I’m So Glad I Never Married Him Like I Wanted To When I Was 12

I can’t say I’m all that surprised, but I gasped when I saw someone post about Corey Haim’s death on Facebook this morning. I can’t help but think back to my bedroom walls circa 1988. They were wallpapered with pictures of the two Coreys and Johnny Depp during his 21 Jump Street days. It’s amazing how different their careers ended up being.

How did we not realize how fucked up he was back then? I remember when he was on the Arsenio Hall Show talking about buying crack on the street after an early rehab stint. He was still a mess. I remember looking back at a picture of him from some teeny bopper magazine like Bop or Tiger Beat where his eyes were completely bloodshot and glazed over. What a waste.

I also recall the tragedy to little girls everywhere when the Coreys announced they would be going their separate ways and not doing movies anymore. Corey Feldman was quoted as saying something along the lines of “We don’t want to be known as the Dean Martin and Frank Sinatra of our generation.” Um, that’s one goal they accomplished, I guess. This idea was short lived as they later did several more epic pictures like Dream A Little Dream 2. Most of these movies went straight to video.

A few years ago, E! did a True Hollywood Story that showed Corey Haim in such a dismal state. They showed a clip of him babbling incoherently about his first television commercial. It was disturbing how messed up he was. Later, a man on the street interview discussed how Corey Haim was panhandling for spare change to buy a slice of pizza. And we all know that pizza is the caviar of crack smokers everywhere.

The TV show that they partnered for on A&E was fairly disturbing to watch. The first season was very lighthearted. The second season was dark. Sometimes it was difficult to watch as it was clear just how unraveled these once shining stars had become. One episode showed Haim buying a wedding gift for Feldman, several years after he had been married. Another episode featured him taking out a full page trade paper ad apologizing to just about everyone in Hollywood. You could just tell he was never going to get better. Dr. Drew, why didn’t you drag him onto your hack show?

But the worst part of this tragedy is that I can’t get “Whenever There’s A Night You Need Love,” a song on the Dream A Little Dream Soundtrack by Mike Reno of Loverboy fame out of my head. Am I the only person who knows this song?