The first letter in this exchange is real. The rest are only in my imagination.
Dear Christina,
Cancer is scary, and lonely. You can’t ask anyone to make decisions for you because it’s just too heavy.
There is a lot of “rush to treatment,” when what you really need is time to research and think about how you want to approach this. Take your time Christina, there is no rush. Take your time and think it through. Use you cancer to learn and grow and as a force to work for you. You might choose to take an alternative approach.
There are more options than the ones presented to you in the oncologist’s office. You will make it. The success and drive you have had in your career will be the same strengths you will use to win over this nasty disease. And I am here if you want to talk to someone who was “there.”
Sincerely,
Suzanne Somers
Dear Suzanne,
Thank you for your deeply personal and not at all exploitive letter, which you thoughtfully published in People Magazine. Some might see that as a cynical way to get attention by piggybacking on my misfortune, but maybe you just didn’t know how to reach me.
In any case, I’m relieved to hear that I’m in “no rush” to make decisions regarding my cancer treatment. Here I was, thinking that malignant tumors and a history of breast cancer in my family meant I should actually do something!
Then there was that stupid oncologist, who had the nerve to tell me that I tested positive for the BRCA1 gene mutation linked to breast and ovarian cancer. If he had told me to “use my cancer to learn and grow”, it would have been a different story, believe me.
I just wish you’d have written to me sooner with some of your scientifically sound alternatives. I could have rubbed crystals on my nipples and douched with rain forest water.
Anyway, no use crying over spilled milk (lol). I had a double mastectomy three weeks ago to spare myself years of fear and worry.
But thanks for the thought. There’s really nothing like a washed up, aging huckster with a face full of poison giving you medical advice in the pages of the tabloids.
Sincerely,
Christina Applegate
Dear Christina,
Your mood says a lot about the effects of traditional western medicine. I wish I could have been there for you before you made this decision, so I could have shared my experiences. Publicly. Again.
If Miley Cyrus hadn’t gotten into that fight with Selena Gomez, People would have published my letter a month ago! Then I could have sent brochures about Mistletoe extract, and articles filled with anecdotal evidence about juicing and Qigong.
It’s too late now. But I still want to send you a copy of my new book, “Chem-NO-Therapy: How to Somersize Away Your Cancer” (autographed, of course). I think the chapter on wrapping your Bluetooth headset in seaweed might be a real eye-opener.
Sincerely,
Suzanne Somers
Dear Suzanne,
I think I’m going to pass on the book, because the chemo is already making me slightly queasy. But I’m sure if you have something valuable to say to me, you’ll have it published.
Hey, did you ever see Bullitt? It’s a great movie. I watched it when I was recuperating from surgery.
Do you realize that if Steve McQueen hadn’t gone to Mexico to treat his cancer with coffee enemas and peach pits, he would have been 68 today? That’s almost as old as you!
Christina Applegate
Dear Christina,
We all have to make our own decisions, no matter how horribly misguided they may be.
So if you want to shoot yourself up with anthracycline-based cellular poisons, you just go right ahead. I’ll be selling my wig collection on QVC next month. Use my name and get 10% off.
By the way, I still have my breasts.
Sincerely,
Suzanne Somers
Dear Suzanne,
I still have my career.
Sincerely,
Christina Applegate
75 responses so far ↓
1 IsraeliSchmali // Aug 20, 2008 at 11:20 am
Wow, that’s all I can say. I wish they still had Celebrity Boxing…I’d love to see Somers getting her ass beat.
http://i34.tinypic.com/2s7sufs.gif
2 ira_shlamazel // Aug 20, 2008 at 11:34 am
Suzanne Who?
3 JohnnyBoy // Aug 20, 2008 at 12:11 pm
She should at least get a second opinion from Joyce DeWitt
4 Speedy Cerviche // Aug 20, 2008 at 12:36 pm
At least Tom Cruise didn’t crawl out of his compound to inform us that cancer can be cured with vitamin pills and vegetable oil.
5 theFatTubist // Aug 20, 2008 at 12:51 pm
Well, it can.
If by cancer you mean “totally healthy”.
6 Mavis // Aug 20, 2008 at 12:57 pm
Speedy , shhhhh, don’t give Tom any ideas, he might come out with a Sci-Fiology backed vitamin cure all.
7 Catman51 // Aug 20, 2008 at 1:58 pm
April,
The stuff in your mind is awesome!
Glad Christina’s recovering.
8 pal Jacky // Aug 20, 2008 at 2:56 pm
suzanne summers has a career. She was just in John Water’s ’serial mom’. Wasn’t that a great satire of the O.J. Simpson media celebrity beserk trial with with Judge ito pulling in James woods and other stars into chambers to meet them?What? it came three months before the ron and nicole murders. John Waters was a visionary once, wasn’t he?
9 clevelandphil // Aug 20, 2008 at 3:40 pm
Serial Mom came out a few months before OJ went OJ on his wife and Ron Goldman.
10 nylasor // Aug 20, 2008 at 3:53 pm
Is that a Yorkshire Terrier?
http://www.todoslosperros.com/yorkshire.htm
11 bnaivar // Aug 20, 2008 at 3:58 pm
From “cats” to a cat fight. Things are looking up.
12 Speedy Cerviche // Aug 20, 2008 at 4:05 pm
A
C
A
T
F
I
G
H
T
I
S
F
I
N
E
T
O
O
13 pal Jacky // Aug 20, 2008 at 5:14 pm
Mindy Cohn (sp?), natalie from the ‘facts of life’(an april guest once upon a time) said on the chelsea handler show that she wouldn’t do any surreal life or shit like that because she thought of herself as an actress first and ‘mindy cohn’ second. When one looks at the celebs who have been themselves on TV it really is a trashy defining line. But to play yourself in a John Waters film, that is just a scarey sort of illness. Hadn’t suzanne summers done any research on John waters? Even Melonie Griffith could con her way into ‘it was only satire’ in “cecil b. demented’.
14 phoebefigalilly // Aug 20, 2008 at 5:57 pm
I wonder what Jasmine Guy or Tina Yothers thought about all this?
15 ira_shlamazel // Aug 20, 2008 at 6:15 pm
They couldn’t give two tits – I mean shits – about it.
Bye now! Off to hell I go!
16 JohnnyBoy // Aug 20, 2008 at 6:24 pm
Speaking of John Waters, doesn’t Suzanne Somers look simply Divine?
17 renedrivers // Aug 20, 2008 at 7:10 pm
I don’t understand why celebrities think it’s ok they offer medical advise to other celebrities. Furthermore why would anyone want to take to Suzanne Summers about anything?
18 ira_shlamazel // Aug 20, 2008 at 7:32 pm
Thighmaster = Tighter twats
And don’t forget brittle-boned Sally Fields pushing her Boniva.
Mae West spent 3 hours a day massaging cold cream into her tits, and at 87 they were as pert and youthful as a 30 yeal-old’s! (I have a friend who verifies this)
Now that’s medical advice from a celebrity we can all use!
19 Speedy Cerviche // Aug 20, 2008 at 8:08 pm
Well ira, maybe that’s why Timothy Dalton liked her so much.
To imagine, all through that cover of “Love Will Keep Us Together”, he was just staring at those perky cold-creamed Maeboobs.
20 gary // Aug 20, 2008 at 9:21 pm
It took me a while to realize that that drag queen was Suzanne Sommers .
She/he could have been on tonight’s Project Runway.
21 Bitsey // Aug 20, 2008 at 10:17 pm
Which one of these hos was the one who went around telling everybody that the #1 health goal in life was to make sure their poop floats? Was that Suzanne, too? stfd, Chrissie. Don’t you have a Malibu mansion to rebuild or something?
22 Kandi // Aug 20, 2008 at 10:48 pm
This isn’t funny. Cancer is very serious and the Thigh Master helped me loose 60 lbs. I’m finally down to 254. How dare you make fun of cancer.
23 TalkinHorse // Aug 21, 2008 at 1:37 am
Yeah, don’t listen to the oncologists, or to the people who say I’m half-crazy. I’ve got a cure that involves tea and oranges that come all the way from China. And then I’m gonna touch your perfect body with my….uh, never mind.
24 bnaivar // Aug 21, 2008 at 5:14 am
So what I’m getting here is that we need a “TitMaster”?
25 JohnnyBoy // Aug 21, 2008 at 6:12 am
If we make fun of cancer, then maybe it’ll get really embarrased and go away.
26 Speedy Cerviche // Aug 21, 2008 at 7:47 am
Gangsta Lean, n;
A common inner-city driving position in which the driver holds the wheel with his left hand while leaning to his right toward the passenger seat, usually bobbing his head or bumpin’ with the beat. This move works best in a Chevy Caprice or any pimp-style car with a 3-person front seat.
“…with a hellafied gangsta lean, gettin’ funky on da mike like an ol’ bunch of collard greens…” -Snoop Dogg
“Diamond in the back, sunroof top, diggin’ the scene with a gangsta lean…” – William DeVaughn
27 eBayEnigma // Aug 21, 2008 at 8:35 am
This website is truly brilliant. The posts start out with comments about Ms. Somers and appropriately evolves into a post about “Gangsta Lean” and a Chevy Caprice pimp-style car. It doesn’t get any better than that!=)
28 Stretch99 // Aug 21, 2008 at 9:13 am
Mae West’s secret was daily enemas – long before Matt and Ben went to Colon cleaning camp together.
I like my enemas with 25% Red Bull (sugar free of course) the carbonation and caffine adds that extra spring in your step
29 ira_shlamazel // Aug 21, 2008 at 10:19 am
TalkinHorse: “tea and oranges that come all the way from China”
Sounds like a flying lizards song…
Red Bull enema?? Sounds sticky. The enema for my enemies, not me.
30 eBayEnigma // Aug 21, 2008 at 10:33 am
If memory serves me correctly the phrase “tea and oranges that come all the way from China” is a line from a Leonard Cohen song…but I could be wrong. =)
31 ira_shlamazel // Aug 21, 2008 at 11:02 am
You are right! The song is ‘Suzanne’ and was covered by the Flying Lizards on the album Top Ten.
What silly things I listen to. I used that album to piss off my redneck neighbors. That and Nina Hagen’s Nunsexmonkrock.
32 JohnnyBoy // Aug 21, 2008 at 12:58 pm
The Flying Lizards do my favorite cover of “Money(That’s what I want)
33 ira_shlamazel // Aug 21, 2008 at 1:31 pm
And my favorite cover of “Summertime Blues”.
34 jandu // Aug 21, 2008 at 2:51 pm
tits…..they’re bags of flesh with a button at the tip. What’s the big deal? Now penis cancer…….there’s a topic
35 EverybodysLittlePony // Aug 21, 2008 at 4:09 pm
bnaivar: “So what I’m getting here is that we need a “TitMaster”?”
If we need one, I volunteer to be it. It’s a tough job, but…
36 Xanadude // Aug 21, 2008 at 4:30 pm
Suzanne’s next product: Die-Master.
37 Speedy Cerviche // Aug 21, 2008 at 4:32 pm
Leonard Cohen… now there’s a man who knows how to perform a proper gangsta lean.
Leonard Cohen is a demigod. I love him.
38 Xanadude // Aug 21, 2008 at 4:50 pm
name this Cohen “…if your life is a leaf that the seasons tear off and condemn, they will bind you with love that is graceful and green as a stem.”
39 JohnnyBoy // Aug 21, 2008 at 4:59 pm
Thanks Ira….guess where I found it? Good Ol’ WFMU !
40 JohnnyBoy // Aug 21, 2008 at 5:01 pm
Posted by: JohnnySansCulo (—.nycmny83.covad.net)
Date: April 21, 2005 06:42PM
There’s no time like the present
and the present is no prize
but give a gift to Germans
and you hasten their demise
The train is at the station
The feces in the hat
but transubstantiation
hardly ever feeds the cat
what started as a good idea
must now but end abrupt
so let’s sing Leonard Cohen songs
and cheer the whole place up
41 ira_shlamazel // Aug 21, 2008 at 5:07 pm
Sisters of Mercy!
42 ribsout@yahoo.com // Aug 21, 2008 at 6:56 pm
Brilliant!
43 eBayEnigma // Aug 21, 2008 at 7:26 pm
Wow, Suzanne Somers, Gangstas, Leonard Cohen, and poetry! I think we’ve touched pretty much all bases with this post!
44 The Cooler: this week in… - World of B // Aug 21, 2008 at 8:47 pm
[...] Link of the week: April Winchell’s imagined celebrity correspondence. That April. Damned funny. And probably totally fine with your decision to use birth [...]
45 Xanadude // Aug 22, 2008 at 7:22 am
Very good, Ira!
46 phoebefigalilly // Aug 22, 2008 at 7:59 am
Let us pause a moment one with another and consult
“TOUCH ME. The Poems of Suzanne Somers”
I have chosen her verse entitled
LIES!
I have lied to you
a thousand times
Reshaped the truth
To keep you close
and avoid hurting you
But I always lied with words
Last night I lied to you
in silence
with my hands my mouth my caress.
The worst lie of all.
And now I know something is over
because before
I only lied with words.
47 ira_shlamazel // Aug 22, 2008 at 9:18 am
Egads! Only lied with words?!?
Speaking of confused,
Can anyone explain Madonna’s “4 Minutes” video?
Am I missing something? What is it all about?
Poor Justin! (Never thought I’d say that!)
It’s left me feeling dizzy, and somehow, victimized.
She’s wearing old-lady underwear! Oww!
48 JohnnyBoy // Aug 22, 2008 at 10:57 am
Oh my thigh
master keeps
your legs flabbier
And I’d like
if you don’t
make me beg
If you would,
please don’t pull
on my labia
Even though
I was pulling
your leg
49 pal Jacky // Aug 22, 2008 at 11:04 am
fuck you speedy, I wanted to commend talking horse on his use of Leonard Cohen. My fave though is still Emmylou harris’ version of ‘a cowgirl’s prayer’ the title track of one of her best albums.
Somehow, this is important because sometimes when Madonna is mentioned, I need to remember that there are people like emmylou harris who have been around a long time and have a legacy of works worth listening to. She worked with dylan in ‘73 and was in the film ‘the last waltz in ‘75. and still she putting out albums worth buying.
50 obscenemom // Aug 22, 2008 at 11:18 am
Does Suzy have sort of a Tammy Faye thang goin’ on there?
51 Speedy Cerviche // Aug 22, 2008 at 11:33 am
There once was a songsmith of skill;
“Leonard Cohen” was the name on the bill
He wrote songs full of win
Then he took Berlin
All while gangsta leanin’ in his pimped-out DeVille
52 ira_shlamazel // Aug 22, 2008 at 11:34 am
I’m sorry I mentioned Madonna. I don’t usually use that kind of language. I was hurt and panicking. I was out of my mind.
I am truly scarred.
53 JohnnyBoy // Aug 22, 2008 at 5:04 pm
An offer that popped up on iWon
promised words that were better than Byron
It said it was “Cohen”
I bought without knowin’
it wasn’t by Leonard, but Myron
54 ira_shlamazel // Aug 22, 2008 at 7:19 pm
Too, too good, JohnnyBoy!
55 JohnnyBoy // Aug 22, 2008 at 7:27 pm
Thanks Ira…I think nearly everyone here is over 40 and actually remembers Myron Cohen
56 coasterboy // Aug 22, 2008 at 7:52 pm
Who?
57 JohnnyBoy // Aug 22, 2008 at 8:57 pm
He was like that Borat guy
58 Speedy Cerviche // Aug 22, 2008 at 9:44 pm
I just downloaded the “HBO: On Location” special featuring Myron Cohen, from back in 1976.
‘Twas quite good.
59 ShannonS // Aug 23, 2008 at 1:18 pm
RE: post number 21 to Bitsy
I am ashamed to admit that I know which celebretard wrote about making sure your poop floats.
“In general, your poop should float. This is always a shock to people, because most people pass “sinkers.” You want “floaters,” as I like to call them. That is what you have to look forward to when assessing the healthininess of your stool. Nothing gives me greater pleasure than to have a new devotee to my program joyously announce her breakthrough of seeing her poop float for the first times.”
NOTHING GIVES THIS WOMAN GREATER PLEASURE…
Marilu Henners Total Health Makeover
And what is even better? I think I remember Katie Curic asking her during her book tour about the chapter titled, “What’s the poop?”
A mind is a terrible thing to waste and ya’ll can see what mine focuses on. Forget law school–I remember who wants your shit to be the USS Brown Log.
60 Andre // Aug 24, 2008 at 11:27 am
I’ll pass on Sommers’ wig collection. I do all my shopping here:
http://www.kittywigs.com/wigindex.html
61 ScottP // Aug 24, 2008 at 5:24 pm
Not a big Steve McQueen fan, but I seem to remember he died in 1980, at age 50… so he’d be 78 now, not 68.
62 DavidinBerkeley // Aug 25, 2008 at 3:00 pm
My toilet doesn’t have enough water in the bowl it for me to tell if it is floating.
Do they take it out and drop it in a glass pitcher or something?
63 DavidinBerkeley // Aug 25, 2008 at 3:00 pm
Andre: You must have tiny head.
64 pal Jacky // Aug 25, 2008 at 4:30 pm
so keeping a peach pit shoved up my ass at all times is not going to prevent prostate cancer? That is the last time I get medical advice from a member of one of Venice beach’s roving homosexuel rape gangs.
65 pal Jacky // Aug 25, 2008 at 5:28 pm
another thing. Here’s the best reason to vote for Obama The terrorists will leave us alone once we have a muslim president.
66 Speedy Cerviche // Aug 25, 2008 at 7:06 pm
You bring up a valid point, Jacky. But of course, the real question is this: is he Muslim enough?
Perhaps he should double up on his mosque time.
67 pal Jacky // Aug 25, 2008 at 8:33 pm
I can’t wait until he campaigns in the Pacific Northwest where they mistake black people for bigfoot sightings.
68 pal Jacky // Aug 25, 2008 at 8:37 pm
http://www.geocities.com/northwestbigfoot/
While Idaho is home to many fine rascist organizations and Marc Furhman, the Seattle area itself is filled with lots of liberal ‘white flighters’ from California. Hence, when they do see a black person in the flesh, they get all dazed and confused and call it bigfoot.
69 JohnnyBoy // Aug 26, 2008 at 1:29 pm
They really should have an operation to have two heads on one body and call themselves Obama bin Biden
Lots o wacky turban possibilities there !
70 pal Jacky // Aug 26, 2008 at 8:17 pm
I just think it is kind of Risky for Obama to put a transvestite on the ticket.
71 Scott // Aug 26, 2008 at 9:40 pm
OK, it’s been 7 days. Are we over it and ready to move on yet?
72 Speedy Cerviche // Aug 26, 2008 at 10:04 pm
*BLAM*
OOH WHATCHA SAAAAAYYY
MMMM THAT YOU ONLY MEANT WEEEELLLL
WELL COURSE YOU DID
OOH WHATCHA SAAAAAYYY
MMMM THAT IT’S ALL FOR THE BEST
BECAUSE IT IS
OOH WHATCHA SAAAAYYY
MMMM THAT IT’S JUST WHAT WE NEED
YOU DECIDED THIS
WHATCHA SAAAAYY
MMMM WHAT DID SHE SAAAYY…
April’s site is dead. ;_;
73 JohnnyBoy // Aug 27, 2008 at 10:17 am
Pretty Sneaky, Sis
74 laffingsherry // Aug 29, 2008 at 6:38 pm
April, I followed you from your earliest days at KFI and I want to say, this is your tour de force.
And true, every single word.
75 April Winchell » Hey, Thanks Suzanne // Sep 18, 2009 at 11:49 am
[...] Oh, you might have been one or two of those things 40 years ago, but now you’re a saggy bag of Restylane who can’t get any press unless she exploits someone else’s cancer. [...]