The tragic real life story of Drew Barrymore
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It almost seems like Drew Barrymore has lived two lives. First, the tragic child star, the wild girl from the '90s who was given a seat at the grown-up table too young, left alone to avoid the dangers of fame. Then secondly, the Barrymore in Hollywood today: she's the mother of two, the author, the kind of producer and director with enough indie credit to be able to simultaneously make a Best Coast music video and voice a character in Man. of family. It's easy to forget that the actress was born out of a long line of fame, partying, and addiction.
At just seven years old, reeling from the success of E.T. - Barrymore became a true movie star, honoring the 400-year legacy of her family tree in entertainment. Her mother, Ildiko Jaid Barrymore, was sometimes an actress-turned-mother, and her father, John Drew Barrymore, had more than two decades of acting credits under his belt. Her grandfather was perhaps the most famous of all, starring in the Paramount original Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. All of the above had a dubious past with substance abuse, according to People.
In more recent years, Drew Barrymore has done her best to break the cycle her parents struggled to escape and provide their children with the stability their childhood lacked, but it wasn't an easy road.
Drew Barrymore lied to become a movie star
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Drew Barrymore was so young when he started acting that he probably doesn't even remember it. According to his 2015 memoir, Wildflower, he was only 11 months old when he first appeared in a commercial, but the success was not instant. Like most Hollywood actors who spend years honing their craft before doing so, Barrymore didn't get her big break until about five years later, when she was cast in the role of Steven Spielberg. E.T. At the time, People reported that it was the most popular movie ever, but Barrymore's involvement only happened because she lied during her audition. Even at six, the star did whatever it took to land the role.
In Wildflower (via Vulture), Barrymore admitted that Goblin originally tried and made up stories during his audition to get the attention of the casting directors. This included stating that she was a chef and a drummer in a rock band. “They all sat around watching me and asking questions. I was a six-year-old girl, a liar and a thief, ”she wrote.
As we know, Spielberg didn't cast Barrymore in Duende, but according to Tonight's Entertainment, he loved her so much that he cast her in E.T.
Do you want some liquor with your ice cream?
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Drew Barrymore wasted no time going to the Hollywood party scene, alarmingly under his mother's guidance. In her first shocking memoir, 1990 Lost Girl, the actress revealed that she started "pouring liquor on her ice cream" (as paraphrased by E! News) when she was just seven years old and got drunk for the first time at Rob's birthday party. Lowe when he was only nine.
According to The Guardian, her mother first brought her to Studio 54 that same year, and the couple often went clubbing during Barrymore's childhood. “It was like Disneyland for adults, only I had to be part of it. We went out quite regularly, sometimes once a week, sometimes up to five times, ”he wrote in Lost Girl. But nothing was enough for me.
When Barrymore was 11, things escalated. In Wildflower, he revealed that he got drunk and listened to heavy metal in a hotel room in Munich while filming Babes in Toyland. When a rock band appeared, they followed a path of drunken debauchery "stealing dozens of garment bags full of clothes," according to Buitrey, throwing them into the river from hotel balconies. The moment was so egregious that Barrymore really began to feel guilty and reigned supreme for the rest of the shoot.
Drew Barrymore started using cocaine when he was 12 years old.
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At an age when most girls play with Barbie dolls or choose colors for their braces and haven't even had their first period, Drew Barrymore was getting high. People revealed that he had already been smoking cigarettes for about a year when he first picked weed at the age of 10 and a half. Conflict reports on the real origin of the drugs (People say it was from a group of young adults, while E! News claims it was given to them by the mother of a friend), but the main conclusion was that it was not enough.
"Finally [pot] got boring and my addicted mind said to me, 'Well, if smoking marijuana is nice, it will also be nice to get the heavier stuff like cocaine,'" Barrymore said. People back in 1989. “It was gradual. What I did was getting worse and worse, and I didn't care what anyone else thought.
At the age of 12, Barrymore was cultivating a cocaine habit. By the time he was 13, he had "undergone extensive drug rehab treatment" twice, according to People. Today, the actress does not touch things. On Netflix's Norma Macdonald Has a Show (via People), the Santa Clarita Diet star revealed that "nothing would make [her] have a panic attack and seem like a bigger nightmare" than cocaine.
Rehab still wasn't Drew Barrymore's breaking point
In a 1989 People cover story, things were looking up for Drew Barrymore, who had just dropped out of drug treatment. Unfortunately, the actress hadn't gotten to the bottom yet, but it didn't take long. By the time her 1990 cover story was published, she had broken her sobriety and the tabloids were full of rumors of a suicide attempt.
Things started to fall apart when Barrymore celebrated six months of sobriety by smoking a joint with his friend. The night ended in a car accident, where she hit her head against the window, but miraculously escaped unscathed. Guilt began to eat into the actress and her relationship with her mother deteriorated. She moved out, her depression worsened, and then her estranged father, whom she hadn't seen in eight years, called her begging for money. Finding out that her friends were mad at her was the final straw.
"I thought, 'My dad hates me, I'm fat, ugly, I don't have money, I live alone, nobody likes me, I can't take this,'" Barrymore said. "... I grabbed a knife and thought, 'Well, what shows the most pain?' So I went into the living room and cut." Drew's incident was widely reported as a suicide attempt, but she insisted that she "didn't want to die."
If you or someone you know is having suicidal thoughts, call the National Suicide Prevention Line at 1-800-273-TALK (8255) or text the Crisis Text Line START at 741741.
Drew Barrymore's 18-month stay in a mental institution
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Drew Barrymore's mother institutionalized her after the court incident. According to my! News, the then 13-year-old actress spent 18 months at the facility, a long stay that was much needed, much as she would have resisted going if she had had the chance. Said Barrymore The Guardian that her mother didn't even tell her she was being compromised or that she "would have run away." But her mother wasn't wrong, according to Barrymore, because she was ultimately the one that helped the Never Been Kissed star changes her life forever.
"I realized, honestly, yes, my mother locked me up in an institution," he said. The Guardian. Boo hoo! But he gave incredible discipline. It was like some serious recruiting training and boot camp, and it was horrible and dark and long-lived, a year and a half, but I needed it. She needed all that madness. discipline." Barrymore added: “My life was not normal. He was not a kid in school with normal circumstances. There was something very abnormal and needed a serious change.
During his stay, Barrymore formed lifelong bonds. As of 2015, the actress claimed that she still maintained a friendship with one of the other girls, whom she described. The Guardian as "wacky but cool."
Drew Barrymore divorced his mother
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Drew Barrymore always had a complicated relationship with his mother. She even admitted on Wildflower (via The Guardian) that her mother lost "credibility" as a mother for taking her to Studio 54 instead of going to school. By the time she was 14, with her institution behind her, the young actress really wanted to change her life, but that meant she had to change her relationship with her mother. In their words, the couple had "conducted [their] relationship with the ground," for which they applied for emancipation.
“On the day of my hearing, my mother was there in full support of my emancipation, which would mean that I would live alone,” wrote Barrymore in his memoirs (via The Guardian) “I felt very sad, but too much had happened. The judge came in and the day passed by in a blur.
In an interview on Netflix Norma Macdonald Has a Show (via People), the actress revealed that becoming an adult at the age of 14 erased everything that happened before. "I finished my shit with, like, 14," Barrymore said. “Like a midlife crisis, institutionalized, blacklisted, with no family. I did it. And then I got into the cycle of being my own father. At the time Wildflower was published, Vulture reported that Barrymore had barely spoken to his mother since her emancipation, but was still supporting her financially.
At 14, Drew Barrymore felt washed out
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Drew Barrymore has managed a monumental career, both front and center in multi-million dollar blockbusters and behind the scenes. This has included producing and starring in her own Netflix series, Dieta Santa Clarita, as well as executive producing the 2019 Charlie's Angels reboot (you know, the one with that song by Lana Del Ray, Miley Cyrus, and Ariana Grande). She managed to subvert the washed-out cliche of other child actors, but it wasn't easy.
At 14, Barrymore was feeling completely past his prime and struggled to book a new job. In an interview with The Guardian, she revealed that she was so bad that the casting directors would laugh at her just for showing up to audition. "Having such a great career at such a young age, then nothing for years, people going, you're a jobless mess, it's a tough journey by the time you're 14," he said.
During this time, Barrymore tried to keep up with a normal job. In her memory wildflower (via The Guardian), the actress revealed that it was difficult to do without a driver's license and little experience beyond acting and partying. She dropped out of school and ended up working at a local café, but admitted she wasn't that good at her job, and her boss eventually told her to "go out there and meet." As we know, serving latte was not exactly the call of Barrymore. She has been constantly working in Hollywood ever since.
Flashing David Letterman was a turning point
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Drew Barrymore is now in leagues beyond her wild child image: She is a mother of two, certainly horrified at the thought of using cocaine as she did in the past (she told Norm Macdonald she still drinks, though). This was not an easy image to shake, and it took a single televised moment of clarity for it to happen. The actress wrote in her memoir Wildflower (via Marie Claire) that her 1995 appearance on David Letterman, in which she featured the talk show host, was her turning point. What seemed like a "funny thing to laugh at" didn't seem so funny when I watched the tape.
"As I watched myself and my friends laugh from an objective perspective, I realized right then that this was the end of an era for me," wrote Barrymore. "And so I began my journey towards sexless scenes in movies, modesty clauses in my contracts, and a total lack of nudity in any public forum from now on."
With the Poison Ivy days long behind her, Barrymore is now known for her healthier roles, like when she played a shy journalist in the 1999s. She has never been kissed or Adam Sandler's love interest in 50 first dates.
Drew Barrymore's first marriage lasted 19 days.
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Drew Barrymore is in a club that is even more exclusive than Studio 54. In 1994, she joined the ranks of celebrities with marriages that lasted less than a month, although Britney Spears is still winning with her 55-hour marriage. According to Radar Online, Barrymore's First Blessed Union lasted only 19 days (although other reports expose it a bit longer, but not much). So who was the lucky one?
The Stars report that Barrymore married British bar owner Jeremy Thomas after just six weeks of dating. They met at her bar in Los Angeles, where she was a patron. At the time, she was 19 and he was 31. Radar online, this brilliant idea came up at 4 a.m. while the two were partying with some friends. Thomas somehow found a 24-hour minister who helped them get married at 5:30 a.m. Barrymore wore combat boots and a pit bull was reportedly the maid of honor.
Clearly, this holy union had all the marks of a marriage destined to last. Thomas told Radar online that he married the star "because she was cute." Barrymore told the Star that she knew instantly that it was a bad idea. "I realized my mistake the day I married him," she said. To be fair, she's not the only celebrity to get married after partying all night. According to some reports, Carmen Electra and Dennis Rodman took the same path, probably with a hangover. The '90s were wild.
Her stormy romance with Tom Green was full of hard times
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Tom Green is a marvel of the past - the comedian roared into the new millennium by putting his butt on things and playing a makeshift sausage organ. It's also easy to forget that Drew Barrymore was in Freddy's Touched, a movie that deserves a place in the Library of Congress so future generations can look back and think about what we've done. Oh yeah, he married his star too, and their marriage was surprisingly fun.
The couple met on the set of the 2000 Charlie's Angels and tied the knot in July 2001. Hora reports their brief marriage - which also included a fake wedding and a breakup on Saturday Night Live - it lasted just 163 days. However, their relationship was full of difficult times. According to the Los Angeles Times, a two-story fire devastated his home, causing around $ 700,000 in damage. Entertainment Tonight reports that their dog woke them up by banging on their bedroom door, which could have saved their lives. According to my! News, they also resisted it in Green's battle with testicular cancer.
By the end of 2001, the marriage had ended. For me! News, They strangely divide intellectual property rights in their divorce. Barrymore kept 46 titles, including Never Been Kissed. Green came up with 52 potential movie ideas, including P. Diddy’s Party, which would clearly deserve an Oscar if the rapper ever let it pass.
Drew Barrymore's battle with postpartum depression
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Drew Barrymore's adult life has been remarkably tame compared to his past. In 2012, the actress married art consultant Will Kopelman, and according to People, she really went out of her way to raise her children in an "ultra-traditional" way, as opposed to her own upbringing. Four months after her wedding, Reuters reported that the actress gave birth to her first daughter, Olive. Her second baby, Frankie, arrived in 2014, along with a wave of postpartum depression.
In an interview with People (via Health), Barrymore revealed that she suffered from postpartum depression for about six months after Frankie's birth. "I didn't have postpartum the first time, so I didn't understand it because I thought 'I feel great,'" she said. The second time, I thought, 'Oh my, I see what people are talking about now. I get it'. It's a different kind of overwhelming with the second. I really got under the cloud.
Ultimately, Barrymore's depression helped him appreciate the time he spent with his daughters, especially when he returned to work. In 2014, the same year that he had Frankie, two films he executive produced - Happy Camp and Animal - released, along with his Adam Sandler comedy, Mixed.
Drew Barrymore's third divorce put her in a 'dark' place
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Drew Barrymore's marriage to Will Kopelman really seemed like the one that would make it through. According to People, they were married for nearly four years, much longer than any of Barrymore's previous unions, before splitting in 2016. Although the couple had two beautiful children to show for in their relationship, Barrymore couldn't help but feel like "The biggest failure." The newly single actress admitted so much to Chelsea Handler on the comedian's eponymous Netflix talk show (via Entertainment Tonight)
In an interview with Hoy, the Mixed actress revealed that she sank into a "very dark and fearful place" during her divorce. Santa Clarita Diet, a brilliantly underrated dark comedy, was the project that grew out of it, but it almost didn't happen. I was not looking for work. In fact, I had stopped acting for several years because I wanted to raise my children, but then a change happened in my life and I was separating from their father and it was a very difficult time. Barrymore explained. "... And then this script came out, and I thought, 'Yeah, I don't think it's a good time.'
Barrymore took the project anyway, which thankfully ended up pulling her out of that hole.
