Earlier in the summer, tabloids had plenty of stories about how Erin Moran, the actress who played Joanie on Happy Days and Joanie Loves Chachi had been forced to move to Indiana after she and her husband lost their California home to foreclosure. The move to Indiana was to a trailer that Erin's mother-in-law owned. Since her shows went off the air, Erin has had problems with substance abuse and has not really worked any kind of job. Now, her mother-in-law has kicked Erin out of the trailer and Erin has been forced to try and find places to stay, but has no place to live. She is essentially homeless, has no job, and very little money. That is a big fall from the top. To have your very own primetime television show and turn into this is really sad.
I always wonder in cases like this, if they reach out to their more successful costars and if those costars help or not. Not judging, just curious. Does she call Ron Howard, Henry Winkler? Would they help? Would she even ask?
ReplyDeleteThis is sad. I have an extra room you can crash in, Erin.
ReplyDelete@donner, I was just wondering if Ron Howard could put her in an episode of Arrested Development. Problem solved! For a hot minute anyway.
ReplyDeleteOther reports are saying she is blowing the settlement money she got from CBS for Happy Days DVD sales on drugs, and moving from hotel to hotel.
ReplyDeleteShe really is a textbook example of a young girl getting chewed up sexually abused and spit out by Hollywood.
Amanda & Lindsay, meet your future when your cute good looks fade away.
Where in Indiana? Indianapolis? Should I be on the lookout?
ReplyDeleteHmmmm...BI.
ReplyDeleteErin is going to write a tell all about Happy Days and out Mr. C.
The main reason that most people stop taking stimulant drugs (coke and meth and other uppers) is because they run out of money. Rarely does anyone with available cash every stop, because you can't bottom out as long as you can still buy more drugs. Hence the destruction that a lot of minor celebs have, as they can afford ten or twenty years of drug taking. This is sad, but it's that drug lifestyle, sadly. I'm hoping the homelessness lights a fire under her and makes her realize that she has to clean up.
ReplyDeleteWhat's odd though is that she LOOKS pretty damn good, y'know? She looks fit--slim and muscular, not too thin, not fat, like someone who eats well and works out.
ReplyDeleteShe *must* be mentally ill. Very sad. From everything I've heard about Henry Winkler, he's a sweetheart and would help if asked. Don't know about Ron Howard...?
Howard and Winkler are big bleeding hearts. Couldn't they cough up a few bucks to help an old co worker?
ReplyDeletePerhaps they've already offered to help, and she's turned it down--I do get the impression that she's burned all her Happy Days bridges quite thoroughly, and even if they've tried to help, she may have rejected them due to their association w/what she feels ruined her life. It's terribly sad no matter what.
ReplyDeleteShe trashed everyone on Happy Days years ago. I can't see them reaching out to her. I wouldn't. There are other more deserving folks who need help.
ReplyDeleteWow. Very sad, I'm with the others in hoping maybe a former colleague can help (if nothing else at this point, some rehab for a start). She was so gorgeous when she was young - every girl wanted to be her.
ReplyDeleteOr they may have helped out in the past and just don't want to throw more money at a problem they can't solve.
ReplyDeleteI guess this IS the answer to the BV. Tom Bosley. Erin Moran must be talking about writing a tell all...for the money.
ReplyDeleteMaybe being homeless will be her rock bottom..hoping she can get the help she needs.
ReplyDeleteFiggy, you do not want to see a close-up of her.
ReplyDeleteI don't mean to kick someone when they're down, but I always thought she was annoying.
This is sad but if she's not ready to change her life then I don't see the benefit of her old colleagues helping. Hope she can finally turn it around for good.
ReplyDeletei too feel sorry for her as the abused child star. I wish her well. If anyone gives her money, she will spend it perpertuating the lifestyle she has now- drugs, moving from motel to motel. I guess letting her know you will help her get into rehab when she is ready is best thing to do for her now. I wld have thought getting thrown out of a trailer park wld be a wakeup, but for her, not yet. best wishes sweetheart!
ReplyDelete@timebob - I was wondering myself if she was abused also. As for her former costars helping her out, you can't fix a drug addict's problems with money. If she is using, she has to get clean first.
ReplyDeleteThis is really sad. Like others have mentioned, I wonder if she's just burned her "Happy Days" bridges, because Winkler sounds like a good guy by all accounts -- helped Marlee Matlin and let her live with his family when she first started out, among other stories -- and I figure Ron Howard is similar. I may be wrong, but that's the impression I get.
ReplyDeleteI don't mean to state the obvious, but why can't the has-beens just get -- GASP! -- regular jobs? You know, like my stupid desk job that I slog through as it kills my soul and I finish up grad school and such? Do they think that they're just too good to be regular folks, or they're so far removed from reality that they can't figure that out? Sure, it's a fall from hanging out at Emmy parties, I would imagine, but it's better than having no job and being homeless, right?
She's been spotted at the HI Express in Corydon, IN.
ReplyDelete... and yet the despicable Scott Baio thrives. There is no god.
ReplyDeleteAKM, I think that on a regular basis too. Whenever I see a contestant on Top Model burst into tears and say, "This is my last, my only shot at ever, ever having anything at all in my life, ever, and if I fail here, boo hoo hoo, I'll never be able to ever live again because this is it, huh hwaaaa!" for instance. I'm always like, "You could just get a job and try to hook up with someone who can help pay the bills, too."
ReplyDeletethere has to be some reality show somewhere who will take her.
ReplyDeleteErin Moran was one of the younger children sexually abused as a child on set with that tutor who just passed away recently. She also was treated so poorly on set as a child, because she was the youngest. Everyone was so mean to her...especially the woman who played her mother on the show. She said when she and Scott Baio got together, it was the happiest she ever was...and then he ditched her, the show was canceled, and she took it to heart and never was the same again.
ReplyDeletei love how people who give a shit about other people are branded 'bleeding hearts.'
ReplyDeleteYeah I noticed that too, always people with the name calling...
DeleteSo sad, I adored her when I was a little girl.
ReplyDeleteOkay, what did I miss about a BI?
ReplyDeleteReally, Crila? I guess you never think about what goes on behind the scenes. Erin was sexually abused? and Mrs. C was mean to her? Very sad.
ReplyDeleteIIRC about a decade ago she made allegations of sexual harassment against Henry Winkler?
ReplyDeleteWas she falsely accusing him?
what about her husband, doesn't he work?
ReplyDeleteI think Ron Howard should help but with stipulations. That she enter a real treatment facility and attend therapy regularly. Even though it rarely works unless the addict decides to stop hurting themselves. It is worth a try. Whether he likes her or not, when you have the resourced to help someone several million times over it seems almost wrong not to. Maybe he did offer....
ReplyDeleteWhy put someone else's personal problems on Ron Howard? He may be rich but perhaps he has his own ideas of worthy causes. Just because you were coworkers doesn't give you responsibilities. The responsibility lies with Erin Moran. You can't help someone who doesn't want it. Let a man (rich or not) make his own choices. He could very well be putting millions to other worthy causes that make a difference.
Deletethis makes me very sad--that show is such a part of my childhood.
ReplyDeleteI hope someone in her life reaches out and helps get her on her feet.
@Laura. Yes. Erin always said that Marion was so mean and cold to her...and the rest of the cast basically ignored her because she was young.
ReplyDeleteAlso...around the time Himmmm was posting is when the BV came around about it being Erin who was one of the first child actresses sexually abused by that tutor.
Shark, I think the husband collects disability.
ReplyDeleteWait, I want to hear some more about the lady that played her mother....I thought she was supposed to be really nice?
ReplyDeleteWe have to remember that not everything that Erin Moran might say is necessarily the truth. I'm not talking about the sexual abuse per se, but more so the treatment she claims she received from Marion Ross, which is a claim that I'm hearing here for the first time. It's entirely possible that Ms. Ross was just professional and did not wish to be overly maternal or close to her. That's not mean or cold, exactly. I would think that some people who work with children in Hollywood just view them as fellow coworkers and don't necessarily become close to them. It doesn't make Ms. Ross a monster or anything.
ReplyDeleteAlso, IIRC, she DID accuse several (I believe) cast members of being inappropriate with her. II also RC, she later recanted. So anything I personally would hear from her, I would take with a grain of salt.
We have no real way of knowing what is going on but often in cases like these they often have burned their bridges in a big way by lies, narcissitic behavior, stealing, etc. People will often help if the person is interested in helping themselves but once drugs are involved you don't know what you are dealing with. I worked for a drug and alcohol rehab. You see the stories observe the patterns and often you have to let the person hit rock bottom in order for them to seriously consider getting help. Seems cruel, but you don't know till you've been there and watched someone destroy their life this way. Sometimes leaving them to their own devices helps them arrive to that conclusion much sooner. Sometimes there is a risk and they don't get the help and eventually die. Enabling never helps. I'll probably get hated on for this but I don't blame them for not wanting to get tangled up in this. There is probably a very good backstory as to why.
ReplyDeleteI remember years ago Erin was on Howard Stern and she blurted out she was sexually molested as a child. Back then there were no safe guard for child actors. Not that they are much better now, but people are more clued in about it. She was free game to predators. She also made it seem family members sexually abused her.
ReplyDeleteJust a sad story.
She
As sad as this is, the only help anyone should offer up at this point is a paid stint in rehab.
ReplyDeleteI don't understand why it's the responsibility of her former co-stars to help her financially. That would be like me losing my job (which I have) and expecting someone I worked with 20 years ago to help with my mortgage just because they are more successful than I am. I feel for Erin but she's an adult now. We all have our crap to deal with, be it financial, physical or emotional.
ReplyDeleteI though I remembered from back when the lawsuit was going on and Erin Moran was telling everyone who would listen how broke she was... someone interviewed Scott Baio and asked him what he thought of the lawsuit, etc., and if he'd be willing to help a broke Erin Moran out. His response was that he HAD helped her out several times in the past, not publicly, but that he was done now and she had to learn to handle her own shit, basically. It's possible I'm totally making that up but if it's true then it's possible Winkler and Howard did the same but with the same result.
ReplyDelete@sbalb - I remember that quote too and was going to mention it. She's used up all the goodwill...now it's her turn to help herself.
ReplyDeleteTrue...Erin was crazy, so maybe she was just talking BS. This accusation was from years and years ago when they were having their first reunion and she refused to be on it. I just always remembered Erin saying it about Marion, because I always thought Marion was the perfect mother and I remembered being disappointed.
ReplyDeleteIF she has a drug problem, IF she was molested as a child, IF, IF, IF....we don't know IF any of this is true, or even it is, to what degree. It's sad, no doubt, but there are too many things we know nothing about to try to armchair solve her problems. She's homeless, like many thousands of others in this country. She was an actress, and good at her job. So were thousands of others in this country. Sorry for the attitude, but I don't see a real 'story' here.
ReplyDeleteGreat point, Silly Girl. She could very well be working her program and staying clean and sober for all we know. Being homeless now and being an addict then are not necessarily the current simultaneous condition. Everyone here just kind of assumed it...
ReplyDeleteShe was abused and she needs someone to help her.
ReplyDeleteI think her drug of choice is crack. My mom has some friends who know her. They said at one of the local bars it doesn't take much to get her to flash you. A d she created quite a spectacle at a car race. She needs rehab.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure that Mittens wants people like her to get help. jk.
ReplyDeleteI guess there were no residuals when Happy Days was syndicated?
I hate to break it to you, but alot of stars end up broke.
ReplyDeleteIt's because stupid people with lots of money are still stupid.
Sorry to say this but the cast of Happy Days owes her nothing. That is like me going back to my old high school employer and expecting them to help me out when I needed money.
ReplyDeleteIt's unfortunate that this is how her life has turned out. I hope she gets help soon. I saw her on that Scott Baio show and she looked terrific. I hope that maybe she can clean up and get acting jobs. She can also start a business providing coaching to local actors/actresses or have a seminar talking abut the ins and outs of working in Hollywood. People would pay big bucks to hear that.
I know some famous actors have done just that and are quite successful.
MrWolf, I think you nailed this one:)
ReplyDeleteI feel bad for her and hope she is able to get back on her feet. Many child stars are messed up. The get fame and lots of money handed to them at a young age. They are tutored, but do not get even close to a good education that way. And then there's the alleged sexual abuse which can mentally cripple a person. Given all of that, I imagine it would be hard to function in the real world after growing up in that f*cked up fantasyland. We've seen the odds, and they're not all that good.
ReplyDeleteScott Baio helped her out many times. She was even on his reality show a couple of times.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure this is an answer to a blind.
Amen Sunnyhorse!
ReplyDelete