Charlie Sheen’s gone off the reservation.
Lost his marbles. A few cards short of a deck. A screw loose. The engine’s running, but nobody’s behind the wheel. The lights are on, but nobody’s home.
Basically, the dude is whacked out crazy.
And we apparently can’t get enough of it.
My friends are texting me quotes. My mother can’t stop watching “The Today Show” for updates straight from Charlie’s mouth, delivered with passion by Charlie’s crazy eyes.
There are Facebook pages and Twitter accounts, growing in followers like some Cult of Crazy.
It got me thinking: why do we love a good, old-fashioned meltdown so much? What does it say about our society that we enjoy this kind of over-the-top moment when you watch someone’s downfall?
Charlie Sheen’s certainly not the first. Clearly, you worry for his kids, but at the same time, how can you not snicker (OK, laugh out loud) at some of his recent comments:
“I’m sorry, man, but I’ve got magic. I’ve got poetry in my fingertips. Most of the time — and this includes naps — I’m an F-18, bro. And I will destroy you in the air. I will deploy my ordinance to the ground.”
“Clearly I have defeated this earthworm with my words — imagine what I would have done with my fire-breathing fists.”
“They’re trying to destroy my family. I take great umbrage with that. Defeat is not an option. They picked a fight with a warlock.”
“I am grandiose. Because I live a grandiose life.”
I mean, really, how do you even respond to that without laughing?
If I were one of the sacrificial lambs donated by the networks to interview Sheen, I don’t know how I would even contain myself. Think of the fun to be had there.
Just for fun, my sample question would be, “Charlie, how evil are rainbows and why do you think they are a secret society hell bent on chasing water from our oceans?”
It’s like playing Mad Libs with him.
Charlie Sheen is________.
a) A total, bitchin’ rock star from Mars
b) Winning
c) Currently living at Sober Valley Lodge
d) On a quest to claim absolute victory on every front
e) All of the above
And yes, according to Charlie, he’s all of those things and so much, much more.
That said, our attention has been captivated by this? Seriously? It’s fun and all…but, seriously?
People are either scared for this man or laughing at him. Meanwhile, the federal government is barely avoiding shutdowns by approving temporary spending bills. Democrat House Representatives in Indiana have fled to Illinois to avoid doing their job and voting on the calendar items because they don’t have enough votes to stop the purposed legislation.
Why are we not more engaged in these things, you know, the stuff that actually impacts our lives?
Whatever party or political allegiances you have, something’s really wrong here. The posturing, the pleading…sort of reminds me of Charlie Sheen.
I suppose that brings it full circle. The more I watch this unfold, I can’t help but wonder: Is Sheen faking it?
He did pass tests last week for every drug known to exist. (Unless he’s created something undetectable, which warlocks could do, you know, with fire-breathing fists.)
But think about it: Sheen is an actor.
Was his show, “Two and a Half Men” (which I’ve never seen an episode of), grossly popular? Sure. But there’s a level of fame Sheen has never been able to achieve. It’s the one where everyone in the world is taking about you and only you for a brief period of time.
And most of the time it happens when you get the crazy eyes and spout off at the mouth a bunch of non-sense that makes people laugh, then say, “Wait, is he serious? No…he can’t be…he can’t actually think he’s a warlock – wait, this dude actually said he’s just winning?”
Tends to grab celeb-gossip headlines. Puts you in the cultural lexicon. Creates Sheen-isms.
Before this, Sheen was “Wild Thing” Vaughn, the guy who snorted coke, cheated on his wives and is Martin Sheen’s kid.
It’s easy to see why we fall for it. He’s been in trouble before, seemed like he partied too much and had a lot of drugs and women around him. Those are listed as ingredients on the recipe for crazy.
But you have to wonder the way it’s all playing out if Sheen’s not using his past as an advantage on us. He’s watched us eat up coverage of Lindsay Lohan and the whole reality TV craze, where we like to watch “real” people spew crazy on each other (the dirty secret, of course, is most of reality TV is just as scripted as a sit com).
So maybe Sheen’s scripted this.
It’s like he took all the fun, fabricated facts people have said about Chuck Norris and turned them into his own.
He’s drawing some major bank right now. He owns the network morning shows (don’t think he’d not getting paid for it), bringing in a massive ratings increaase for re-runs of “Two and a Half Men” and watching other channels show some of his old movies on a marathon.
He gets money for all that. Ratings and re-runs bring in the cash. And I suppose if there’s one thing we can tell Charlie’s telling the truth about, it’s that he loves money.
In that context, maybe Sheen’s right.
He is winning.
And we’re letting him because we’re feeding the crazy. We’re transfixed by this, hypnotized by some alter-Truman Show. The more we eat it up, the more crazy we get from him.
And there will be others.
Fame is a drug, too. Charlie Sheen’s certainly on that.
I can’t help but wonder if we’re all not high off the fumes.
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