm our son."
I would never represent that
that was their intention.
However, once being educated
about what had happened,
they continued
to refuse to admit it.
Over the years, I would try and
talk to them about certain suspicions
and things in my professional
career, and they just they either turned
a deaf ear or they didn't
want to hear it.
Or they just didn't support me.
And I have taken that
very deeply to heart
and I resent it,
and it still bothers me today.
And there's nothing I can do about
that feeling because it's the truth.
It's honest.
It separated Gary
from his parents,
to the point where even if he
wanted to talk to them, he couldn't.
It's very sad.
It's very sad.
That was a tough time for us.
It was really tough.
But we let him know that we
were always, that we were home.
And, "Your room is still here.
"Anytime you want to come home,
come home."
Gary always, you know,
would tell me,
"Don't give my parents
my phone number.
"Do not give it to them."
And I remember one time,
Willie called me,
He says,
"Todd, can you have Gary call me?"
I went, "No,"
click and I hung up.
Gary told me that he started having
financial issues when he was 18,
and that's why I never really had
any interest to meet his parents.
Because you don't just take
advantage of someone like that.
- Who's on your lap?
- This is Autumn.
She's my fun little
rescue puppy.
She's very lovable.
I was friends with Gary
in Santaquin,
and the first thing he said to
me was, "All she wants is money."
But then there wasn't any.
Shannon took me out to a closet
and there was a stack
of photos of him.
She was grabbing them, so that
he could autograph and sell them.
And that's the very first time
I'd seen her explode on him
because she couldn't
find these pictures.
I think the best word to describe their
relationship, in my view, was tumultuous.
It was all over the place.
Sometimes they'd be happy
and joking.
And on the flip of a dime,
it would become raging,
yelling, demeaning,
and disparaging.
I would say that they fought
mainly about money,
because Gary constantly
needed money and work.
And there was not a lot of work
in Utah for him.
She constantly wanted him
to go make the money.
"Call this person,
call that person.
"Do this."
He just always felt like
he was a paycheck.
He put a $17,000 down
payment on my car, almost paid my car off.
But, you know, a lot of
people just stick their hand out.
They want your money.
They want your fame.
And I wasn't like that at all.
All you care about is the money.
That's all you want.
The love for Gary
keeps fading away
because you believe that Gary
doesn't want to support you.
But how are the bills
going to get paid?
You don't pay the bills without
me making some kind of money.
If we were in an argument, you know,
cuss words obviously get brought up.
And a couple of times
we were both like, "F you."
And he's like,
"You're a bitch."
And I'm like,
"You're an asshole."
So, you know.
Just stuff like that.
It was just constant.
It was just every day,
her doing something,
her creating some situation,
her creating drama,
demeaning his manhood,
demeaning his size,
sometimes calling him a failure.
I mean, sometimes she'd just come
right out and say, "I hate you, Gary."
And it was disturbing.
We had a talk about their
relationship on a few occasions,
and we talked about how he
said that, "She's my soul mate."
And I said,
"Gary, love is not enough.
"And the way she respects you
is not the kind of respect
"that you would want to have
in a relationship."
I was always optimistic that he was going
to one day come to me and say, "I'm done.
"I just, I need her gone.
"I need her out of my life."
So I was sad for him that
he didn't get to that point.
Yeah, that switch right there.
Oh, it's cushy.
Back in October 1997,
I was working at this location
for a chain
of video rental shops.
I was filing movies
back in the main library
and I heard this voice say,
"Excuse me, miss. Could you
help me find a movie, please?"
And I turned and I looked.
And it was
Gary Coleman. Wow!
This is where I had
my car parked that night,
and I came out at 1:00
in the morning
and I found Gary Coleman sitting on the
hood of my car like a giant hood ornament.
And then I said,
"What are you doing here?"
"It's four hours later.
What are you doing here?"
And he said, "I was waiting
for you."
We exchanged numbers and talked
a little, and then I drove back home.
As soon as I got there, I rang the
number he'd given me and it really was him.
And we spent the next
six hours on the phone.
So, yeah, the friendship really
just blew up. It was instant.
It was like a big bang
of friendship.
After a few weeks,
I pretty much just moved in.
He was living on the fourth floor
of these apartments in Culver City.
Eventually we were an item.
Gary and I were a couple
for six and a half years,
but he had no interest
in the physical act of sex.
I'm reading your bio.
It says you are a virgin.
Yes, still to this day, because
I was not endowed with that,
"Go! Go! Conquer every woman"
libido that every man has.
- Right.
- I don't have that.
But he was very romantic.
So, yeah, he loved to hold
hands and kiss and snuggle.
And he really showed
a lot of affection.
One of the most
challenging things
that I had to deal with as
Gary's manager at that time
was, you know, getting the work.
Gary did feel
a renewal in spirit.
He had this desire to be part of the
entertainment industry once again,
but he was still 4'8"
and Gary loved action
adventure movies.
Rambo.
You know, he wanted
to play a superhero.
And there were no roles
for Gary Coleman as a superhero.
He wanted to play a cop.
He wanted to play
a larger-than-life villain.
I'm 31 years old.
"Wholesome" must die.
Otherwise, I'll never be able
to do any cool bad guys.
I'll never be able to do any
cool characters of any depth ever
because people are still thinking
of me as Arnold on Diff'rent Strokes.
We're not having that.
- This looks like a great place, Arnold.
- Yeah. Willis would love it.
Yeah, that is, if he wouldn't mind living
over a haunted Indian burial ground.
He was just getting
piecemeal work, tidbits here and there,
and people still wanted him
to do Strokes-related stuff.
You hear the wailing
of the dead.
Whatchu' talkin' bout, Will?
People didn't want Gary.
They wanted Arnold Jackson.
That was common.
They might not let you in because the only
black person they respect is Ted Danson.
Whatchu' talkin' about, Bundy?
Gary absolutely despised
that catchphrase.
He called it "the line."
I'm not saying "that line."
Whatchu talking about, Gary?
I mean, just walking down the street,
he would have people run up on him.
"Yo, yo yo, he's got to say it!
He's got to say it!"
They would just, people treated
him like he was a penny arcade,
like they could just stick a
penny in him and get a good show.
I was wondering if you'd say
your famous line for us.
I knew that was coming.
I'm sorry.
- You know...
- You don't have to do it.
You don't have to do it.
I already did it.
No, it's not that
I wouldn't do it,
it's that,
I don't have it in me.
I can't, it sounds ridiculous
when I do it.
I'm sorry.
Quite often, child actors don't
go forward in their careers.
Some of them
aren't talented enough.
Some of them are labeled too
strongly with the character they played.
Please welcome Todd Bridges, Dana Plato
and Gary Coleman!
Gary and Todd and Dana
after Diff'rent Strokes
struggled with where
their career was going.
Todd and Dana became involved in
drugs and alcohol.
Former child star Todd Bridges is
in trouble with the law once again.
Bridges was arrested yesterday
in California for having drugs
and a loaded handgun in his car.
They had bets on us in Vegas,
who would die first.
People lost a lot of money on me,
you know, because I'm still here.
After a troubled career, child
actress Dana Plato has died.
Known for her role on
Diff'rent Strokes,
Plato died Saturday of an overdose
just days after denying she used drugs.
Dana Plato was 34 years old.
It's a tough thing to be famous
and be so young.
So much fame,
so much opportunity.
Kids have power when they
are in that position, and it's unreal.
So you leave behind your power
and suddenly you feel terrible,
because now you have to really
struggle to be like a regular kid.
If someone had've told me that
my life would have been like this
early enough where I could
have got out, I would have got out.
I'd say, "No, you know, I want
to go and have a normal life
"and have friends."
Twenty years ago, I made
millions and millions on TV.
The sad part is the people who
took care of the money spent it.
Recently, I needed
some cash, fast.
Gary needed work. He wasn't
getting enough TV work to live on,
so times were
very tough for him.
CashCall was there
when I needed them.
I work because I like to work.
If I'm working
as a security guard
or I'm flipping burgers
or bagging groceries,
it's because I enjoy working.
One of his dream jobs as a
little boy had been to be a cop.
So Gar was so ecstatic when he
had finally become a security guard.
Becoming a security guard was
Gary's way of fulfilling that fantasy,
of being an action hero,
playing a cop, being a cop.
He was so proud.
He was just crowing.
And then being a security guard
went wrong for him.
Former child actor Gary Coleman
faces assault charges.
The 4'7" Coleman
now works as a security guard.
He surrendered to police
in Hawthorne, California,
after allegedly punching
an autograph-seeker.
He was going to the
security store to get a bulletproof vest
and out of nowhere...
"Gary Coleman! Gary Coleman!
Can I get an autograph?"
And he walked over and
gave it to her and she was like,
"Well, can you write down
something nice?"
She says, "Well, can you
put a little more?"
You know, just add a little something,
like "good luck" or something.
He took it and ripped it up
and was like, "Well, for what?
"You know,
this doesn't mean anything."
She had this hurt look in her face.
She says, "No, I want it for my son."
And she was like,
"Well, I can see why
"you didn't make it as an
adult actor, just a child actor,"
and that must have set him off
because he walked up to her
and literally punched her
in the eye.
Former child actor
Gary Coleman pleaded no contest
to assault and battery charges
on Thursday.
He wept as he was given
a 90-day suspended sentence,
a $400 fine, and an order to
attend anger management classes.
Gary regretted
what happened instantly.
Instantly.
He felt that really, in that moment,
the bottom had fallen out once again,
and it was horrible.
Yet another opportunity
for the public
to make fun of him,
to cast aspersions upon him.
And to belittle him.
Oh, m God, it's Gary Coleman!
Can I have your autograph?
Miss, please, I'm
busy at work right now,
and I really don't like
doing that anymore.
Thank you. I'm so sorry.
You's an asshole.
That's why your broke ass
ain't famous now.
Bitch, what?
He was really depressed.
He stopped going out as often,
he didn't trust people anymore.
This was one of those
experiences that changed him.
He constantly referred to
himself as "God's punching bag."
He felt like one of life's jokes
and that he was never meant
to be a person of good fortune.
In one note that he left
behind for me, he writes,
"I am a hurt, confused, broken man
with no one and nowhere to turn to.
"I am more sad now than I have
ever been, and I feel suicidal.
"But of course, because of fear,
"frustration and no real means
of doing it painlessly,
"I can't release my soul
from the ongoing madness,
"betrayal and misery
that surrounds my life."
It's horrible.
This kind of loneliness,
this kind of hopelessness.
Gary often didn't sleep
well, so a lot of times we'd just
drive out here along Mulholland
Drive and look out over the city.
If we could catch a few stars
once in a while, it was nice.
Gary liked outer space, and
the idea of space exploration
was just a way of hoping
and dreaming
about that better future
that Gar wanted to live in.
It wouldn't be about Black
or white or male or female,
tall, short, rich,
or any of that.
He thought that in the future like
that, he could have been treated
with all the respect that he
deserved and not as the butt of a joke.
Nor as a penny arcade.
So this was a way
to just look up
and hope for that better-ness
that was coming someday.
In 2005, he got approached
to do Church Ball,
which was filming out
in the state of Utah.
I'm gonna wipe the floor
with your face, little man.
He called me on the last day
of the shoot,
and he said,
"I've decided something.
"I want to move
out here to Utah."
"The people here in Utah
are awesome.
"They're so friendly
and wonderful
"and they're not treating me
like Gary Coleman.
"They're treating me like
just Gar." And I was like "Oh!"
He said,
"Is that okay with you?"
And I said, "Yeah, I'll
be there. Not a problem."
So I packed up
the Los Angeles apartment
and we drove
straight to Santaquin.
It took me about four days to
get out there, and I was exhausted.
So I hopped out of the truck
and Gary came running out.
And Shannon Price was walking
out of the house behind him.
She just struck me as very,
very young.
I was 19 years old
when I met him.
And I was worried whether or not
she would be immature.
I was like, "Hey, my name is
Shannon. Nice to meet you."
And I could just tell
immediately.
Cold shoulder. Very
standoffish. Not friendly at all.
Within the first day,
I was already picking up on
her wanting things.
Not wanting Gar, wanting things.
I remember one night
she had been drinking.
And she spit beer on me.
Believe it or not, she did.
After an admittedly ugly
night, eventually, I told Gar
that I think it'd be best
if I go away for a little bit
and let you explore this
and see what it is.
We always had the freedom to explore
other relationships if we wanted to.
I was really hoping that it would be
another person in his life that, you know,
would lift him up and bring him joy
and that's not what happened at the end.
I had left his employ
as his manager.
And when Gary moved to Utah,
I was not aware at all
of what was happening with him
on a day-to-day basis.
I learned that there was
someone that he met.
This "Shannon,"
and I wasn't terribly concerned
until I learned that
she was living with him.
Then I had grave concerns.
There were a couple times
where we had arguments that I'm like,
"Hey, you should go do
this film because, you know,
"we do need to pay the bills
at some point."
Some of the movies that he did the
last few years of his life, he didn't like.
Shannon said, "You gotta do it.
We need money. We got to live."
I remember he would call me
every single day
and he's like,
he would blame me for it.
And I was like, "You know what? I'm
done," and I decided to divorce him.
They were divorced in 2008.
And I know they got back
together socially after that.
I know that she continued to
live at his house and eat his
food and have him buy her things
even after they were divorced.
We still lived together.
We still stayed together.
We were still together.
He had told me himself,
"She's just my roommate."
In the public and out and about,
it was, "we're married."
But behind closed doors, it
was, "You're just my roommate."
There were multiple times
when Gary and I
discussed a restraining order.
He just couldn't deal
with it anymore.
It was never served to me,
so it was just a document
that Randy had made up
and had printed out.
We'd prepared the paperwork,
and the next day
he'd call me and say...
Randy, it's Gary Coleman.
I need to rescind that order.
Everything's cool, everything's fine
so far, so maybe the fourth time around
things will work out.
It was just toxic.
I know the police had been there
quite a few times to domestic issues.
They both laid
their hands on each other.
Neither one of them
was the innocent party.
Strokesstar Gary Coleman sits
in the Utah County Jail tonight.
Coleman was booked into jail
around 1:00 this afternoon
after being arrested
by Santaquin police.
Gary.
What happened today?
Nothing, nothing
you'd be interested in.
No jail time,
not leaving my house,
not paying any heavy fines.
And now I'm just gonna
go to lunch.
It was only a couple of times
as far as anything physical.
Yeah, there was
a couple of times.
I mean, I slapped him
a couple of times.
I mean, nothing major,
nothing like, "red flag."
Like, people smack each other.
They hit each other.
People do it.
You know, if you deny it,
you're crazy.
I have this on my head
because I fell down the stairs.
I don't want people thinking
that my wife is abusing.
Why don't you want to answer the
question about whether you beat your wife?
Everything out. Pardon me?
- You can go yourself,
and quit asking me. - Really?
Is that the way you talk
to your wife?
Yes, I have to. If I
need to. But I don't.
- I don't know you.
- Hold on. Hold on.
If I get hit by a bus tonight,
I'm not gonna care
because she's pushing my buttons
and I don't like her now and
the next thing I'm going to do
is leave, so all of you.
- Gary, come back.
- No you.
He had dialysis that morning,
and he came home,
and he immediately came
upstairs and I could tell
he wasn't really
feeling that well.
But also I was really sick.
I have an inner ear problem,
so I was just basically bedridden.
And I asked him, I was like, "Hey,
would you mind going downstairs
"and just putting some pizza
rolls in the microwave for me?"
Then he went downstairs.
I have a lot of questions and concerns
about what happened in the house that day.
I was shocked when I found
out he was fixing her dinner after dialysis
because I've seen how
he felt after, he was weak.
He was sick,
and honestly,
he just wanted to go take a nap.
When I heard the big, loud boom,
I was like, "Gary? Gary?
Gary?" and I heard nothing.
I got out of bed and I went downstairs
and there he was laying down
on the floor with blood
around his head.
And I didn't know what to do.
I didn't know what to think.
So, yeah, of course
that's when I called 911.
I heard the 911 call.
I was appalled.
"I can't help him because
there's blood"?
If you care about somebody,
you don't care about that.
She was more worried about herself
than the person she was calling 911 for.
I think her actions
speak volumes,
and I don't have
to say much more than that.
My 911 call was frantic,
but, I mean, it was
a decent amount of blood,
and it just freaked me out.
I did not want to intervene
with where all the blood was,
because I knew help was coming.
She didn't help him.
She wanted somebody to hurry
and get there and help him.
It's not that I didn't help him.
I helped him.
Clearly I helped him.
The paramedics came. They made
sure that he was being assisted.
I just thought he was going to go to
the hospital, get stitched up, come back.
All is good.
She watched them load him
into the back of the ambulance,
waved goodbye and went back into
the house and put the garage door down.
And Gary was alone.
I was not in the right frame
of mind to have gone with him.
I was frantic. I was stressed.
Anxiety, sad.
You know, just stuff like that
that any normal person
would feel.
And I called him at the
hospital and I was like,
"Do you know anything, like,
what's going on?"
I was like, "When are
you coming home?"
And he's like,
"I have a really bad headache.
"Okay. I think
I'm just gonna go to sleep."
And I was like, "I'll talk
to you later. I love you."
And he's like,
"I love you, too."
And that was the last thing
he said to me.
The next day, I get a phone call and
they say he has an intracranial hemorrhage.
So he has, you know,
certain bleeding in the brain.
And they were
taking him to dialysis,
and he immediately
went into cardiac arrest.
A friend sent me
a text and said,
"Hey, Gary's in the hospital
and it's critical.
"It's really bad." So I immediately
sent some text messages to Shannon.
And I was encouraging her
to go to the hospital.
And I said, "It's really
important that you be there."
So then my dad and I, we
went together Thursday to go see him.
He was on a ventilator. I mean,
he wasn't breathing on his own.
But he was still alive
using a machine.
It was really heartbreaking
to see him that way.
And the doctors and the
nurses told me, they're like,
"Hey, he's not gonna make it."
And I didn't know what to do.
I didn't know what to think.
And they were like, "Shannon,
what do you want to do?"
Actor Gary Coleman
is in critical condition
this morning at a hospital in
Utah. His family described...
Willie heard it on television.
All I could do was take my cell
phone, call the sheriff's office
in Salt Lake City and say,
"I hear my son is in the
hospital and he's critical."
"Would you send somebody over to
speak with Shannon and have her call me?"
She did not call me.
I pulled up
Shannon's number and called
and she was very distant,
very short.
"The doctor says
it doesn't look good at all.
"He's probably going to die.
He's a goner.
"He's done. He's done."
I get a call from Shannon and
she said, "You better run up here.
"He's not gonna make it."
I headed
straight to the hospital.
I told her to start
writing down these questions
of what you need to ask
the physician.
And she asked several times,
"Is there anything we can do?"
"Is there any way
you could get the fluid out?"
"Did you ever perform an EEG?"
But the doctors suggested that
she take him off life support.
There's nothing there.
His brain is gone.
His head was full of blood.
I went in there and I said
everything I needed to say.
"I love you. I'm gonna miss you.
"You're the most amazing thing
that happened in my life.
"And you really were loved.
And you were cared about.
"I want you to know that
if I failed you, I'm sorry.
"I'm sorry that you had to live
with these health issues in this life."
And the decision,
to say, "Yes, take him off
life support,"
was the hardest thing
I had ever had to do.
Gary Coleman died yesterday
after being taken off life support.
Stunned, you know?
You couldn't find
the words to speak...
or describe how it felt
at that time.
It broke me.
It broke me mentally.
I spent the next three weeks
bawling my guts out.
Every day from sunup to sundown.
We were absolutely stumped because
there were way too many questions
with no answers.
The fact that people come
out and say that she murdered Gary,
she pushed him down the stairs.
That really, really,
really hurt me.
I think everybody felt that the
death of Gary Coleman was suspicious,
and whatever happened in the kitchen
when he fell, and have that much blood,
you know, it raises a question,
"What really happened there?"
He was 4'8" tall.
He didn't have that far to fall.
In order to create
such a significant injury,
it just begs question
after question after question.
I personally, in my opinion,
do not think that he fell.
I want to say so much,
but I don't...
I don't know what...
What I can say
without being sued.
I broke down, I cried.
I'm not going to lie.
Like, how can people be so evil
and just think that I did this?
Why? Because I'm the ex-wife.
I'm the evil person, right?
You said, I've had a lot of people sit
there and say, "Yeah, she pushed him."
I would never hurt my
husband. Ever.
People felt like she had been
the one that caused his death
and either pushed him down the
stairs or knocked him down or something.
But the police concluded
that there was no foul play.
There was no criminal element to it,
that it was just an unfortunate accident,
that he had just simply fallen
and hit his head.
I mean, I'm here for a reason
talking to you right now
because I didn't do anything.
I didn't touch him. I didn't hurt
him. I was nowhere near him.
Nothing happened.
The spotlight turned
to the decision...
to pull the plug
and end Gary's life.
Gary had an advanced
healthcare directive
where he stated he wanted
at least two weeks of care
before any plugs were pulled.
So, I just...
I can't understand...
why anyone would pull the plug
two days later,
not two weeks later?
Did you not want to give him
some time?
Why did you feel the need...
to do that so quickly?
I mean,
you never gave him a chance.
On the medical directive, he
said if there was two or more doctors
that stated that he's not
going to come out of it,
then to take him off
life support.
And there were enough doctors...
and medical staff that told me
his condition
and that he just wasn't
going to get better.
I think that legally...
Miss Price is covered in terms
of turning off Gary's life support...
but not morally.
The cover photo of Gary
in his final moments...
was the ultimate betrayal.
I actually took
that photo. It was a selfie.
And I was also crying
and I had a tear.
That's how everybody is now
going to remember Gary.
I mean, nobody looks good
when they're dying.
But not everybody gets their...
Their final moment sold.
It's my understanding
that she sold them.
It was...
one of the most depraved acts
I've ever seen perpetrated...
on another human being
in my life.
I think that people needed
to honestly see it,
to see what he went through
health wise.
To show people like,
"Hey, look, he's human."
I couldn't believe
anything worse
than Gary being dead
could possibly happen.
Damned if she didn't find a way
to do it.
Funeral plans are expected
to be announced soon
for the former child star
Gary Coleman.
He specifically said,
"No funeral, no headstone.
"I want to be
left alone in the end.
"I want to fade away."
He was really very tired of everyone
wanting him for all the wrong reasons.
Gary did live a life fraught
with so many disappointments.
There were a lot of people
that let him down.
I know Gar felt let down
by his parents first and foremost.
But it just kept piling on.
Business managers, Hollywood,
the public,
and, in the end, Miss Price.
Celebrity's always a
burden. I don't care who you are.
I don't care how much
you claim you like it.
You're stuck with it for life.
You're gonna die a celebrity. Even
if you haven't worked in 20 years.
The entertainment industry...
is not designed...
to protect anyone's life.
It will chew you up...
and spit you out.
Gary said this several times. He
said, "I feel as if I never existed."
How could someone
feel like that?
How could Gary Coleman feel
like he feels as if he's never existed?
He is the greatest child actor.
In my book, he is the greatest
child actor of all time.
But he honestly felt like
he never existed.
Because he was always Arnold.
His life...
is definitely a cautionary tale.
But I choose
to acknowledge his life
in a complete whole perspective
for everything that it was.
The tragic moments as well as
his victory and his triumphs.
Super-Arnold is ready
for action.
There are certain performers
that are given to us,
to change our lives,
to make us happy.
And I think he was one of them.
Monsters spotted
on the Empire State Building.
The proof of the pudding
is in the tasting.
And his life and career
tasted great.
So long, wood monster,
I'm turning you into toothpicks
with my zowie zap gun.
Zap, zap, zap.
Give him that credit.
And acknowledge him for that.
Super-Arnold saves
New York again!
certain performers that are given to us,
to change our lives,
to make us happy.
And I think that Gary Coleman
was one of them.
Stand up so Arnie-poo
can knock you down.
Name me
another child actor that was like him.
The kid was a true star.
Whatchu talkin' about, Willis?
Unfortunately, all of
that got snatched from poor Gary.
Why do so many child stars
end up broke or broken?
Gary felt completely abandoned by
the people who were closest to him.
Whether it was his parents
or former business people.
He'd earned
over $18 million as an actor...
and most of the money was
going to people that weren't Gary.
It really devastated him.
He didn't trust people anymore.
Former child
actor Gary Coleman faces assault charges.
It's little wonder that Gary spent
so much time escaping reality.
He liked outer space because
it was just a way of hoping
and dreaming about that better
future that Gar wanted to live in.
My prayer was that he would
meet somebody that loved him.
I love you.
Their relationship was tumultuous.
Raging, yelling and demeaning.
- I
- slapped him a couple of times.
I mean, nothing major,
nothing like red flag.
Former child star, Gary Coleman
died in a Utah hospital on Friday
after suffering a brain
hemorrhage. He was 42.
I think everybody felt that the death
of Gary Coleman was suspicious.
You said, "I've
had a lot of people sit there and say,
"'Yeah, she pushed him.'"
I would never hurt
my husband. Ever.
I really wanted some answers.
Why did his life have to end
this way?
Celebrity's always a burden.
You're stuck with it for life.
You're gonna die a celebrity.
How do you like all the shade
and shit I'm throwing at people?
I don't like to be ugly.
But like, for this documentary,
this is probably the last
that I can actually speak truth.
And you know, because I've
had a lot to absorb over the years.
I was in bed.
And Gary was already downstairs.
And to me it sounded like pans
that hit the floor.
I got out of bed and I went downstairs
and there he was laying down...
on the floor...
with blood around his head.
I did not want to intervene
with where all the blood was
because I knew help was coming.
I mean, blood doesn't really freak
me out. It was just the amount of it.
I met Gary while he was filming
the movie Church Ball,
and It was here behind us.
So I was waiting for, you know,
the person in charge
for the extras, the director,
whatever, and the door opened,
and it was Gary.
He's like, "You're too cute to
be here. You should go home."
And I was like, "Oh. No, I'm just
trying to see what's going on here."
I wanted to be an extra
possibly.
And he was like, "If anyone says
anything, say Gary Coleman sent you,"
and he let me in.
Guys, beers on me!
I just sat up on the
bleachers and he worked his way up
and then asked for my number.
I didn't think that he was
going to call me at all.
And I was really shocked to hear
the voicemail the next day.
What's the worst
that could happen?
He actually brought me
Olive Garden takeout,
which was really sweet.
I was like, "Okay, is this too
good to be true, or is this real?"
I actually went back with him to his
hotel that he was staying in Provo.
It was really cool. We just
started talking and watched TV
or played a couple
of video games.
It was basically just
get-to-know-you kind of a thing.
I honestly didn't know who he was
at all. I never sawDiff'rent Strokes.
And he started to tell me
about his life
and everything
that had happened.
And I mean, it's pretty rough.
Are you okay
to take the gum out?
Or I can stick it behind my ear.
Gary was born in 1968.
He was always an entertainer.
Even as a youngster.
We were shopping
for school clothes
and they were doing like a
fashion show,
and they were showing
all the children's fashions.
And he was like...
"I can do that?"
I wrote a letter to the
coordinator of the program
if she allowed little boys
to model clothes.
And that Fall, I was modelling
clothes on a little runway.
The manager of the mall
saw a lot of the shows
and said, "That kid has talent.
He should have an agent.'"
And he gave my parents a card
to an agent in Chicago.
Gary's parents
brought him into the agency.
He was only about eight
years old, seven, actually.
And he wore
a three-piece suit...
and had a high-pitched voice.
I collected bears, and he
was knocking them off my shelf.
He had a great laugh.
And I knew that he was
a tremendous talent.
The thing that really
started the wheel rolling really fast
is the Harris Bank commercial.
Well, it's that time of the year
when you can get a Hubert doll
at the Harris Bank.
Just open a savings account
with $200 or more.
Or add $200 dollars to a
savings account you already have.
Huby, the Huby doll...
Oh, my God, where did
you get this? This is amazing.
It's not a bear,
but it's all right.
You can never have
too many Hubert dolls 'cause...
you can
never save too much money!
We made the Norman
Lear producers aware of that commercial.
My name is Norman Lear.
Norman Lear was a big shot
producer back in the 1970s.
And he was sending
a scout around
and when Gary got to the
audition, he was there for three hours
and he was reading
with everybody.
The casting director said to me,
"You know, he's a superb talent.
"He's got a tremendous timing."
And insisted that Lear see him.
I was told to
come up and meet this young man
who came bouncing
out of his office and was
just a ball of energy
and funny and adorable.
He was put under contract immediately.
And he was doing appearances
because we were
beginning to build him.
Hey, look here, Mama.
Let me tell you something.
We're gonna settle this thing
right here and now.
It like hit the roof.
"Who is this kid?"
Chicago's answer to
the neutron bomb.
At your service.
Hello, totem pole.
Everybody wanted
to see Gary Coleman.
Gary, I'd like you to meet
Miss Florida Evans.
Hey, Flo!
I thought, "Hey, this is
a whole new adventure.
"This is cool. This is
fun. And wait a minute,
"I get paid for this?"
That kind of thing.
Never in my wildest dreams
had I ever thought
it could get bigger than that.
I was told they had a
script for a show calledDiff'rent Strokes.
And they asked Conrad Bain to
be the father of these two young kids
that were orphans
that he took in.
Ah-ha! You're here.
Welcome, gentlemen.
How about that, Willis?
Downtown two minutes
and already we're gentlemen.
Come in, come in.
Oops, shoot, sorry.
Sorry.
My clumsy feet, get in the way.
All right.
I got clumsy feet, so.
The very first time
that I met Gary,
I was like,
"This ain't no little kid."
"This is not a little kid."
Because he was so smart.
He was so ingenious
and just funny.
Be careful of my goldfish.
His name is Abraham
I've never seen
a black goldfish before.
That's okay. He never saw a
rich white man before either.
He was cute and he played games.
He joked with everybody. He'd
always hide stuff from people.
And then he would always come
in my room and steal my combs
because he was like, "That
hurts. That hurts." I was like, "Well,
"it's going to hurt worse
if you don't sit still."
We happened to be in my garage,
which is one of the storage spaces
that I I have for a lot
of Gary's memorabilia,
that Gary collected
throughout his life and career.
I've got photos.
We have awards.
This is Gary's...
venerable...
show jacket from
Diff'rent Strokes.
Can you believe
how small he was?
It takes me back for sure.
No question.
My mother needed to get to
set to audit one of the teachers.
She suggested that I come along
because she heard there was this new
sensational kid named Gary Coleman
that she was very eager to meet.
And I accompanied her
to the set.
He was a mere 10 years old
and I was 14 years old.
And we became
true childhood friends.
I knew upon the first take,
something was different.
I had never, ever seen
a kid that was so dynamic.
There was a meteor that had landed
unlike anything I had ever seen before
in the constellation
of child stars.
Everything's gonna
be okay, honey.
Arnold and Willis will come
and tell me what it's all about.
Here they come now.
- Hi, guys.
- Hi, Dad. Hi Julie.
We are in stage 17 where
Diff'rent Strokes was shot.
How do you do? I'm happy Willis.
And I'm delirious Arnold.
It was so much fun working with
Gary. We were thick as thieves, man.
Big brother, little brother,
we did everything together.
This is Dana Plato.
She's the girl in the show.
Me and Gary Coleman and Dana
Plato, who played Kimberly in the show,
we hung out together and
we had a great time, you know.
I'm only 13 years old
and he's only 10, I think.
We used to build
the most amazing spaceships.
- I'm fixing his lasers.
- He put lasers on, that's the problem.
I got two lasers in the front
already. He needs some lasers.
Kids, we're gonna shoot the second
show. We need you on stage, please.
Okay.
All through here was the
audience and over here was the set.
And we had, let's see,
the living room was right here.
This is dancing.
And this was our bedroom.
- Arnold, are you in there?
- No, I'm not in there.
And this was the kitchen.
- Well, if it isn't sleeping beauty.
- You mean sleeping ugly.
Diff'rent Strokes
was a groundbreaking show.
It was a new thing to see
blended families on TV.
I never had
a white grandma before.
It was the first time we've
seen a white man adopt two Black kids.
For some white
people, the show was unfavorable.
They didn't like it and they were
angry with what it was showing.
I don't understand.
Why is a person's color
such a big deal to some people?
Sometimes I think if the
whole world was the same color,
some people would still find
something to hate each other for.
There were some complaints
from Black people, too.
They thought that Conrad Bain was
being the white savior of Black kids.
I am going to open up
a whole new world for you.
It wasn't that there was
a white savior there.
It was just a man...
trying to save two kids from
ending up being on the streets.
I am going to see that you have the
same advantages that I had growing up.
No matter the hate mail from both sides,
we knew what we were doing were right,
and the thing that our show
proved was love conquers all.
Ebony and Ivory
Live together
in perfect harmony
It was a celebration.
You could feel it.
The audience loved Gary.
He stole the show.
- You think we'll hit it big?
- Yeah, but don't worry, Willis.
If you get rich and famous,
you'll always be a nobody to me.
He was a big man
in this little kid's body.
Some of the things that he would
say and the way he would say things,
that's how grown men
would say it.
And it was very comical.
And the audience loved him.
They loved him.
Suddenly Gary
is on the cover of everything.
Black magazines,
white magazines, teen magazines.
I mean, he's everywhere.
How about a picture
of your kid for the paper?
I think I can force myself
to be on the front page.
Gary's catchphrase was,
"Whatchu talkin' about?"
Whatchu talkin' about,
Kimberley?
I think it came accidentally.
Whatchu talkin' about, Mr. D?
But they had him saying it
three times a show.
Whatchu talkin' about, Willis?
Gary attracted star names...
Mrs. Reagan, I didn't know
that you knew Mr. Drummond?
I don't.
...like Nancy Reagan.
I'm really here to see Arnold.
Whatchu talkin' about,
Mrs. Reagan?
Mr. T, who was very popular
at the time.
Well, what do we have here?
And Muhammad Ali.
Could I ask a favor while I've
still got breath in my little lungs?
Yeah, what is it?
Could you autograph
a picture for me?
- Be glad to.
- Here's a pen.
He appeared in six
movies for NBC and two feature films.
Satellites are launched and we are
ready to button up and get some rest
You are a real genius.
Actually, they call it
severely gifted.
But it's no big deal.
I remember asking him, "How do
you act? How do you know this?"
And he says, "When the
director tells me to laugh, I laugh.
"And when the director
tells me to cry, I cry."
And yet he'd be home at night,
watching his episode ofDiff'rent Strokes
taking notes
on his performance.
Arnold, you look very handsome.
Yes, I do.
Along with being
a genius comedic actor,
Gary had a really vivid,
creative imagination.
And you would often find him
writing fictional stories,
and doodling the characters
in a notebook.
He loved outer space.
He would write the lines and
he would draw these characters.
He would tell me, he says
someday the people were going to be
just like the people
in Outer Space.
He had this affinity
towards that...
to the point that I called the showBuck
Rogers that was on TV here for years,
I said, "Gary loves your
show and he wants to be on it."
And they put him on
in two minutes.
Gary Coleman
rockets into the 25th century...
as the president of a distant
planet, trapped on a world
where only Buck Rogers
can save him.
I did have a front row
seat in the rise of Gary's success.
I was Gary's best friend,
like his brother,
but little did we all know that there
was a much more challenging story
that we would all soon
come to learn.
At about...
two years old, Gary
started to run a temperature.
And that's when they found out
that he had this
congenital kidney defect.
One kidney was
pretty much atrophied,
and the other kidney
was functioning,
but not really...
properly.
It was really, really tough.
But when he was five and a half,
we got the news that
they had a kidney for him.
Two weeks after he had his surgery,
he was standing on his head and I said,
"Oh my God, don't do that." And
he said, "I'm okay."
So, he had a spirit about him
that, "I'm going to master this.
"I'm going to do
what I want to do, regardless."
Even when I was five
I was the "do or die,"
'"never say die," the tenacious, "I'll
be back'," you know, kind of person.
That was the kind of kid I was.
This is the Gary that
the world came to know and love.
And if you look very
specifically...
at his size, this was brought on
by the immunosuppressant drugs
from his first kidney transplant
when he was five.
The drugs stunted his growth.
How tall am I going to be? 6'3"?
Six two?
Six one?
It looks like you're going to
grow to be about five feet tall.
Whatchu talkin' about, Doctor?
The immunosuppressant drugs
brought about the fullness in his face.
You've got the cutest, fattest
little cheeks I've ever seen.
Ironically, it was his
diminutive size.
And the fullness in his cheeks that
created Gary Coleman as we know him.
You're just a sweetie pie.
I was told...
that the prognosis was,
if Gary were lucky,
he would live to the age of 12,
and at that point would require
another kidney transplant.
So, it's an amazing
psychological dynamic
to consider about someone
who was so successful...
and so full of life,
who fundamentally never
knew what it was
to be fully healthy.
Yeah, he told me, he's like, "Yeah, I
had a kidney transplant when I was five."
It was a whole new ballpark for me that,
something I just was very unfamiliar with.
I just wanted him
happy, healthy,
and just with me.
The thing that
I liked about Gary the most
was he treated me like a queen.
He made my life change in so
many awesome, drastic ways.
Go to Disneyland, all the
things that you think of as a kid
that you want to do,
you never think that that those things
are going to happen or be fulfilled.
And he made all that happen
and then some.
You know, that meant a lot to me
because I never
felt important...
as a child.
I never felt like
I got that love
that every human deserves,
growing up.
I feel like I got my childhood
stripped from me at an early age
because I lost my mom.
And I was always just somebody
that needed someone.
All I know is that I love you.
And nobody can put
a price on true love.
You can't.
Watch the mic!
I'm now aware of you!
I'm a Utah agent.
When do I get somebody as
big as Gary Coleman come in?
It doesn't happen.
But it was a joy to me
to be able to help them both.
The only thing that mattered
to Gary was Shannon.
That's all he wanted...
was to find somebody
who he could love.
And Shannon just needed love.
Our wedding was amazing.
We went on a helicopter ride,
and we went up to the Valley of Fire
and we got married
on the most beautiful mountain.
I, Gary, take you Shannon.
I, Gary, take you Shannon.
- To be my wife.
- To be my wife.
I was like, "This is the
most beautiful place
"that anybody could have
a wedding ceremony."
It was great.
I will be faithful to you.
I will, and have been
faithful to you.
I will be honest with you.
I will be honest with you,
and I have been.
I will stand by your side.
I will stand by your side
through whatever it takes.
My prayer was that he would
meet somebody that loved him...
Gary, place this
on your lady's finger.
...and somebody that he loved,
who could encourage him
mentally, physically, spiritually,
and in any other way, you know.
I love you.
But that wasn't the case.
Dion, turn around,
so I can get your open eyes.
You're shooting it
against the window.
By 1983, Gary was 15 and
really at the height of his success.
Alright,
enough that. Let me eat my bread.
He had a team around him
that became more like
a family after a while.
He had myself as his agent.
And my responsibility was
his theatrical representation
in negotiating his contracts.
Do you remember
the name of your card?
Ace of Hearts.
- Are you sure?
- Yeah.
He had a
lawyer, he had a publicist.
And then he had Anita de Thomas,
which was the business manager...
- Anita?
- What?
- Where are you?
- I'm right here.
...whose job it was
to manage their money.
Yeah, perfect!
The Colemans
became his managers.
Most children are not
the employers of their parents.
The atmosphere changed
on the set when Mr. Coleman showed up
and I remember the first thing
I heard from him was,
"Look out! Look out!
The star is here."
And Gary came in on top
of some bodyguard's shoulders.
And I looked at Conrad
and he looked at me
and he was like, "Okay,
this is gonna change things."
Nobody wanted Willie on the set.
Because he created havoc.
He'd be standing there.
So, everybody knew that
Willie was there.
He was very vocal
about the fact that his son
was the star of the show.
Gary went from
being cute to ugly.
He picked up all the ugliness
of his dad,
telling people,
"Who do you think I am?
"I run this show."
One day, he said, "Come
here, JoAnn, let me slap you."
I was like, "Slap me?"
I said, "Boy, if you slap me,
"it'll be the end of Diff'rent
Strokesbecause I will beat your ass."
And then he became sick again.
The kidney that had
been transplanted
was absorbed by the body.
And so, from December 31st
of 1985
until his death, Gary lived
with not a single kidney
in his body.
He then started on dialysis,
which is going to the hospital
three times a week
and sitting at the machine
three to four hours at a time,
while every drop of your blood
is cycled through a machine,
cleansing the blood.
And it is very oppressive
for most people.
I can recall
showing up to set one day,
and Gary was in the middle
of a scene,
completed the scene,
bent over and threw up.
He spent a lot of time with me.
So the producers were like,
"Well, JoAnn, how is Gary doing?"
I said, "Gary is sick."
The studio said, "Okay,
"let's go down for two days
until Gary is feeling better."
Willie was huffing and puffing,
and he said, "Who the
hell do you think you are?
"Why did you have them
cancel the show?"
I said, "Because they asked me
how Gary was feeling,
"and I told them
he didn't feel good.
"So, sorry if I pissed you off."
I remember the time
when Gary was throwing up.
I overheard Willie,
you know, saying,
"You got to get out there and
you got to work. You know?
"You got people that
depending on you.
"You gotta get out there
and do what you gotta do."
I never saw it. As a matter
of fact, I saw the opposite.
There was one occasion when
Gary was invited to Australia,
for tons of money to do
television shows.
And Willie Coleman says,
"No, he's not going
"because we don't think
he's feeling well these days."
And we turned down a fortune.
When Gary was 17,
as well as his poor health,
he was not comfortable
with the fact that the character
of Arnold Jackson
was not aging at the same pace
that Gary Coleman was aging.
Don't worry. You get ready,
I'll drop you off at school.
Okay, Dad. Thanks.
They didn't want to change him.
I mean, he was, you know,
"We have a golden goose!"
He's the golden goose.
He was.
And then that caused him
pain, emotionally, I'm sure.
- Are they maturing you
in the show? - Not much.
Are you complaining?
Like you know?
- Of course.
- Yeah.
Not much I can do about it yet.
He was just a meal ticket.
That's how he felt.
"I'm just making money,
but I'm not happy."
He wasn't happy.
They didn't think that Gary
was happy in the character anymore.
And I think it ran its course.
I bet you're all wondering
what I'm doing here.
Yeah. Now beat it.
The ratings were declining.
I mean, how many times can you
deal with the same kind of jokes
or the same kind of energy?
Well, I've had it. I'm quitting.
I'm out of here.
When Diff'rent Strokes
was canceled in 1986
Gary was 18
and he was exhausted.
He was spent.
He retreated.
He went into a very deep
depression for months.
In fact, he vowed never to work
again in the entertainment business.
And no one would accept that.
Not his parents, not an agent, not
a business manager, not a lawyer.
And, in fact,
there was a very dynamic,
concerted effort to put him
back to work
as soon as possible.
Which was primarily spearheaded
by his agent, Vic Perillo.
The agent that I had all
during Diff'rent Strokes
didn't pressure me until later
when I wanted to quit.
When Strokeswent off the air,
there were projects,
three of them that I
developed for them, you know.
With Gary on
the scene, a crook shouldn't be
He played a little detective,
and they shot the pilot
up in Canada.
Gary resented that
they were still
pursuing opportunities for him
when he was clearly expressive
about not wanting to do anything
in the entertainment business.
He would say to me,
"Why are they doing this?
"Why isn't anybody
listening to me?"
About a year later, I was at home
and about 10:30 my phone rang.
And it was Gary.
He said, "Well,
I just wanted to call you
"to say goodbye.
"I cannot take this anymore.
"It's not worth living.
"I'm gonna kill myself."
I raced over in the deepest fear
that anybody could imagine
not knowing what
I was going to find.
But he was sitting alone
with a keyboard.
And he was just tapping
single notes at a time.
We sat and we cried.
And I held him
and comforted him.
And just let him weep.
And I concluded, you know,
"You don't deserve this.
"You don't deserve
to go through this.
"And you do deserve to
take a break. To get away,
"to unfamiliar people,
unfamiliar places."
And that was when the
discussion came up about Hawaii.
You're getting everything
I already got.
We jumped on a plane
and off to Hawaii we went.
He began to ask very specific
questions about his money.
What did I know?
I very clearly expressed to him
that I felt that some of his
businesspeople in his life
were completely insincere,
that they were duplicitous
with him.
Because I heard very frequently,
"Gary's a little jerk.
"Thank God he pays us
a great salary."
Just horrible things
that left nothing
to the imagination
about how they really felt.
I wasn't getting it.
I just wasn't getting it,
until I finally just said,
You know,
"Enough of all you people.
"I'm sick of all you people.
"I don't want to hear
from any more of you people.
"I want an accounting.
I want it now."
Eventually, it came
to a point where
Gary terminated
his business relationship
with his entire team of handlers
and his parents.
I kind of expected
the call to come in,
because he was letting
everybody go.
He let Anita de Thomas go.
He let his publicists go.
And then I was the last.
I said, "Gary, this isn't
going to be good for you
"and it's not going to be good
for me."
There was a silence at the
end of the phone, you know.
I'm sure he was
influenced by people
to get Mrs. de Thomas away
from the finances
and get us away from him.
Dion will always be
my lifelong mentor,
a lifesaver more than twice.
And he's the one that opened
my eyes to the rest of my life.
Right.
I think that Dion had a wonderful
relationship with Gary at the beginning.
But I think that he convinced himself
that Gary needed people around him
that would take care of him
and that we were all beasts.
And it couldn't be
the farthest from the truth.
- To Dion.
- To Gary.
- Best friends.
- Best friends.
- Best luck. Best Money.
- Ha. Scary.
I became Gary's business manager
in late 1987.
I think even Dion
was inspired to say,
"Hey, listen, you're hanging
out with a big child star.
"Why don't you move in
and become his manager."
I did not have
any intention of riding
the coattails of Gary Coleman,
and I didn't need to.
I came from a family
that was successful.
I didn't need Gary for money.
I received the job
based upon the trust
that was well established
in my relationship with him.
That was not part of a long term
plan, and it scared me out of my mind.
I'm glad we pulled it off.
I hope you're happy.
Maybe we should
do this again next year.
And I'll pay for it.
Maybe. Bye.
For two years,
there were deep investigations
into Gary's finances.
When I first met Gary,
it was at an invitation,
to become part of the legal team
that was investigating his finances
and his business relationships
with his entire management team.
What we found out almost immediately
was that he'd earned over $18,000,000
in fees as an actor, and most of the money
was going to people that weren't Gary.
His parents became
his personal managers
and took the biggest cut, 20%.
His agent, Vic Perillo, 10%.
His business manager, Anita
de Thomas, was taking 5%.
His two lawyers
were taking 7.5%.
So even before taxes, almost half of
Gary Coleman's earnings were gone.
These were professional fees,
which were industry standard and legal.
One piece was supposed
to be set aside for Gary Coleman alone.
California law required that 25% of
his income go into a blocked account.
The blocked account
is administered by the court.
And it's supposed to just go
into a standard savings account
and just sits there
until he turns 18.
But what our
investigation showed
was that, again and again, Anita
de Thomas and the Colemans
would go into court and petition to
have large sums of Gary's money
taken out of the safe, blocked
accounts and placed into investments.
Millions were put
into complex real estate deals.
An office building in Denver,
this strip mall in Colorado Springs,
and this building
in Salt Lake City.
All of the investments failed.
Every investment was
100% loss. All gone.
Sue Coleman
put her trust in people
that were representing Gary,
like Anita de Thomas.
So if they said, "This is
a good investment for him
"and this is a good investment
for him," she took their word for it.
And then we discovered
something even worse.
There was a series
of loans and overpayments
from the blocked account
that went to the parents
and Anita de Thomas,
who said, "Oh, no,
"that was a gift.
"Gary never meant us
to pay that back.
"It was always a gift."
It's even worse than that.
They took money
out of the blocked account
and placed it into a
pension fund in Gary's name.
And then dissolved
the pension fund,
and took $770,000 of what
had been Gary's money
and gave it to themselves as
recipients of the pension fund.
Is that legal?
No, it's not legal.
I mean, none of this is legal.
I mean,
certainly none of it is moral.
It's a direct lift of money
from Gary
to themselves.
I was not aware that money
was going to be taken
out of his blocked account to
be put into a pension plan for us.
Did you get paid
the three quarters of a million?
Not that we know of.
We went over to
his parents' house together,
and began to explain
the findings.
It rolled right off of them
like water off of a duck's back.
At one point, Willie said,
"We are your parents.
"Absolutely nothing is wrong
with your business affairs.
"Nothing at all."
Gary felt not only betrayed
but completely abandoned
by the people
who were closest to him,
his parents.
Gary was left with no choice
but to file a lawsuit against
his then business manager,
Anita De Thomas,
and his parents, Willie and Sue.
As the litigation progressed,
Willie and Sue felt
that it was necessary
to file a petition
to have him conserved.
Gary was 22.
The Colemans made representations
to the court that Gary could not handle
his own business affairs,
that the court should intervene.
And that's a very ugly thing
to do to your child in public.
My concern was that
with his medical condition
and all the things
that goes on with him
that can affect
the way he thinks.
And then to have people zeroing
in on him and confusing him,
I'm just concerned that
he'd... do things irrationally.
The conservatorship case
is a very concerted
and expensive attempt
to hide the truth
because the public is told
that Gary can't handle himself.
Okay. And If he can't
handle himself,
then the lawsuits
and investigations
against them end.
Gary was absolutely livid.
He was embarrassed
that someone would make
such a claim before the world.
There was the first hearing
with Judge Martha Goldin.
The parents remained
on one side of the courtroom,
and Gary was on the opposite side.
And this judge was savvy enough
to call Gary back
into her chambers
and have
a private meeting with him.
And she emerged
to scold his parents.
Mr. Coleman does not come close
to requiring a conservator.
Thank you, Your Honor.
Where do you think
things went wrong between you and Gary?
I don't think anything has gone
wrong between me and Gary.
Do you feel he's just receiving poor
advice? Is that what you're saying?
That's my opinion.
After nearly three full years
of litigation,
Gary went back into court.
When we finally
got to the trial,
the judge did everything
the judge could do,
which was find that $1.3 million had
been taken out of the accounts falsely
and was therefore owed.
And that was his judgement.
A California judge
bought Coleman's argument
that the 25-year-old actor's
parents and business advisers
skimmed some of his earnings.
The court said the money
that had been appropriated
for our pension,
for our savings should be
returned to him.
And I said, "Rather than
go through this...
"take it."
During the courts
and in interviews afterwards,
the parents would say...
"I'm not a bookkeeper,
"I was not an accountant.
"I didn't handle any finances
or anything.
"All we did was sign documents
and gave our approval."
At the beginning, it's a couple
of befuddled people from Chicago
who didn't know how to handle
the sharp business managers
that you run across in LA,
but at the end,
I just cannot imagine
how you cannot notice
all the money being drained
out of the accounts and gone,
especially when you're getting it.
I do believe that they became aware
that, "Yes, some things were really wrong.
"But we didn't deliberately
engage in this behavior
"to consciously
and deliberately harm our son."
I would never represent that
that was their intention.
However, once being educated
about what had happened,
they continued
to refuse to admit it.
Over the years, I would try and
talk to them about certain suspicions
and things in my professional
career, and they just they either turned
a deaf ear or they didn't
want to hear it.
Or they just didn't support me.
And I have taken that
very deeply to heart
and I resent it,
and it still bothers me today.
And there's nothing I can do about
that feeling because it's the truth.
It's honest.
It separated Gary
from his parents,
to the point where even if he
wanted to talk to them, he couldn't.
It's very sad.
It's very sad.
That was a tough time for us.
It was really tough.
But we let him know that we
were always, that we were home.
And, "Your room is still here.
"Anytime you want to come home,
come home."
Gary always, you know,
would tell me,
"Don't give my parents
my phone number.
"Do not give it to them."
And I remember one time,
Willie called me,
He says,
"Todd, can you have Gary call me?"
I went, "No,"
click and I hung up.
Gary told me that he started having
financial issues when he was 18,
and that's why I never really had
any interest to meet his parents.
Because you don't just take
advantage of someone like that.
- Who's on your lap?
- This is Autumn.
She's my fun little
rescue puppy.
She's very lovable.
I was friends with Gary
in Santaquin,
and the first thing he said to
me was, "All she wants is money."
But then there wasn't any.
Shannon took me out to a closet
and there was a stack
of photos of him.
She was grabbing them, so that
he could autograph and sell them.
And that's the very first time
I'd seen her explode on him
because she couldn't
find these pictures.
I think the best word to describe their
relationship, in my view, was tumultuous.
It was all over the place.
Sometimes they'd be happy
and joking.
And on the flip of a dime,
it would become raging,
yelling, demeaning,
and disparaging.
I would say that they fought
mainly about money,
because Gary constantly
needed money and work.
And there was not a lot of work
in Utah for him.
She constantly wanted him
to go make the money.
"Call this person,
call that person.
"Do this."
He just always felt like
he was a paycheck.
He put a $17,000 down
payment on my car, almost paid my car off.
But, you know, a lot of
people just stick their hand out.
They want your money.
They want your fame.
And I wasn't like that at all.
All you care about is the money.
That's all you want.
The love for Gary
keeps fading away
because you believe that Gary
doesn't want to support you.
But how are the bills
going to get paid?
You don't pay the bills without
me making some kind of money.
If we were in an argument, you know,
cuss words obviously get brought up.
And a couple of times
we were both like, "F you."
And he's like,
"You're a bitch."
And I'm like,
"You're an asshole."
So, you know.
Just stuff like that.
It was just constant.
It was just every day,
her doing something,
her creating some situation,
her creating drama,
demeaning his manhood,
demeaning his size,
sometimes calling him a failure.
I mean, sometimes she'd just come
right out and say, "I hate you, Gary."
And it was disturbing.
We had a talk about their
relationship on a few occasions,
and we talked about how he
said that, "She's my soul mate."
And I said,
"Gary, love is not enough.
"And the way she respects you
is not the kind of respect
"that you would want to have
in a relationship."
I was always optimistic that he was going
to one day come to me and say, "I'm done.
"I just, I need her gone.
"I need her out of my life."
So I was sad for him that
he didn't get to that point.
Yeah, that switch right there.
Oh, it's cushy.
Back in October 1997,
I was working at this location
for a chain
of video rental shops.
I was filing movies
back in the main library
and I heard this voice say,
"Excuse me, miss. Could you
help me find a movie, please?"
And I turned and I looked.
And it was
Gary Coleman. Wow!
This is where I had
my car parked that night,
and I came out at 1:00
in the morning
and I found Gary Coleman sitting on the
hood of my car like a giant hood ornament.
And then I said,
"What are you doing here?"
"It's four hours later.
What are you doing here?"
And he said, "I was waiting
for you."
We exchanged numbers and talked
a little, and then I drove back home.
As soon as I got there, I rang the
number he'd given me and it really was him.
And we spent the next
six hours on the phone.
So, yeah, the friendship really
just blew up. It was instant.
It was like a big bang
of friendship.
After a few weeks,
I pretty much just moved in.
He was living on the fourth floor
of these apartments in Culver City.
Eventually we were an item.
Gary and I were a couple
for six and a half years,
but he had no interest
in the physical act of sex.
I'm reading your bio.
It says you are a virgin.
Yes, still to this day, because
I was not endowed with that,
"Go! Go! Conquer every woman"
libido that every man has.
- Right.
- I don't have that.
But he was very romantic.
So, yeah, he loved to hold
hands and kiss and snuggle.
And he really showed
a lot of affection.
One of the most
challenging things
that I had to deal with as
Gary's manager at that time
was, you know, getting the work.
Gary did feel
a renewal in spirit.
He had this desire to be part of the
entertainment industry once again,
but he was still 4'8"
and Gary loved action
adventure movies.
Rambo.
You know, he wanted
to play a superhero.
And there were no roles
for Gary Coleman as a superhero.
He wanted to play a cop.
He wanted to play
a larger-than-life villain.
I'm 31 years old.
"Wholesome" must die.
Otherwise, I'll never be able
to do any cool bad guys.
I'll never be able to do any
cool characters of any depth ever
because people are still thinking
of me as Arnold on Diff'rent Strokes.
We're not having that.
- This looks like a great place, Arnold.
- Yeah. Willis would love it.
Yeah, that is, if he wouldn't mind living
over a haunted Indian burial ground.
He was just getting
piecemeal work, tidbits here and there,
and people still wanted him
to do Strokes-related stuff.
You hear the wailing
of the dead.
Whatchu' talkin' bout, Will?
People didn't want Gary.
They wanted Arnold Jackson.
That was common.
They might not let you in because the only
black person they respect is Ted Danson.
Whatchu' talkin' about, Bundy?
Gary absolutely despised
that catchphrase.
He called it "the line."
I'm not saying "that line."
Whatchu talking about, Gary?
I mean, just walking down the street,
he would have people run up on him.
"Yo, yo yo, he's got to say it!
He's got to say it!"
They would just, people treated
him like he was a penny arcade,
like they could just stick a
penny in him and get a good show.
I was wondering if you'd say
your famous line for us.
I knew that was coming.
I'm sorry.
- You know...
- You don't have to do it.
You don't have to do it.
I already did it.
No, it's not that
I wouldn't do it,
it's that,
I don't have it in me.
I can't, it sounds ridiculous
when I do it.
I'm sorry.
Quite often, child actors don't
go forward in their careers.
Some of them
aren't talented enough.
Some of them are labeled too
strongly with the character they played.
Please welcome Todd Bridges, Dana Plato
and Gary Coleman!
Gary and Todd and Dana
after Diff'rent Strokes
struggled with where
their career was going.
Todd and Dana became involved in
drugs and alcohol.
Former child star Todd Bridges is
in trouble with the law once again.
Bridges was arrested yesterday
in California for having drugs
and a loaded handgun in his car.
They had bets on us in Vegas,
who would die first.
People lost a lot of money on me,
you know, because I'm still here.
After a troubled career, child
actress Dana Plato has died.
Known for her role on
Diff'rent Strokes,
Plato died Saturday of an overdose
just days after denying she used drugs.
Dana Plato was 34 years old.
It's a tough thing to be famous
and be so young.
So much fame,
so much opportunity.
Kids have power when they
are in that position, and it's unreal.
So you leave behind your power
and suddenly you feel terrible,
because now you have to really
struggle to be like a regular kid.
If someone had've told me that
my life would have been like this
early enough where I could
have got out, I would have got out.
I'd say, "No, you know, I want
to go and have a normal life
"and have friends."
Twenty years ago, I made
millions and millions on TV.
The sad part is the people who
took care of the money spent it.
Recently, I needed
some cash, fast.
Gary needed work. He wasn't
getting enough TV work to live on,
so times were
very tough for him.
CashCall was there
when I needed them.
I work because I like to work.
If I'm working
as a security guard
or I'm flipping burgers
or bagging groceries,
it's because I enjoy working.
One of his dream jobs as a
little boy had been to be a cop.
So Gar was so ecstatic when he
had finally become a security guard.
Becoming a security guard was
Gary's way of fulfilling that fantasy,
of being an action hero,
playing a cop, being a cop.
He was so proud.
He was just crowing.
And then being a security guard
went wrong for him.
Former child actor Gary Coleman
faces assault charges.
The 4'7" Coleman
now works as a security guard.
He surrendered to police
in Hawthorne, California,
after allegedly punching
an autograph-seeker.
He was going to the
security store to get a bulletproof vest
and out of nowhere...
"Gary Coleman! Gary Coleman!
Can I get an autograph?"
And he walked over and
gave it to her and she was like,
"Well, can you write down
something nice?"
She says, "Well, can you
put a little more?"
You know, just add a little something,
like "good luck" or something.
He took it and ripped it up
and was like, "Well, for what?
"You know,
this doesn't mean anything."
She had this hurt look in her face.
She says, "No, I want it for my son."
And she was like,
"Well, I can see why
"you didn't make it as an
adult actor, just a child actor,"
and that must have set him off
because he walked up to her
and literally punched her
in the eye.
Former child actor
Gary Coleman pleaded no contest
to assault and battery charges
on Thursday.
He wept as he was given
a 90-day suspended sentence,
a $400 fine, and an order to
attend anger management classes.
Gary regretted
what happened instantly.
Instantly.
He felt that really, in that moment,
the bottom had fallen out once again,
and it was horrible.
Yet another opportunity
for the public
to make fun of him,
to cast aspersions upon him.
And to belittle him.
Oh, m God, it's Gary Coleman!
Can I have your autograph?
Miss, please, I'm
busy at work right now,
and I really don't like
doing that anymore.
Thank you. I'm so sorry.
You's an asshole.
That's why your broke ass
ain't famous now.
Bitch, what?
He was really depressed.
He stopped going out as often,
he didn't trust people anymore.
This was one of those
experiences that changed him.
He constantly referred to
himself as "God's punching bag."
He felt like one of life's jokes
and that he was never meant
to be a person of good fortune.
In one note that he left
behind for me, he writes,
"I am a hurt, confused, broken man
with no one and nowhere to turn to.
"I am more sad now than I have
ever been, and I feel suicidal.
"But of course, because of fear,
"frustration and no real means
of doing it painlessly,
"I can't release my soul
from the ongoing madness,
"betrayal and misery
that surrounds my life."
It's horrible.
This kind of loneliness,
this kind of hopelessness.
Gary often didn't sleep
well, so a lot of times we'd just
drive out here along Mulholland
Drive and look out over the city.
If we could catch a few stars
once in a while, it was nice.
Gary liked outer space, and
the idea of space exploration
was just a way of hoping
and dreaming
about that better future
that Gar wanted to live in.
It wouldn't be about Black
or white or male or female,
tall, short, rich,
or any of that.
He thought that in the future like
that, he could have been treated
with all the respect that he
deserved and not as the butt of a joke.
Nor as a penny arcade.
So this was a way
to just look up
and hope for that better-ness
that was coming someday.
In 2005, he got approached
to do Church Ball,
which was filming out
in the state of Utah.
I'm gonna wipe the floor
with your face, little man.
He called me on the last day
of the shoot,
and he said,
"I've decided something.
"I want to move
out here to Utah."
"The people here in Utah
are awesome.
"They're so friendly
and wonderful
"and they're not treating me
like Gary Coleman.
"They're treating me like
just Gar." And I was like "Oh!"
He said,
"Is that okay with you?"
And I said, "Yeah, I'll
be there. Not a problem."
So I packed up
the Los Angeles apartment
and we drove
straight to Santaquin.
It took me about four days to
get out there, and I was exhausted.
So I hopped out of the truck
and Gary came running out.
And Shannon Price was walking
out of the house behind him.
She just struck me as very,
very young.
I was 19 years old
when I met him.
And I was worried whether or not
she would be immature.
I was like, "Hey, my name is
Shannon. Nice to meet you."
And I could just tell
immediately.
Cold shoulder. Very
standoffish. Not friendly at all.
Within the first day,
I was already picking up on
her wanting things.
Not wanting Gar, wanting things.
I remember one night
she had been drinking.
And she spit beer on me.
Believe it or not, she did.
After an admittedly ugly
night, eventually, I told Gar
that I think it'd be best
if I go away for a little bit
and let you explore this
and see what it is.
We always had the freedom to explore
other relationships if we wanted to.
I was really hoping that it would be
another person in his life that, you know,
would lift him up and bring him joy
and that's not what happened at the end.
I had left his employ
as his manager.
And when Gary moved to Utah,
I was not aware at all
of what was happening with him
on a day-to-day basis.
I learned that there was
someone that he met.
This "Shannon,"
and I wasn't terribly concerned
until I learned that
she was living with him.
Then I had grave concerns.
There were a couple times
where we had arguments that I'm like,
"Hey, you should go do
this film because, you know,
"we do need to pay the bills
at some point."
Some of the movies that he did the
last few years of his life, he didn't like.
Shannon said, "You gotta do it.
We need money. We got to live."
I remember he would call me
every single day
and he's like,
he would blame me for it.
And I was like, "You know what? I'm
done," and I decided to divorce him.
They were divorced in 2008.
And I know they got back
together socially after that.
I know that she continued to
live at his house and eat his
food and have him buy her things
even after they were divorced.
We still lived together.
We still stayed together.
We were still together.
He had told me himself,
"She's just my roommate."
In the public and out and about,
it was, "we're married."
But behind closed doors, it
was, "You're just my roommate."
There were multiple times
when Gary and I
discussed a restraining order.
He just couldn't deal
with it anymore.
It was never served to me,
so it was just a document
that Randy had made up
and had printed out.
We'd prepared the paperwork,
and the next day
he'd call me and say...
Randy, it's Gary Coleman.
I need to rescind that order.
Everything's cool, everything's fine
so far, so maybe the fourth time around
things will work out.
It was just toxic.
I know the police had been there
quite a few times to domestic issues.
They both laid
their hands on each other.
Neither one of them
was the innocent party.
Strokesstar Gary Coleman sits
in the Utah County Jail tonight.
Coleman was booked into jail
around 1:00 this afternoon
after being arrested
by Santaquin police.
Gary.
What happened today?
Nothing, nothing
you'd be interested in.
No jail time,
not leaving my house,
not paying any heavy fines.
And now I'm just gonna
go to lunch.
It was only a couple of times
as far as anything physical.
Yeah, there was
a couple of times.
I mean, I slapped him
a couple of times.
I mean, nothing major,
nothing like, "red flag."
Like, people smack each other.
They hit each other.
People do it.
You know, if you deny it,
you're crazy.
I have this on my head
because I fell down the stairs.
I don't want people thinking
that my wife is abusing.
Why don't you want to answer the
question about whether you beat your wife?
Everything out. Pardon me?
- You can go yourself,
and quit asking me. - Really?
Is that the way you talk
to your wife?
Yes, I have to. If I
need to. But I don't.
- I don't know you.
- Hold on. Hold on.
If I get hit by a bus tonight,
I'm not gonna care
because she's pushing my buttons
and I don't like her now and
the next thing I'm going to do
is leave, so all of you.
- Gary, come back.
- No you.
He had dialysis that morning,
and he came home,
and he immediately came
upstairs and I could tell
he wasn't really
feeling that well.
But also I was really sick.
I have an inner ear problem,
so I was just basically bedridden.
And I asked him, I was like, "Hey,
would you mind going downstairs
"and just putting some pizza
rolls in the microwave for me?"
Then he went downstairs.
I have a lot of questions and concerns
about what happened in the house that day.
I was shocked when I found
out he was fixing her dinner after dialysis
because I've seen how
he felt after, he was weak.
He was sick,
and honestly,
he just wanted to go take a nap.
When I heard the big, loud boom,
I was like, "Gary? Gary?
Gary?" and I heard nothing.
I got out of bed and I went downstairs
and there he was laying down
on the floor with blood
around his head.
And I didn't know what to do.
I didn't know what to think.
So, yeah, of course
that's when I called 911.
I heard the 911 call.
I was appalled.
"I can't help him because
there's blood"?
If you care about somebody,
you don't care about that.
She was more worried about herself
than the person she was calling 911 for.
I think her actions
speak volumes,
and I don't have
to say much more than that.
My 911 call was frantic,
but, I mean, it was
a decent amount of blood,
and it just freaked me out.
I did not want to intervene
with where all the blood was,
because I knew help was coming.
She didn't help him.
She wanted somebody to hurry
and get there and help him.
It's not that I didn't help him.
I helped him.
Clearly I helped him.
The paramedics came. They made
sure that he was being assisted.
I just thought he was going to go to
the hospital, get stitched up, come back.
All is good.
She watched them load him
into the back of the ambulance,
waved goodbye and went back into
the house and put the garage door down.
And Gary was alone.
I was not in the right frame
of mind to have gone with him.
I was frantic. I was stressed.
Anxiety, sad.
You know, just stuff like that
that any normal person
would feel.
And I called him at the
hospital and I was like,
"Do you know anything, like,
what's going on?"
I was like, "When are
you coming home?"
And he's like,
"I have a really bad headache.
"Okay. I think
I'm just gonna go to sleep."
And I was like, "I'll talk
to you later. I love you."
And he's like,
"I love you, too."
And that was the last thing
he said to me.
The next day, I get a phone call and
they say he has an intracranial hemorrhage.
So he has, you know,
certain bleeding in the brain.
And they were
taking him to dialysis,
and he immediately
went into cardiac arrest.
A friend sent me
a text and said,
"Hey, Gary's in the hospital
and it's critical.
"It's really bad." So I immediately
sent some text messages to Shannon.
And I was encouraging her
to go to the hospital.
And I said, "It's really
important that you be there."
So then my dad and I, we
went together Thursday to go see him.
He was on a ventilator. I mean,
he wasn't breathing on his own.
But he was still alive
using a machine.
It was really heartbreaking
to see him that way.
And the doctors and the
nurses told me, they're like,
"Hey, he's not gonna make it."
And I didn't know what to do.
I didn't know what to think.
And they were like, "Shannon,
what do you want to do?"
Actor Gary Coleman
is in critical condition
this morning at a hospital in
Utah. His family described...
Willie heard it on television.
All I could do was take my cell
phone, call the sheriff's office
in Salt Lake City and say,
"I hear my son is in the
hospital and he's critical."
"Would you send somebody over to
speak with Shannon and have her call me?"
She did not call me.
I pulled up
Shannon's number and called
and she was very distant,
very short.
"The doctor says
it doesn't look good at all.
"He's probably going to die.
He's a goner.
"He's done. He's done."
I get a call from Shannon and
she said, "You better run up here.
"He's not gonna make it."
I headed
straight to the hospital.
I told her to start
writing down these questions
of what you need to ask
the physician.
And she asked several times,
"Is there anything we can do?"
"Is there any way
you could get the fluid out?"
"Did you ever perform an EEG?"
But the doctors suggested that
she take him off life support.
There's nothing there.
His brain is gone.
His head was full of blood.
I went in there and I said
everything I needed to say.
"I love you. I'm gonna miss you.
"You're the most amazing thing
that happened in my life.
"And you really were loved.
And you were cared about.
"I want you to know that
if I failed you, I'm sorry.
"I'm sorry that you had to live
with these health issues in this life."
And the decision,
to say, "Yes, take him off
life support,"
was the hardest thing
I had ever had to do.
Gary Coleman died yesterday
after being taken off life support.
Stunned, you know?
You couldn't find
the words to speak...
or describe how it felt
at that time.
It broke me.
It broke me mentally.
I spent the next three weeks
bawling my guts out.
Every day from sunup to sundown.
We were absolutely stumped because
there were way too many questions
with no answers.
The fact that people come
out and say that she murdered Gary,
she pushed him down the stairs.
That really, really,
really hurt me.
I think everybody felt that the
death of Gary Coleman was suspicious,
and whatever happened in the kitchen
when he fell, and have that much blood,
you know, it raises a question,
"What really happened there?"
He was 4'8" tall.
He didn't have that far to fall.
In order to create
such a significant injury,
it just begs question
after question after question.
I personally, in my opinion,
do not think that he fell.
I want to say so much,
but I don't...
I don't know what...
What I can say
without being sued.
I broke down, I cried.
I'm not going to lie.
Like, how can people be so evil
and just think that I did this?
Why? Because I'm the ex-wife.
I'm the evil person, right?
You said, I've had a lot of people sit
there and say, "Yeah, she pushed him."
I would never hurt my
husband. Ever.
People felt like she had been
the one that caused his death
and either pushed him down the
stairs or knocked him down or something.
But the police concluded
that there was no foul play.
There was no criminal element to it,
that it was just an unfortunate accident,
that he had just simply fallen
and hit his head.
I mean, I'm here for a reason
talking to you right now
because I didn't do anything.
I didn't touch him. I didn't hurt
him. I was nowhere near him.
Nothing happened.
The spotlight turned
to the decision...
to pull the plug
and end Gary's life.
Gary had an advanced
healthcare directive
where he stated he wanted
at least two weeks of care
before any plugs were pulled.
So, I just...
I can't understand...
why anyone would pull the plug
two days later,
not two weeks later?
Did you not want to give him
some time?
Why did you feel the need...
to do that so quickly?
I mean,
you never gave him a chance.
On the medical directive, he
said if there was two or more doctors
that stated that he's not
going to come out of it,
then to take him off
life support.
And there were enough doctors...
and medical staff that told me
his condition
and that he just wasn't
going to get better.
I think that legally...
Miss Price is covered in terms
of turning off Gary's life support...
but not morally.
The cover photo of Gary
in his final moments...
was the ultimate betrayal.
I actually took
that photo. It was a selfie.
And I was also crying
and I had a tear.
That's how everybody is now
going to remember Gary.
I mean, nobody looks good
when they're dying.
But not everybody gets their...
Their final moment sold.
It's my understanding
that she sold them.
It was...
one of the most depraved acts
I've ever seen perpetrated...
on another human being
in my life.
I think that people needed
to honestly see it,
to see what he went through
health wise.
To show people like,
"Hey, look, he's human."
I couldn't believe
anything worse
than Gary being dead
could possibly happen.
Damned if she didn't find a way
to do it.
Funeral plans are expected
to be announced soon
for the former child star
Gary Coleman.
He specifically said,
"No funeral, no headstone.
"I want to be
left alone in the end.
"I want to fade away."
He was really very tired of everyone
wanting him for all the wrong reasons.
Gary did live a life fraught
with so many disappointments.
There were a lot of people
that let him down.
I know Gar felt let down
by his parents first and foremost.
But it just kept piling on.
Business managers, Hollywood,
the public,
and, in the end, Miss Price.
Celebrity's always a
burden. I don't care who you are.
I don't care how much
you claim you like it.
You're stuck with it for life.
You're gonna die a celebrity. Even
if you haven't worked in 20 years.
The entertainment industry...
is not designed...
to protect anyone's life.
It will chew you up...
and spit you out.
Gary said this several times. He
said, "I feel as if I never existed."
How could someone
feel like that?
How could Gary Coleman feel
like he feels as if he's never existed?
He is the greatest child actor.
In my book, he is the greatest
child actor of all time.
But he honestly felt like
he never existed.
Because he was always Arnold.
His life...
is definitely a cautionary tale.
But I choose
to acknowledge his life
in a complete whole perspective
for everything that it was.
The tragic moments as well as
his victory and his triumphs.
Super-Arnold is ready
for action.
There are certain performers
that are given to us,
to change our lives,
to make us happy.
And I think he was one of them.
Monsters spotted
on the Empire State Building.
The proof of the pudding
is in the tasting.
And his life and career
tasted great.
So long, wood monster,
I'm turning you into toothpicks
with my zowie zap gun.
Zap, zap, zap.
Give him that credit.
And acknowledge him for that.
Super-Arnold saves
New York again!