Actor Charlie Sheen says he’s HIV-positive,
Sheen’s disclosure of HIV status may be more about beating back the blackmailers
Charlie Sheen woke up much earlier than usual to unburden himself on national TV.
On Tuesday, the troubled actor descended on Studio 1A at Rockefeller Center, home of NBC’s Today. As the network had blitzed in promos, the actor was about to reveal something “immensely personal and private.”
At 7:40 a.m., Sheen sat across from NBC’s Matt Lauer and confirmed the chatter boomeranging from the tabloid ether in recent days: “I am, in fact, HIV-positive.”
The interview was sliced into two segments for maximum exposure. As it played out, something became obvious: this was not so much a PSA as it was an attempt for Sheen to shut down the jackals and vultures who have already pocketed about $10 million in hush money after threatening to reveal his condition.
“For some reason, I trusted them,” Sheen told Lauer, sounding lucid and downcast after he revealed the monetary sum he’s paid. “They were deep in my inner circle. I thought they could be helpful.”
Sheen discovered he was HIV-positive about four years ago, after suffering a series of symptoms that included cluster headaches and “sweating the bed.” His first thought: brain tumour. But a series of tests, including spinal taps, revealed the virus.
The diagnosis triggered “personal disbelief,” “confusion, shame, anger,” all of which led to a “temporary yet abysmal descent into profound substance abuse and fathomless drinking.”
This is the Sheen of recent memory, the grinning urchin who cavorted with a harem of mansion “goddesses” and appeared to be smashed at all hours of the day. It was a precipitous fall for a man who was once the highest-paid actor on television. Lauer framed it in the cultural shorthand of Sheen’s bizarre catchphrases from the time: “The whole ‘tiger blood’-‘winning’ period in your life.”
The period also overlapped with Sheen’s longstanding habit of hiring “unsavory and insipid types” for companionship.
He says he was honest with every woman who entered his bedroom. And that, he adds, is where the trouble started.
On one occasion, he said, an escort snapped a photo of his antiviral medication and threatened to sell the image if Sheen didn’t pay. So he did. And he kept paying, millions to multiple former companions.
“We are talking about shakedowns,” said Sheen, which prompted Lauer to ask the obvious: Why keep inviting these people into your life?
“Because I was so depressed by the condition I was in,” said Sheen. “I was doing a lot of drugs. I was drinking way too much. I was making a lot of bad decisions.”
So while his appearance on Tuesday was ostensibly to spread awareness for the disease, it was really an attempt to wiggle free from this extortion play, to grab control of his own future (and dwindling finances) by breaking the news and “releasing myself from this prison.”
It was also an attempt to get ahead of a major investigation by the National Enquirer, set to hit newsstands on Wednesday. And be proactive in what might become a barrage of lawsuits, if some of these “insipid” companions can prove Sheen engaged in sexual acts with- out divulging he was HIV-positive. He says that never happened. But as for the potential litigation: “I’m sure that’s next, sure, yeah.”
Indeed, by early afternoon on Tuesday, a number of his past sexual partners emerged in media reports to deny Sheen had ever told them he was HIV-positive. At least six of them, according to TMZ, have retained a lawyer and are threatening to sue, with “more on the way.” Perhaps sensing he’s now facing a costly battle, Variety reported Sheen was preparing to sell two of his three mansions.
During the second half of the interview, Dr. Robert Huizenga joined Sheen, whom he has been treating. Sheen takes four pills each day and this antiviral cocktail has suppressed the virus to the point where it is now “undetectable” in his blood.
“My biggest concern with Charlie as a patient is substance abuse and depression from the disease more than what the HIV virus can do in terms of shortening his life,” said Huizenga, who viewers may recognize as “Dr. H” from NBC’s The Biggest Loser.
Lauer concluded the interview by reading some of the real-time messages of support Sheen was receiving via social media. But there was also one viewer who wrote that Sheen’s lifestyle “left him open to this.”
“That’s not a completely insane or crazy statement,” said Sheen, looking down.
For now, lucid and unburdened, he intends to “ride this wave of support” even if he has no intention of becoming “the poster man” for the illness.
Sheen believes the illness is under control. But the fallout from what did or did not happen after he was diagnosed remains unclear. vmenon@thestar.ca
The Sheen of recent memory is the grinning urchin who cavorted with a harem of mansion “goddesses”