Accidental; Tributes Pour In
by Peter Knegt (June 5, 2009)
David Carradine on the set of "Kill Bill, Vol.1" with director Quentin Tarantino. Image courtesy of Miramax Films.
Following
reports yesterday that actor David Carradine had tragically committed suicide in his Bangkok hotel room, Thai police are now
questioning their initial theory. The Associated Press is
reporting that Carradine, found in a hotel room closet with a rope tied to his neck and genitals, might have died of accidental suffocation. There was no suicide note, and Pornthip Rojanasunand, director of Thailand’s Central Institute of Forensic Science, said it’s possible Carradine died attempting auto-erotic asphyxiation, which entails cutting off oxygen to the brain for sexual arousal.
Thai police completed an autopsy on Carradine today, and results will not be ready “for at least three weeks because the cause of death was unclear.”
AP interviewed Tiffany Smith, one of Carradine’s managers, who said: “All we can say is, we know David would never have committed suicide. We’re just waiting for them to finish the investigation and find out what really happened. He really appreciated everything life has to give ... and that’s not something David would ever do to himself.”
Carradine was born John Arthur Carradine on Dec. 8, 1936, in Hollywood, California. His father was part of director John Ford’s company of character actors. His mother was the former Ardanelle McCool, the first of his father’s four wives. Carradine is survived by his wife, Annie Bierman, and four children. He was well-known for his work as Kwai Chang Caine in the 1970s television series “Kung Fu” (which spawned sequels in the 1980s and 1990s, in which he also starred), and starred in over 200 films and television series, including work for directors Martin Scorcese (playing ‘Big’ Bill Shelly in 1972’s “Boxcar Bertha”), Ingmar Bergman (playing Abel Rosenberg in 1977’s “The Serpent’s Egg”), and Hal Ashby (playing Woody Guthrie in 1976’s “Bound for Glory,” in which he won a National Board of Review award for best actor, and was nominated for a Golden Globe). Recently, he found a significant career resurgence playing “Bill” in Quentin Tarantino’s two-part “Kill Bill” films, and can be seen on the film festival circuit right now in David Lee Miller’s well-received “My Suicide.”
Memorials have been pouring in over the past 24 hours: Bruce Weber
offers an extensive obituary at
The New York Times;
The Guardian‘s Xan Brooks has a
“life in clips” memorial on his blog;
The House Next Door has
created a forum for people to share their thoughts and remembrances;
Cinematical‘s Peter Martin
takes a look at Carradine’s lesser known works;
Entertainment Weekly‘s Clark Collis
said Carradine “was a sly, devilish, and at times downright freaky movie presence”;
CHUD‘s David Oliver
wrote of the actor: “In a staggering career that ranged from the 1966 TV series Shane, to the iconic Kung Fu in the 1970s, to Death Race 2000, all the way to Kill Bill, Carradine is a man who seemingly did it all on film, for all the good and bad that that entailed”; While
Living In Cinema‘s Craig Kennedy
emphasizes that while “speculation as to the circumstances and cause of his death are spreading around the Internet,” the “only important fact is that Caine walks the earth no more.”
david carradine death
