1. The mecca of dreams can also be the museum of nightmares
In Hollywood, everything is done big, including murder. Alienated, accidental, deliberate, or sadistic, all these tragedies have something in common: they shocked millions of people and took hours to start generating rumors, gossip, and conspiracy theories. Because "in Hollywood anything is possible" is not only a cliché, but has made the streets of the Happiest Place on Earth the scene of the most chilling human depravities. the protagonist of one of them, Sharon Tate. She poses with her husband, film director Roman Polanski, in 1969. She was murdered six months after this snapshot.
2. The dark incident of Matthew Broderick
The press went crazy. Matthew Broderick (New York, 1962) was not only the fashionable teen star thanks to 'Everything in a Day', but also the accident he caused during a vacation in Northern Ireland (he started driving in the right lane by mistake ) revealed his sentimental relationship with the co-pilot, Jennifer Gray (very famous at that time for starring in 'Dirty dancing').
The two occupants of the vehicle that Broderick collided with, mother and daughter, were killed instantly. The actor assured me that he did not remember anything he had done that day, not even getting out of bed. He was sentenced to pay a fine of 175 dollars (about 150 euros) to the astonishment and indignation of the family of the victims. The sister and daughter of the deceased have tried to stay with Broderick to forgive him in person, but he has rejected the proposal. What he did agree to was to star in a car ad for Honda in 2012 for which he was paid a fortune. Matthew Broderick and Jennifer Gray at the premiere of the play 'Burn This' at the Plymouth Theater in New York, in 1987.
3. The first Superman and the Mafia
The first Superman, George Reeves (Iowa, 1914-Los Angeles, 1959), inaugurated the esoteric theory that the character is cursed because all those related to him end up suffering abject misfortunes. Officially, Reeves committed suicide in his room while a party was taking place in the living room. The testimonies of the witnesses, all drunk, only added confusion to an alleged suicide full of inconsistencies: the angle of the bullet and the absence of traces on the weapon and of gunpowder on Reeves' hands contradicted the official hypothesis of suicide. Rumors suggested that Eddie Mannix, vice president of Metro-Goldwyn-Meyer, hired gangsters to kill Reeves. The actor had had an affair with Mannix's wife, Toni, but he broke off the relationship, and Eddie, who knew and consented to this infidelity, wanted revenge on Reeves for breaking his wife's heart. It is said that she confessed her guilt to a priest shortly before she died. George Reeves poses dressed as Superman for the television series 'The Adventures of Superman' (1953).
4. The great Mexican 'Latin lover', murdered for $20
The premature death of the first 'Latin lover', Rodolfo Valentino, from peritonitis, left a gap in the market that Hollywood filled with the Mexican Ramón Novarro (Mexico, 1899-Hollywood, 1968). He became one of the highest-paid stars of the 1920s, but he was also one of the first victims of the arrival of sound in cinema. In 1968, away from Hollywood and at the age of 69, Novarro was tortured by two brothers, ages 17 and 22, whom he had hired as hustlers. The killers believed that Novarro had a fortune in cash in his house and they beat him into confessing where he was. There was actually no money, and the criminals left him to drown in his own blood after making off with $20 in loot. Ramón Novarro in a scene from the movie China Bound.
5. The drama of the 'Playboy Girl' of 1980
Known as Galaxina, the title of the B-series science fiction film that she starred in before her death, Dorothy Stratten (Canada, 1960- Los Angeles, 1980) was 'Playboy Girl' from the year 1980. Also in 1980, at the age of 20, she was murdered, tied to a sit-up bench, and r@p-d (in exactly that order) by her ex-husband. He then committed suicide. The founder of 'Playboy', Hugh Hefner, was peppered with controversy because director Peter Bogdanovich (Stratten's partner when he died) claimed that the only reason she had married that violent guy was to flee the mansion. Playboy, where she was S- subjected. Bogdanovich, for her part, ended up marrying Dorothy Stratten's sister, Louise, when she turned 20 (he was already 49), the same age Dorothy died. Peter Bogdanovich and Louise Stratten were married for 13 years and divorced in 2001. Dorothy Stratten, next to Hugh Hefner in 1980. She holds the plate that distinguishes her as the 'Playboy girl' of that year.
