The Phil Spector murder trial seems to be slowly grinding to a halt, with witness after witness doing nothing more interesting than pointing out that Lana Clarkson was depressed in the days and weeks before she died.
That was exactly the case yesterday when Lana Clarkson's friend Punkin Laughlin took to the stand to basically repeat what every other one of Phil Spector's defence witnesses have said – that Lana Clarkson was so depressed that she drank and took drugs in the period after her death. However, just when you thought that listening to identical testimonies over and over again was getting a bit old, Laughlin managed to throw up a sliver of brand new evidence into the equation. Not only did Phil Spector not murder Lana Clarkson, she said, but it was Michael Bay who may have inadvertently made her depressed enough to kill herself. And since Lana Clarkson died in the same year that Bad Boys 2 was released, that totally adds up.
As has been the case for a couple of weeks now, the Phil Spector murder trial hinges of whether or not Lana Clarkson was depressed. And, judging by the defence testimonies so far, we'd assume that she probably was. Not only has a forensics expert called Lana Clarkson depressed but one of her old friends has also called Lana Clarkson depressed too. The question is, though, just how depressed was she?
Lana Clarkson may have been a bit depressed, but was she so depressed that she managed to kill herself before Phil Spector – a man who, it's claimed, once attempted to rape a girl at gunpoint and thought all women were 'fucking cunts' who deserved to be shot – could murder her first? Turns out that the answer could be yes, and it's all Michael Bay's fault. Allegedly. It's all allegedly Michael Bay's fault. Yesterday Punkin Laughlin took to the stand to testify for Phil Spector's defence and, as the LA Times reports, she singled out a meeting with Michael Bay as an example of how depressed Lana Clarkson was:
Punkin Laughlin, who called Clarkson her best friend, testified that Clarkson drank, used drugs and was depressed about her faltering acting career before her death…. Clarkson's frustration erupted at a party about a week before her death, Laughlin said. When film director Michael Bay, whom Clarkson had once worked with on a car commercial, did not recognize her, Clarkson broke down in tears, Laughlin said. Soon after, Laughlin recalled Clarkson telling her in a phone conversation, "I don't want to live anymore. I don't want to live in this town. I want to end it."
Now, although Phil Spector's defence has taken a hammering over the last few weeks – being unable to call Lana Clarkson a ghost-seeing nutter and getting involved in all kinds of fingernail tampering scandals – we're not sure that blaming Michael Bay for Lana Clarkson's suicide is really the way to go. After all, we actually paid money to go and see The Island when it was released and we didn't manage to blow the inside of our own face out afterwards. True, the horror of the film made us spend a week in a dark room listening to Radiohead songs and staring at a gun, but we didn't shoot ourselves and that's key.
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Wadey says
To be honest I’m getting a bit fed up with this now. To cut to the chase I assume it’s not an offence to shoot people in the head if they are depressed taking drugs and pissed. Has OJ Simpson been called yet?
Mithaearon says
I knew it was Michael Bay I just knew it. It was so obviously himl.
Loz Actual says
Your article says “witnesses have said – that Lana Clarkson was so depressed that she drank and took drugs in the period after her death. ”
..the period *after* her death?!
Well, if anything’s going to depress you, being dead has got to be near the top of the list. Good for her, drowning the pain of her recent death with drink and drugs. That’s dying as you lived for you :-)