Wednesday, September 23, 2009

Media-shrewd actress-turned-bestselling author Suzanne Somers last week outraged many Americans—including the equally vocal Whoopi Goldberg, who just ripped her on The View—with her latest, publicity-magnetizing comment, which goes something like this: Chemotherapy poisoned the late Patrick Swayze. Last week's headlines took it a (logical) step further: "Suzanne Somers Claims Chemo Killed Patrick Swayze."

The always-outspoken Somers' remarks surfaced just days after Swayze died—and, ironically, less than a week after TV icon Farrah Fawcett's cancer documentary, Farrah's Story, was denied an Emmy amidst claims that Ryan O'Neal seized control of the NBC special and, in essence, muffled Farrah's voice in her final months. Retroality.TV recently broke news about Fawcett's hopes for the project—and revealed stunning details about her fight for life and O'Neal's alleged threats to killSwayze's death, more people would be willing to listen. On the other hand, would her comments spread like wildfire once the media focuses squarely on (God forbid) the next untimely (and, in the case of Michael Jackson and Billy Mayes, non-cancer-related) celebrity death?

In Somers' defense, she says she just wants to get potentially life-saving information to the public. As someone who's had the honor of interviewing a few famous cancer survivors—namely Fran Drescher, Jaclyn Smith and Olivia Newton-John—I appreciate the value of Somers' voice in the public arena. And as the guy who literally wrote the book on her rise to superstardom and public war of words with her Three's Company producers and, many years later in my book, her former co-stars, I also appreciate Suzanne's passion to