Here are exceprts from the VH1 press release:

VH1 and Dr. Drew Pinsky Will Open Up The Inner World Of Rehab As They Help Nine Celebrities Through The Process Of Getting Clean And Sober

VH1 has partnered with Dr. Drew for the reality series "Celebrity Rehab with Dr. Drew." The project, consisting of eight one-hour episodes, is slated to premiere on January 10, 2008 at 10pm ET/PT.

This series will follow the real-life experiences of Brigitte Nielsen, Chyna, Daniel Baldwin, Jeff Conaway, Jessica Sierra, Jaimee Foxworth, Seth "Shifty" Binzer, Mary Carey, and Ricco Rodriguez as they undergo detoxification and treatment at a center in the Los Angeles area. While these celebrity patients may be accustomed to receiving special treatment in their everyday lives, they were in for a major surprise when they entered this no- frills treatment facility. Dr. Drew was aided in the process by his experienced and trusted staff of counselors, including registered nurses and other addiction experts.

In a television first, the highly respected Dr. Drew, a practicing MD and assistant clinical professor at KECK USC School of Medicine, will give viewers an unflinching look at exactly how the rehab process works and what it feels like for participants. Dr. Drew hopes to use his celebrity patients to humanize the process and show viewers that treatment is a viable way to break the cycle of addiction. "The road to sobriety is not easy and rehabilitation and the recovery process are not to be taken lightly," said Dr. Drew Pinsky. "My goal is to lift the veil and help my patients, as well as viewers, understand that if not taken seriously, addiction is a disease that will kill you."

All but one of the patients completed an intensive 21-day round-the-clock program with both group and one-on-one therapies. After they completed the program, the patients were given the opportunity to continue their treatment in a sober living facility or treatment center for at least three months at VH1's expense.

While most people know Dr. Drew as the host of the syndicated radio show Loveline and the MTV show of the same name, Dr. Drew is a medical doctor on staff at Huntington Hospital, a board certified addictionologist and medical director of the chemical dependency unit at Las Encinas Hospital in Pasadena, where he has been treating addicts for over 20 years. Although he is an associate professor of clinical psychiatry at the KECK USC School of Medicine, he is not a psychologist or psychiatrist. His book, Cracked: Putting Broken Lives Together Again (Harper-Collins,) is all about what treating addicts is like from a caretaker's perspective. Dr. Drew co-authored the first academic study on celebrities and narcissism. The study was published in the Journal of Research in Personality (Elsevier) in September 2006, and is the first systematic, empirical scholarly study of celebrity personality.

"Celebrity Rehab With Dr. Drew" is executive produced by John Irwin and Damian Sullivan for Irwin Entertainment. Dr. Drew Pinsky and Howard Lapides are also executive producing. Michael Hirschorn, Jeff Olde, Jill Holmes, and Noah Pollack are executive producers for VH1.

rehab should be taken very seriously. They don't even show the trauma that the "intervention" people go through, and with good reason. Who wants the lowest point of their lives televised? Whoever was these star's agents/managers took co0mplete advantage of sick people. It's sickening. Will I watch? Of course!

Sad sign of the social stigma about seeking addiction treatment that this is the class of 'celebrity' willing to go on the show. That weight loss show gets a better class of 'D' celebrity. I had to google most of them to figure out who they are. Dr. Drew's really good. Britney, Lindsey, and Owen should be beating on his door, sobbing for help, but, no.

Dr. Drew said on Loveline that we'd be SHOCKED at some of the celbs, but I guess he means shocked, like WHO? I'm not shocked at Jeff Conway. Ever since Drew came to drag him away from the Fat Celb Show, I'm sure Conway's had Drew on his speed dial.

I'm going to give Drew the benefit of the doubt that this won't be another pathetic, trying to get back on the public radar by exposing myself in the most intimate fashion possible, sort of show. But if he thinks druggies will watch, see rehabs not so bad for that chick from Family Matters, and rush right out for treatment, I'm not seeing it.

I'm guessing Jessica Sierra is the one who didn't finish, just based on the fact that she just got busted for drug possession. Of course, I could be way off. My other guess is Conaway.

Chyna was interviewed on one of my local radio stations. My guess is that this show is wrapped up. Chyna seems to be another celeb who wont find the light at the end of the tunnel. She sounded horrible.

Is it sad that I only recognize four of the nine "celebrities"?

Seems like one more spin on the fame-whore merry-go-round for several of them...

Previews promoting Jessica Sierra "from American Idol" HUH? I don't recall this name at all. Anyone know what season? What was she, top 37? Not on any AI I've ever seen.

Familiar with the first 4, slightly have heard of the second 2 (no idea how) and blanked on the rest. I am voting on Conaway for running, and none of them for still being sober.

At least Daniel Baldwin has one sober brother to turn to, if he wanted to.

Jessica was in the season 4 top 12 on AI.


http://www.americanidol.com/contestants/se...jessica_sierra/

I thought Jaime had her stuff together...or at least it seemed so when she was on Oprah last year (or at least I think it was last year). I swear man, her parents really screwed her over, no wonder she's in rehab.

This isn't showing up on my TiVo yet so I can't set the season pass (sigh). But is it horrible to admit that I'm really looking forward to this show?

Glad they're getting treatment and all, but, some of them are just a mess and won't ever straighten out. At least from what they showed on past reality tv. I'm not even sure they want to.

I'll end on a positive note though, in saying that Dr. Drew does take all this very seriously and if anyone can help them, he can.

I have no doubts about Dr. Drew being stand up. The editing monkeys, however, are a completely different story. This show may just take the pleasure out of the guilty.

After the first 4 names I have no idea who these people are. But, sadly, I too will probably be watching mostly because I have a huge crush on Daniel Baldwin, or I used to.

I saw the promos and realized that this is some sort of low point for civilization (Dr. Drew aside), but of course I'll be watching. I can't even enjoy the schadenfreude aspect, only pity.
The only people whose names I didn't recognize were Ricco Rodriguez- a mixed martial arts fighter, Jessica Sierra, and Seth "Shifty" Binzer- the co-founder/frontman of Crazy Town.

Do they get paid to appear, or just get the free rehab?

The IMDB page shows Andy Dick and Tom Sizemore in the "cast", I wonder if they dropped out?

Sizemore may not have Lohen's pretty girl looks, but he's just as doomed. Then again, why should he seek help? He's having a ball! 'ho's and speedballs and high speed cop chases, oh my!

Andy Dick was just on Loveline a couple of weeks ago and they didn't discuss anything about him being on the show. Drew considers him a friend and I'm sure would want him to get sober but Dick's another one who doesn't see anything wrong with his lifestyle and choices, so what can you do?

All of a sudden I realized Mary Carey is the porn star who ran for Governor in California when Grey whats his name was recalled and everybody and thier brother ran, including Gary Coleman.

Is Jaimee Foxworth 'Judy Winslow'? The mom in Family Matters? If so that breaks my heart.

I still have zero clue who Seth or Crazy Town is.

Hell Tom doesn't need this. Didn't you see that great series he had, 'Shooting Sizemore'? Yeah he got his career back on track by filming himself smoking meth. **sarcasm**

ETA: Can the Kardashians go on here to detox from being famewhores?

Wasn't Puck supposed to be on this show?

If I do watch, it'll be for her as I was a huge fan of hers back when she was at her peak in the "good old days", but it's so hard to keep being emotionally invested in her. She really is a roller coaster; she's doing great in one interview one week, and the next week she's having a meltdown somewhere else. Last I saw her was on Nancy Grace a few months ago and she had her long black hair and was reasonably lucid.

Judy was the daughter, not the mom. The forgotten daughter who went upstairs to her room and was never seen again.

Is it horrible if I say 'shoo', as I wipe my hand across my forehead? I know it sounds mean but I really couldn't bear to go through rehab with a grandma type figure.

That was so weird. Except for that mystery it was a good show.

I might have to watch this one.

Unless you've watched "My Baby Got Back 29" or "More Black Dirty Debutantes # 30 and 32". Foxworth went on to a short-lived porn career under the name Crave.


They had one hit, that annoying "Butterfly" song. They were part of that rap metal/nu metal genre like Linkin Park and Papa Roach. from wikipedia
They totally got booed at Ozzfest 2001. Hee!

She was on other "where are they now?" shows talking about how she was clean and trying to get back into acting (she was in the middle of a reading and doing a shitty-ass job). Usually people who've cleaned up their lives avoid famewhoring, but from the fact that she's on this show means she's far from a sober life.

I wouldn't be surprised if Jodie Sweetin (Stephanie from "Full House") fell back and needed rehab again, and appeared on a future season of this show. She seems like one who would, too.

Is this only drug rehab or are we going to see other things like on Intervention? Maybe some shop-a-holics, eating disorders?

That would really open up the celebrity pool, not that there aren't enough alcoholics and drug addicts to run this show for the next 50 years.

Count me in as someone who will be watching. I've been a fan of Dr Drew since his MTV Loveline days. I read his book Cracked when it came out and I found it to be interesting, so I'm looking forward to seeing him in action so to speak. I think he is very passionate about the work he does so I'm not worried about the show exploiting anyone or becoming a joke.

I wouldn't either, but I hope not. She's expecting a baby soon.

Why does Conaway need this? Rehab and detox when you're only on freakin' Benadryl? Did he really think anyone believed that was all he was taking?

I certainly hope Jodie doesn't relaps esp. with a baby due soon.

My sister used to addicted to many things and she used that Benadryl excuse among many other stupid things many times. I asked her once when she back to normal self if she really thought we were all that stupid and she said sometimes she was really lying to herself. I hope this works out for this people but from the experience I had with my sis one time in rehab doesn't always work.

It's probably wrong, but I think it's hilariously ironic that in the video for Crazytown's "Butterfly," one of the other band members is wearing a "DARE" t-shirt.

I don't know quite what to make of this. I used to have a lot of respect for Dr. Drew, but it seems like, lately, all he does is go on news shows and talk about which celebrities he thinks have drug problems. That seems marginally unethical. Nonetheless, I'll still watch, partly because I love a celebrity train wreck, and partly because Dr. Drew is still foxy.

I saw this thread and didn't know what to make of it. My first reaction was that it was some kind of a joke that someone put here as a takeoff on some of the more absurb reality show concepts, like "Fat Pets." But astonishingly, it is a real show, and Dr. Drew is apparently so in love with the cameras that he is willing to partner with the very tasteful VH1 to put some very sick people up to national disgust, ridicule, hatred and loathing for a little more money and fame for himself. Hopefully, he won't cross the line and show AA meetings. This is far more exploitive than anything just a couple of years ago. I'm disappointed in Dr. Drew.

I imagine a young person seeing Paddy Chayefski's "Network" for the first time today would be utterly puzzled as to what the hell it was supposed to be satirizing.

I realized I have hit a personal low today when I began wondering how soon this train wreck would be appearing on my TV.

Addiction to sleazy reality is a slippery slope. It starts with American Idol & before you know it, you're DVRing The Bad Girls Club & waiting breathlessly for the ILNY2 Reunion. Then it's time for the Intervention when you seriously consider attending Bret "Wigzilla" Michaels' RoL New Year's party at a nightclub in your hometown because Heather "Oh.My.Hell" & Lacey will be attending.

Someone call A&E & schedule me an Intervention....especially if you love me like crazy!

Just saw the promo for this today. Wow, if anything it should teach people what a number drugs and alco can do just to your looks. Some of those folks looked like twenty miles of bad road.
What was Conaway thinking? Not getting into rehab but agreeing to show himself retching his guts out on national tv. Could he actually have thought this might help in staging some sort of comeback?



Is that a real word? Or the right word for that specialty? Made me think of that SNL skit with the joy-ologist consultant.

Artistictype, I remember on Loveline they used to introduce him as a "board certified physician and addiction medicine specialist". Addictionologist just sounds wrong.

I listened to the radio program for over 10 years, so I'll always love Dr. Drew, but I remember even back in the day when he was a "consultant" for the first season of Big Brother and I didn't understand that either.

Whenever he was broadcasting from a sister station because he had traveled to paid speaking engagements (while working a full-time job during the day and broadcasting the radio show from 10pm to 12 am), Adam would ask, "Why are you in ________, Drew?" Then the brilliant/twisted Engineer Anderson would drop in Drew's voice saying, "Because somebody dropped a nickel."

Good times.

I don't think it's that, but he sure does seem to take every opportunity to get his face out there.

You can now see the first full episode, in six parts, at VH1.com. It is dramatic and disturbing and definitely doesn't glamorize drug and alcohol usage - quite the opposite really. It is also, however, uncomfortable viewing. It's kind of like when you're in a long traffic line and you slowly pass by a wreck and know you shouldn't look but do anyway. Unlike other VH1 shows that can make the same claim, though, there's a serious tone throughout, mostly because Dr. Drew is driving the car and legitimately seems to care about both the patients/"celebrities" and educating the viewing public. Having said that, if I didn't already "care" about one of the folks involved, I probably wouldn't be watching it, but as I do, I will.

I hear ya...I will admit it gave me a stomachache watching it. I really like how Dr. Drew talks to people, it's very disarming.

In the previews I saw, I didn't see any attempts to ridicule any of the participants. None at all. If anything, I saw a genuine desire to help these celebs out in order to rid them of their self-destructive behavior.

I at least think it's more ethical to just come out and make the show about the nature of addiction, addict behavior and treatment rather than just casting them in your typical "Surreal Life" or "Real World" type of reality show for the trainwreck factor and just pretending away that these aren't deeply, deeply troubled people with huge problems. Those shows are infinitely more devious than this show. Most of the time they're even offering them free booze while filming to get better footage.

Holy bejeezus. Just watched the episode online. The guy from Taxi -- GOD!! "Unglamorous" doesn't begin to describe it. He's a corpse. A corpse that's been rotting in a ditch for six days. MAN. I wonder who's making legal decisions for him, because he doesn't seem anywhere near competent to make choices for himself. There's no possible way to spoil this with a description. If you've ever watched a relative die of cancer or Alzheimer's disease...to me, it looks pretty similar.

I don't think I'll be watching this.
I'm currently taking my courses to become a licenced drug and alcohol counselor and have been working in the field for 5 years.
I've seen addiction on all levels, And was once stuck in addiction at the age of 13 but am now sober for 9 years.
I don't want to watch it because first off, this man who is supposed to be a "professional"...is just degrading himself and these people who are extremely sick and aren't even in the right state of mind to clearly make the decision for themselves if they want to participate on this show.
Often times you can not sign a contract, or any sort of medical paper work like for surgery or any procedure like that if you are under the influence because you are not able to comprehend the information, obligations, and possible dangers plus all the legal guide lines that go along with it if a person is high or drunk they can break the contract and not be held responsible, or sue the person on the other end and say that they were in an altered state and they were lied to or taken advantage of, and i am almost 100% sure none of these participants were sober while making this decision, if they are true addicts they weren't and if they were why are they on this show, I'd like to know what "Treatment center" this is taking place at because there has to be such an extreme amount of red tape with this show seeing how strict the HIPPA laws are and all other privacy and confidentiality terms there are regrading the medical field, even more so when it comes to mental health and substance abuse treatment.
The rehab I work at is extremely strict, when we come in for work we can not have cell phones in case they have cameras on them, we can not go up to a client if we are at the mall and say hello unless they say hello to us first we are not suppose to talk about work at home, I can't see what reputable place would want to tarnish their credibility along side Dr.Drew.
So for a treatment center to just bend the rules to that extent really makes this hard to believe to me, they are probably on some studio lot or rented a nice house and so forth, it will be interesting to see their detox methods, see if they have any real nursing and or medical staff it would be extremely dangerous for them not to, seeing as a lot of these stars are commonly addicted to alcohol and benzo's the only two drugs that withdrawal can kill you by going into exstream DTs and gran maul seizures.
But as interesting as all these thing would be to see, I can't watch it.
I see people every day at work face these problems who so badly want to change and want and need help and are extremely serious about recovery, but yet they get kicked out two days after being there because they can not afford it, than you have these pathetic waste of the human race who have all the money in the world, but want no help do not want to change keep putting other peoples lives at danger and waste the time of professionals/and taking the beds that the people who want it and need it could have.

It's over all just disgusting, and I would love to see Dr.Drew get all his other projects and other engagements he has fail, and his colleagues completely disassociate with him.
No Dr, No Therapist who truly cares about these people, and are in this field for the right reasons would ever do anything like this.
It's sick for the fact that he's completely exploiting these people, and also if he was so great in addictions wouldn't it come into his mind that a lot of these "stars" are addicted to the attention, and to the cameras?
That this is something that most of them crave just like any other drug, and by having these cameras around it's just going to cause them to regress if they come in with any improvement on their situation, that they will be acting 24/7 and never getting down to the gods honest truth and bottom of the issues that they are having, they will always be putting on their little shows and gimmicks that they were doing on the outside after leaving night clubs and reinforcing their addictive nature and old behaviors, in order to change the addiction you need to change the outside stimulus, you need to change people, places and things....a lot of times in real rehabs, if you know someone who is there they will separate you from them, and put one of them in a different program because if the two people know each other it can cause all sorts of triggers, influence, and drama it's not logical to have two people so early in recovery in the same program together so they can sit around and chat about where they'd party and where they'd get their drugs and times they may have gotten high together or fight and cause drama if it's two people who have hooked up, or have had any drama like that.
It just doesn't make any sense to me, and I can not see how he can justify this in his own head.
This is serious illness, that people die from every day and people go through hell and back because of it, even when people get better it is and will be a daily struggle they face on every day.
Many kid's have been born addicted, many people have been killed because of the actions of addicts, and many addicts have killed themselves because they just can't bare to battle the war any longer, and to try to turn this into entertainment, no matter what manor they decide to spoon feed us it, no matter if the make it dirty and grimy like it truly is they are still trying to pass this as entertainment and it's disgusting but yet they know they can get away with it because they know that theres always going to be a group of people who enjoy to watch others fail and like to view train wrecks to make them feel better and more content with their owns lives at the expense of someone elses pain and misery because it's not happening to them, it's not effecting their lives so why would they care, it just makes them validate in their heads that "hey there's someone out there more screwed up than me" and justifies whatever self destructive action they may be partaking in.

While I understand and agree with a good bit of what you've said regarding the ethics of televising anyone's rehab - thus the uncomfortable feeling I had in watching the first ep - you're making a couple of assumptions about the way this was set up and run that are are completely incorrect and thus are also misleading. First off, the show was not filmed on a lot or nice house anywhere; it was filmed at the Pasadena Recovery Center, a real medical center run by real medical professionals including Dr. Drew who is a real doctor and addiction specialist with many years of real experience in medical and rehab settings. Sorry to use the word "real" so many times in that last sentence, but it's unfair to imply that this program was a Hollywood production on a set with pretend doctors and nurses. It's also wrong to assume that all the people on this show have "all the money in the world" and could easily go to a private rehab elsewhere. Keep in mind that VH1 shows about "celebrities" often feature folks who most folks don't know at all and never had much money in the first place. At least one person on this show could not have afforded rehab anywhere else and frankly may well be dead now had she not done this. (I will add as a side note of opinion here that I don't think the fact that an addict has some sort of celebrity status makes them any more or less a "pathetic waste of human race" than any other struggling addict, be it a janitor or senator. How do you know these folks weren't extremely serious about getting better?) Finally, anyone who actually watches the first episode will see that Pinsky's motivation clearly isn't entertainment but rather is education; he may be misguided and he may have crossed an ethical line, but his heart - based on the first ep - is definitely in the right place, and he clearly does seem to care about these folks.

There is some truth to this, but as I speculated above (I'm a lawyer), generally someone else is empowered to make those decisions for an incompetent person. If the patient is incompetent and has no next of kin or attorney to act on his behalf, then the government will step in and do it. Furthermore, a hospital does not need legally binding consent to perform emergency care on an incompetent or unconscious person. Detoxing someone like Jeff Conaway is emergency care; his life is hanging in the balance from minute to minute.



So an alcoholic who wakes up in the morning sober (though hung-over) isn't a true addict unless he starts drinking again before going to work? Come on. Some addicts use only at night. Others (such as Brigitte Nielsen, according to her intake interview) don't use every day; they go on binges with brief periods of sobriety in between. And Daniel Baldwin says in his interview that he's been sober since last November, and he's re-doing rehab as a refresher course. It's rather infantilizing to suggest that the disease of addiction renders all of its adult victims legally incompetent all the time.

I promise you, VH1 has REALLY good lawyers on the job. There's no way that you're catching legal violations that their legal team failed to anticipate.



Well. I think I'd rather go to Dr. Drew should I ever need help.

I would think one would have to sign legal binding contracts and release forms to check into any rehab facility.

Absolutely. With this kind of show, VH1 will be covering their asses in every single way imagined.

Dr. Drew is on shaky ground with me because he's been on other shows speculating about celebrity drug use. Don't get me wrong, of course I think people like Briney Spears have a problem, but no way would I go on national television and say "she has a drug problem because x, y, and z" unless I'd actually met with her. I really hope that the show is done in a sensitive way, but I'm just not too convinced of Dr. Drew's motives right now.

We already know it didn't work for Jessica Sierra. It's probably too late for her baby.

Ditto, and actually, I'm sort of shocked that VH1 is running a show this serious and that appears, at least in the first episode, this tasteful and respectful of the celebrities.

God knows they looked bad enough on their own its not like you need to help them look a mess.


I can't pinpoint what it is but its pretty darn clear to me from watching them that everyone going in signed off on whatever paperwork was necessary and full well knew what they were getting into.

Did he have a stroke? I mean seriously. Is that just from the drugs? It makes me nervous to watch. He is inches from death. And the second I saw his girlfriend I knew she was 100 miles of bad road.

I don't believe Baldwin's pontifications about how he is sober and here to help someone else, not for a minute.

I am liking Dr. Drew. He is calm, but firm and really seems to know what he is doing. He picks up on important cues, noone is fooling him, even if he doesn't flat out tell them that.

So many TV docs. are so half baked, the therapist from Breaking Bonaduce, the therapists on CFC. Drew was kind of refreshing.

Word. I was actually worried for Kenickie (the guy from Taxi). I mean should he really be detoxing in an environment like that? With his drug history, you'd think he'd warrant closer supervision during his detox.

But the environment in question is a normal rehab center staffed by medical personnel. They're undoubtedly used to cases like this. Also, you may have not noticed it, but there was a short shot in the premier where you could see one of the staff watching monitors of what appeared to be each of the rooms...so they literally could watch him 24-7.

Heh. I'd forgotten about that. That Benadryl sure is some strong stuff, these days.

I'm torn with whether or not to watch this show. I cannot stand looking at Conway again, and in no way do I believe this run at rehab will be successful for him. In all the clips I have seen he is still angry, lashing out and defensive, and in my experience people who explode like that are not ready for change. He also looks a hot mess, still. Hopefully he won't try to eat his shirt or throw his shoes at fellow castmates (again).

Then I saw a preview with some castmemeber unknown to me who is talking to his child on the phone, and the kid says in such a hopeful, excited kid voice "You're gonna stop doing bad things? Daddy's gonna stop doing bad things!" after the guy tells him he's gonna stop doing drugs. Things like that tug at the ol' heart strings. Whoever he is, I hope he succeeds.

I'm kinda meh on Dr. Drew. I grew up listening to Lovelines on NYC radio, then MTV, so I'm familiar with him. One thing I do like is his voice - it's very calm and soothing. He seems very knowledgable and I agree iwth previous posters that have said if anyone can get th celebs to kick the habit, he seems most qualified. And quite easy on the eyes ;)

On Celebrity Fit Club it was revealed that although Jeff Conaway CLAIMED to have only taken Benadryl, he was also on Xanax and possibly other medication, too.