He’s ringmaster in the Circus of the Damned.
Dr. Drew Pinsky is the nation’s leading huckster for celebrity addicts — the go-to guy for almost-famous faces lost to liquor, sex, ecstasy and crack.
Since 2008, Dr. Drew has glammed up and tarted up B- and Z-list celebs on his hit VH1 show, “Celebrity Rehab” — renamed “Rehab” last fall so as not to exclude folks who’ve yet to make it big by falling on their faces. He’s turned addiction from an affliction to a wise career move.
From Tiger Woods’ Bimbo in Chief Rachel Uchitel — self-diagnosed as addicted to inappropriate men — to plastic-surgery enthusiast Janice Dickinson, no life is too trivial or sad to exploit.
Thanks to the good doc, feeling powerless in the face of drugs or, who knows, compulsive, naked tweeting, are not weaknesses. He’s done more to make addiction look hip and trendy since stoned rocker Jimi Hendrix choked to death on his own vomit in 1970 at age 27.
Eight days ago, Dr. Drew lost it. With the passing of country singer and “Rehab” alum Mindy McCready (pictured with him), who died of an apparently self-inflicted gunshot wound to the head, folks suspicious of the Rehab Industrial Complex are taking a dim look at Dr. Drew.
It’s about time.
“I think ‘Dr’ Drew Pinsky should change his name to Kevorkian. Same results,” singer Richard Marx tweeted the day McCready died Feb. 17, referring to the late Dr. Jack Kevorkian, who helped terminally ill patients off themselves.
Marx backed off the next morning. Sort of. “I went too far with the Kevorkian crack.” Then he continued to lay blame at Dr. Drew’s feet. “It is, however, my opinion that what Dr. D does is exploitation and his TV track record is not good.”
“Dr. Drew has lost another one,’’ was the reaction to McCready’s death from Eugene Kovar, grandfather of dead “Rehab” player Joey Kovar.
Five of Dr. Drew’s “Rehab” stars have, to date, succumbed to their demons, including actor Jeff Conaway and Rodney King. Three have died from the 2009 season alone — rocker Mike Starr of Alice in Chains was lost to a drug overdose in 2011, “Real World” star Kovar died in August from opiate intoxication, and McCready. Dr. Drew diagnosed her on the show as suffering from “love addiction.”
This is serious?
Dr. Drew is no killer. But he has reason to fail. He sits at the epicenter of the multibillion-dollar addiction industry, whose existence depends on the relapses of people he’s trying to cure.
“Whenever a celeb overdoses or has an addiction problem, buy Drew Pinsky stock. It’s good for his brand,” said Michael Levine, a Hollywood publicist and author who says he likes and respects the doctor.
“These shows glamorize and misrepresent the agony of addiction,” said Dr. Alan Hilfer, chief psychologist at Maimoinides Medical Center in Brooklyn. “There’s a level of narcissism here.”
Dr. Drew defended himself, calling into “The View” to blame McCready’s death on last month’s suicide of the father of one of her kids and loss of her children’s custody.
“I wish I could be more responsible for them,” he said of the mounting body count.
I reached out to Dr. Drew, and his publicist offered statements of support made on an Internet podcast by former cast members, including horror show Michael Lohan (dad of Lindsay) and washed-up Hollywood Madam Heidi Fleiss. But Dr. Drew himself is now in the witness-protection program.
Maybe we think of addiction all wrong.
Mark Scheeren, chairman and co-founder of upstate’s St. Jude Retreats, said ordinary treatment “doesn’t work.”
“Treatment makes victims of people whose choices we don’t agree with. They tell them they have a lifelong, powerless condition, and the only way you get well is by staying in treatment for life.”
He said his institution’s high success rate is due to counselors telling the truth. “People do crack and heroin because they enjoy it.”
Heresy? One thing can’t be denied.
Dr. Drew’s methods are doomed to failure.
Slick and tired of Chavez
I can’t turn on my TV without seeing former Massachusetts Rep. Joe Kennedy II, son of the late Robert F. Kennedy, in a commercial as tear-jerking as it is anti-American.
Joe introduces Dylan, a 5-year-old undergoing treatment for a brain tumor, his brother, wheelchair-bound mom, and dad, who works two jobs. And they can’t afford home heating oil. “It just breaks your heart,’’ he says.
Joe to the rescue! “The people of Venezuela and President Hugo Chavez” donated free CITGO oil to needy Americans through Joe’s Citizens Energy program. Chavez, the ailing, anti-capitalist, anti-Semitic despot, has long tried to buy our goodwill as his regime allegedly tortures political opponents. Keep your oil, Joe and Hugo.
This country takes care of its own.
Beer and whine with anchor Rob
Erstwhile TV anchorman Rob Morrison, charged with choking and threatening to kill his wife, Ashley, downed three pints of Bud Light in a Connecticut saloon last week with Post reporter Laurel Babcock. The strapping ex-Marine whined that his 115-pound spouse struck the first blow in the infamous Feb. 17 fight at their Darien home — hitting him in the face with a TV remote control.
The bizarre conversation came before Connecticut cops revealed that, last month, a drunken Morrison, 44, allegedly choked Ashley, 40, until she nearly passed out. (He was not arrested after Ashley told cops she, too, was drunk and “exaggerated” the allegation.)
Morrison denies throttling her.
He seemed most upset over quitting his job at WCBS/Channel 2 in disgrace.
“I just lost my job today,’’ Morrison whined at Buffalo Wild Wings in Stamford. “I could not go on the air again.’’
There is no excuse for these accusations, if true. None.
A ‘pink’ stink over CUNY Israel bashing
If you’re gay, Jewish or both, look out.
On the heels of an anti-Semitic forum at Brooklyn College, the City University system is holding another bashfest. Put on by the Center for Gay and Lesbian Studies at the CUNY Graduate Center, the April 10-11 conference advances a ludicrous theory.
It’s about “pinkwashing’’ — the notion that Israel supports gay rights just so that no one will notice that the country oppresses Arabs. Get it?
A taxpayer-funded institution has no business hosting such hate.
Alec being Alec. Again.
My inbox is flooded by folks demanding I slam my soulmate Alec Baldwin as he’s probed by hate-crimes cops for allegedly spewing racist slurs at Post photographer G.N. Miller. (Alec admits he told reporter Tara Palmeri, “I want you to choke to death.’’) The angry actor filed a harassment complaint against the journalists.
“What does Andrea Peyser think of the Bloviator?’’ a reader asked.
Not much.