Tuesday, January 15, 2008

"Rest in Peace" Doesn't Mean Much.


When an actor dies, I get a strange feeling in the pit of my stomach. Because while the person was a complete stranger, something he or she did while on this planet resonated with me. I aspired to a little piece of who they were. And while I get to keep waking and sleeping and dreaming big dreams, that person now only exists on DVD.

He was only 25. In my head, he was still the 12-year-old boy holding his own in The Client. Or the kid who made me cry in The Cure. He was the Huck to Jonathan Taylor Thomas’ Tom.

“Found dead.” Such a strange phrase. As if dead is a state of being. No, the headlines should read “Lost.” There’s something just so hopeless about it all. Just a whole lot of nothingness. Like when Jonathan Brandis killed himself a few years ago. These are guys with careers I wanted, with smiles I swooned over. But they were broken. And when you’re broken, none of that really matters anymore.

Sometimes I get a little delusional and wish for the “good ol’ days” that never existed, where death was for old people who lived long and full lives.

Brad Renfro. I wish I knew you. Maybe I would have lent you my hope until you found some of your own.

"Found dead." Gone.

2 comments:

michael lewis said...

I only remember him from Ghost World (IMDb, Wiki).

michael lewis said...

And I forgot Sleepers (IMDb, Wiki).

Wow. He did a movie with Brad Pitt, Kevin Bacon, Dustin Hoffman, and Robert De Niro.