People Features
Obituary: Anna Nicole Smith: strange life of controversy and tragedy
By Andy Goldberg Feb 9, 2007, 2:12 GMT
Model Anna Nicole Smith (R), accompanied by her lawyer Howard K. Stern, arrives for a hearing at the Supreme Court in Washington in this February 28, 2006 file photograph. Smith, 39, died after collapsing in her room at a hotel in Hollywood, Florida, ending a six-month period that was extremely weird even by her own high standards. REUTERS/Chris Kleponis/Files
Los Angeles - Anna Nicole Smith liked to compare herself to the Hollywood legend Marilyn Monroe, and maybe she was right. She was certainly blond and buxom and if the blanket coverage of her death Thursday by the cable news networks was any indication, she was also an icon of our strange, celebrity obsessed times.
Smith, 39, died after collapsing in her room at a hotel in Hollywood, Florida, ending a six-month period that was extremely weird even by her own high standards.
It was just last September that the news anchors were reporting that Smith had given birth to a baby girl in the Bahamas. Smith, whose career in recent years centred around a reality TV show highlighting her weight gains and losses, was reportedly overjoyed at the birth.
But the celebration turned to tragedy when her son Daniel, 20, flew in to visit her and mysteriously collapsed and died in her hotel room. Pathologists now believe that the cause of death was a lethal combination of antidepressants and over-the-counter drugs.
If that drama wasn't enough, a paternity battle quickly broke between her lawyer and companion Howard K Stern and her ex-boyfriend, entertainment photojournalist Larry Birkhead, who steadfastly maintained his contention that he was the baby's father and filed a lawsuit to challenge paternity.
Scandal of course was nothing new to Smith, who was born Vickie Lynn Hogan in Houston, Texas on November 28, 1967.
Her father and mother divorced before she was two years old and her childhood dream was to be the next Marilyn Monroe. She was married at age 17 to a 16-year-old cook at the small time diner where they both worked. She gave birth to a son in 1986 and after working at Wal-Mart and Red Lobster she took a job at a strip club to support herself and her young son.
It was while working at Gigi's strip club in Houston Texas that she met the octogenarian oil tycoon J Howard Marshall, who courted her for two years as she broke into exotic modelling and was named Playboy's Playmate of the year in 1993.
She then secured a lucrative contract to replace supermodel Claudia Schiffer as the star of a Guess? jeans ad campaign. She married Marshall in June 1994 when she was 26 and he was 89. Most people believed that she married him for his money. But though she reportedly never lived with him, Smith maintained she loved her husband and that age did not matter to her.
Marshall died in August 1995 after 14 months of marriage, sparking a bitter battle for his 1.6-billion-dollar fortune between Smith and his son E Pierce Marshall.
The complicated case reached as high as the US Supreme Court but remained unresolved at the time of her death.
Unable to access the cash left by her late husband, and after several critically panned movies, by 2002 she jumped on the reality TV show bandwagon with a show that highlighted her bizarre antics and battles with her weight. She also became a spokeswoman for diet regimen TrimSpa, which helped her lose 36 kilogrammes and regain her trim shape from the 1990s.
Whether any of all this should really have catapulted her to the status of a national celebrity is debatable, but it's clear that she certainly isn't a role model that most parents would want their children to follow.
David Granoff, Smith's former publicist, told MSNBC that he was 'sad, but not shocked' by Smith's death. He added that there was 'Just no spark in her any more.'
© 2007 dpa - Deutsche Presse-AgenturCOMMENT
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Older Talkback
page: 1
I agree with you Maggie - the two lawyers, her LA lawyer and Howard Stern are best friends and one or the other was destined to get control of her fortunes. They definitely could have plotted this out. Neither of them seemed too interested in getting her into treatment. They just watched her drink and pop pills and take methadone and antidepressants, possibly waiting for the inevitable. I wonder if Howard isn't hiding because he can't fake looking like he's devastated. And the LA lawyer is flying to be with Howard right now. Spooky.
it is very sad situation; there is a baby girl who will never know her mother or big brother. there should be a very intense investigation into anna nicole and her son's deaths.
Now that Anna's dead & Marshall's son is dead, I wonder who his billion dollar fortune will go to? There's nobody left to squabble over it now
end of this.
If you don't like it, don't read it. In a free society, you can't tell people to stop talking about something. Duh!
Without all the makeup and bizarre actions, she was a lovely girl. She just didn't have the best advice during her life, and so many people took advantage of her so-called lower intelligence. It is a sad situation - she was afterall, a human being!!!
Its about the child / Dannielynn Hope
Its not about Anna Nicole- its not about her body that lays so cold.
It’s about a little beautiful girl-and how she will be treated and raised in this world.
It about the little things that go so wrong- it’s about, if the world will keep this bashing and name calling going on to long.
Anna had to know what would happen-she knew it, still she used drugs over and over again.
No one knows what was going on in Anna’s head-just, as we don’t know who slept in her bed.
But there will be those who care-those who will talk and stare.
Those who wont care, if they’re words hurt this child-those who for years will help along her struggle, her trials.its about the childThose who will keep this name calling going year after year-those who will sit in they’re living rooms and enjoy a teenagers tears.
It won’t matter rich or poor-they’ll do anything to wench a thirst, act immature.
The world shouldn’t feed on her denial-we should come together and be about this child.
She didn’t ask to be born to this world-she is just a sweet innocent little girl.
A child born in confusion and sin-who needs the worlds help to create a thick skin.
Those who loved Anna Smile-have to come together and be about this Child.By: Patricia Robinson-2/08/07-5pm
Well, no loss to soceity that she is gone. At least the pea-brain news media will get off her news (and probably to some other bimbo dope head)
As insensitive as it sounds, I don't want to hear about this trashy gold-digger anymore. We make our own beds....and we lie in them.
Anna Nicole made Marilyn Monroe look like Meryl Streep.
I happened to love anna nicole, It broke my heart when her son died , and to see her in such pain! Do not Judge her , she was a beatiful woman, with a kind heart, who happened to suffer from a abusive childhod! I say to her mother ' how dare you be here now' Where were you when she needed you like when her died. You are a loser of a mom.
If she WAS SO DUMB....she made good business disions other wise she would ot have had made all that money! do not forget, she did not have her x money, when she died! RIP ANNA , with your love of your life son Danial.
I love you and am sorry you never found someone to love you!
Laurie walters
page: 1
Maggie RendeFeb 9th, 2007 - 03:37:08
I believe someone should really look into her death as well as her son's
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