Op-Ed: Casey Johnson, Tragic Beauty

I'd never heard of Casey Johnson, the beautiful young socialite heiress to the Johnson & Johnson empire, until I read the news today on how she died. After digging a little deeper, the story of her life struck me as profoundly as a Shakespearean tragedy.

For an award-nominated and optioned screenwriter who has walked a few red carpets and rubbed elbows with A-listers in Beverly Hills, I have to admit I'm a pathetic Jed Clampett rube when it comes to the Hollywood celebrity scene and well-known socialites like Paris Hilton. Of course, I'm not so deep in my rabbit hole that the tragic youthful passing of a Heath Ledger or River Phoenix escapes my notice. But for the most part, I really could care less about the Hollywood social scene. All I care about is writing great stories for the screen. The story is all. The rest is all just glitter and background noise to me. Yet for some reason, after I read today's autopsy report on how 30-year-old socialite heiress Casey Johnson died far too young last month from complications brought on by lifelong diabetes, it was her picture in the news story that really caught my eye and personalized her for me. She was as beautiful as any Hollywood A-lister or supermodel gracing the pages of Elle, yet her eyes are what most caught my attention. They are as captivating as any I have ever seen in my life. Beauty may be in the eye of the beholder, but to me a woman's greatest beauty lies in the windows of her soul. So, as the bookworm writer and researcher I am, I decided to dig a little deeper. What I found only magnified the sense of her loss. It so didn't have to happen. Casey Johnson was born in 1979 in the best of all possible worlds, the silver spoon of the multi-billion dollar Johnson & Johnson medical products empire lodged firmly in her mouth. Yet as so many of wealth have found in the past, riches do not make one invincible to human frailties. Casey was diagnosed at the age of 8 with diabetes, and required lifelong maintenance of the condition as do millions of Americans. She even co-wrote a book on juvenile diabetes with her father, Robert "Woody" Johnson IV, who is also the owner of the New York Jets football franchise. It was in fact this biological malady which contributed directly to her early death, but that was hardly the only factor. As with every story, each ending is the culmination of many complex elements, plots and subtexts. Casey Johnson's story is as complex as any I've ever read. After dropping out of Brown University in 2000, Casey bounced around in a few publishing jobs as she also sought an 'in' to the starry world of Hollywood filmmaking as an actress. Ironically, Casey turned down the first offer made to her by her friend Paris Hilton, a role in the TV series The Simple Life. Casey later called the decision "the stupidest mistake of my life" after seeing how the role bolstered the career of Nichol Richie, who seized the opportunity Casey passed on. Casey appeared in a cameo role in Sidney Lumet's redux of Gloria with Sharon Stone and also starred in two documentaries in the early 2000s, but little else. Throughout it all, Casey lived the same life of luxury and partying as her high school friend and fellow heiress Paris Hilton. But from all appearances, the mid-2000s marked the beginning of Casey's long fall from grace with both her family and in her personal life. That fall may have begun when she denied rumors that she had started a brawl between friend Bijou Philips and Playboy Playmate Nichole Lenz at an MTV party in 2004. "Drama seems to kind of surround me," Casey told Vanity Fair shortly after the incident. If drama surrounded Casey Johnson in 2004, it would outright envelop her for the rest of her days. Her twenties were overshadowed by drug abuse, failed trips to rehab, family turmoil, the remanding of custody of her adopted daughter Ava-Monroe to her mother, Sale Johnson, and eventual cutoff of her financial lifeline by the Johnson family. The real family trouble seems to have started in 2006 when Casey had a falling out with her aunt, Libet Johnson, whom she accused of seducing her then-boyfriend John Dee. The family had hoped that incident would be a positive turning point for Casey, but seemed to have had the opposite effect. Admittedly bisexual, Casey dated both men and women. Yet is was the latter which apparently caused her the most grief and compelled her to act in very un-socialite ways. In October 2009, her hair was reportedly set on fire during a fight with Courtenay Semel, whom she had dated since 2008. A month later, Casey was arrested for stealing jewelry and a number of other personal items from British model and actress Jasmine Lennard (who was in turn tipped off by Courtenay Semel), reportedly leaving a used vibrator and wet towel as calling cards. Casey was scheduled for a preliminary hearing for that offense on February 2nd. Casey again made news last December after announcing her engagement to reality star Tila Tequila, and was planning on regaining custody of Ava-Monroe from her mother. Yet despite Casey's flashing of a gifted 17-carat ring on the occasion, her financial and personal situations could not have been more dire. Having been financially cut off from her family, Casey's Porsche was impounded. Court records show she owed over $105,000.00 on the car. She had also been sued by a nanny, who had won a $20,000.00 judgment against her. And there was the court hearing for the stolen jewelry looming over her like a dark shadow. It has also been reported that Casey was living her last days in squalor in her rented house on Mulholland Drive, an exclusive residential area for some of Hollywood's richest and most well-known actors, actresses and other film professionals. Yet behind the high wooden gates that bore a sign Casey had placed there which read "Grumblenot" was a scene one observer described as akin to Grey Gardens: rotted food, chaotic dishevelment and a swimming pool so filthy that it resembled a swamp. As we all now know, Casey was found dead in that house on January 4th. Today, we know the cause of her death: diabetic ketoacidosis brought on by low insulin levels and extremely high blood sugar. That such a young, wealthy, smart and stunningly beautiful woman, who once held the world in the palm of her hand, departed this life in such sordid circumstances is a classic American tragedy reminiscent of Gia Caranji and Margeaux Hemingway, a stunning fall from riches and grace, and a dire cautionary tale to others. Casey Johnson leaves behind her parents, two younger sisters and her adopted daughter Ava-Monroe, whom Casey named after her personal and likewise ill-fated heroine, Marilyn Monroe. I had never heard of Casey Johnson before today, or of her gold-plated yet greatly troubled life. All I know is what I have just researched on the web, however reliable those sources may be. Yet like the bookworm I am and storyteller I try to be, I know a profound tragedy when I see it. The tragedy of Casey Johnson's life, so full of promise yet so needlessly and recklessly cut short, is Shakespearean in dimension. It all so didn't have to happen. In that respect, I can fully empathize with her friends' and family's pain at her loss. Yet as I am sure her family would not sugar-coat Casey's story based on the facts of her life, neither will I. Yes, it is true that Casey suffered from diabetes from the time she was very young. Yet diabetes can be managed over a normal lifetime through diet and blood sugar management and the avoidance of smoking, alcohol, recreational drugs and other aggravating substances Casey seems to have reveled in. It is also possible that had Casey lived, her upcoming trial might have been the one inescapable warning sign that she had finally hit bottom and would have turned her life around as a result. Casey had even admitted that her life had become an unmitigated disaster in her final interview with Star magazine, and as anyone who has hit bottom knows, admitting your life is a train wreck is the first step in getting it back on the tracks. Casey was still very young and no doubt very much loved by her family, which had tried so hard over the years to help her change her ultimately self-destructive ways. Had she done so, Casey's story might just have become a classic Hollywood tale of riches-to-rags-to-riches again. It might have even become a book and a celluloid success story bringing Casey the attention, spotlights and red carpets she dreamed of in life as so many young women do, instead of the tragedy we sadly now know it to be. Casey Johnson could have one day sat atop the world and done anything she had put her keen and witty mind to (see video). Yet from all appearances, Casey had succumbed to the dark side to the point there was no turning back, as happens all too often to so many young and vibrant people in our world. Be they rich or poor, famous or unknown, it doesn't matter. The pain is felt no less keenly by friends and family. I'm sure many of you have experienced similar deeply personal losses in your lives. In that respect, be you Hollywood mogul, financial emperor or Blue Collar Joe, we are all the same in our human sorrow and regret at the graves of the young. In closing, what I have learned today that I did not know before is of Casey Johnson's frenetic life and tragic death, the immense pain her family and friends must still be feeling at her loss at so young and promising an age, and that we are all the lesser for it because Casey's smart and witty persona, astounding beauty and deep sparkling eyes have been extinguished for all time. I also believe that Casey's family and friends must hope through her loss that maybe, just maybe, Casey Johnson's tragic story will serve as a lesson to other troubled young people in similar circumstances. If there is one ray of light that shines from the tragic life story of Casey Johnson, it's the only one I see. The rest is darkness. End of story. FADE TO BLACK.