Tag Archives: Patrick Swayze
2009 California Women’s Conference: Lisa Niemi Speaks About The Passing Of Her Husband Patrick Swayze
Posted on 28. Oct, 2009 by CSS.
Lisa Niemi is opening up about the grief that came with the loss of her husband, beloved actor Patrick Swazye, calling the paralyzing pain of sorrow “an animal all of its own.”
Lisa was married to Patrick, her teen sweetheart, for 34 years before the Dirty Dancing star succumbed to pancreatic cancer on Sept. 14.
Lisa, 54, spoke about Swayze’s passing alongside Elizabeth Edwards at Maria Shriver’s 2009 California Women’s Conference in Long Beach on Tuesday. She revealed that dealing with loss is very new to her. “I thought during the 22 months of my husband’s illness that it gave me all this time to get used to the idea of losing him. I found for myself that when I actually got to this point I said, ‘No no no’… it wasn’t the same at all.”
Lisa credits the support of close friends with keeping her strong.
“I’ve gotten great advice from all my friends and I’m just going with the flow. I just know I have to go through it and it’s going to take as long as it’s going to take.”
Lisa admitted that she “wanted to, at some point, feel like I had the courage to go on and have a good life. And in the first few days after [Patrick's death], I felt like that would almost be a betrayal. That I would be letting him down somehow, and of course everyone’s saying to me, ‘Trust me, this is what he would have wanted.’ And it’s true… in a way, I would be letting him down to not do that.”
Lisa — who co-authored a memoir with Patrick before his passing — said carrying on is hard, but she knows that is what she must do.
“It’s a brutal truth that you have to go on without that person, but unfortunately, that’s what happens in life.”
Lisa will appear on The Oprah Winfrey Show this Friday, Oct. 30.
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Patrick Swayze’s Widow Lisa Niemi To Appear On ‘Oprah’
Posted on 27. Oct, 2009 by CSS.
Patrick Swayze’s widow, Lisa Niemi, will sit down for a intimate conversation with Oprah Winfrey during an episode of Oprah airing this Friday.
According to a press statement from Harpo Productions, O has snagged Neimi’s “first one-on-one interview since the death of her husband.” The beloved actor died Sept. 14 at age 57 of pancreatic cancer.
Patrick and Lisa met and fell in love when a then-16-year-old Lisa was student at his mother’s dance studio. The pair were married for 34 years. Lisa will promote the book she wrote with Swayze, The Time of My Life.
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Despite “Terrible Pain” Patrick Swayze Recorded Audio Book For “Time Of My Life”
Posted on 29. Sep, 2009 by CSS.
Patrick Swayze called contracting pancreatic cancer a “death sentence” in his new audio book, Time of My Life — recorded in August and available yesterday (September 29).
The beloved screen star lost his battle with the inoperable disease earlier this month, but on the pages of his autobiography, Patrick recalls the day he learned he was suffering from the disease.
“When my doctors at Cedars-Sinai in Los Angeles said the words ‘pancreatic cancer,’ a single thought popped into my head: I’m a dead man,” Swayze says. “Now, a lot of things go through your head when you get a death sentence handed to you, starting with: ‘Why me?’ It’s hard not to sink into bitterness … For me, that initial shock quickly turned into self-criticism and blame.”
“I just stared at him in shock. I had gone in for a simple gastrointestinal procedure, then all of a sudden — surprise! You could be dead before springtime!” he continued. “Fear sliced through me. What the f*** had just happened? I had been so excited about the upswing my life was on. Now it all seemed like a cruel joke. I couldn’t be dying…I had too much to live for! I just couldn’t face the idea that life as I’d always known it was over, that there was a disease inside me that would grow and mutate and eventually kill me. I didn’t know where I would find the strength to deal with it.”
Defiant until the end, the star — whose filmography includes The Outsiders, Dirty Dancing, and Ghost –admitted he was “not ready to go” and vowed not to stop fighting the cancer “before he was good and ready.”
“So I said to my doctor, ‘Show me where the enemy is and I’ll fight him.’ It was “the most challenging, eye-opening battle I’ve ever had,” he continued.
“Facing your own mortality is the quickest way possible to find out what you’re made of. It strips away all the bullshit and exposes every part of you, your strength, your weaknesses, your sense of self, your soul. It also leads you to confront life’s hardest questions.”
Simon & Schuster audio book producer Elisa Shokoff worked with Patrick and his wife Lisa Niemi recording his audio book. She recalls how the actor battled terrible pain to finish the recordings.They would begin at dusk and work late into the night.
“Before, in-between and after recording, it was clear that Patrick was gravely ill and in terrible pain. But when he was actually reading, the weight of his illness seemed to lift and it was easy to forget that he was even sick. From him, a wonderful, kind, cowboy-storyteller emerged, full of life and humor and a heightened compassion. The resulting audio book is a testament to the great and graceful performer that he was.”
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Patrick Swayze Writes About Emotional Jennifer Grey During Filming Of “Dirty Dancing”
Posted on 24. Sep, 2009 by CSS.
Patrick Swayze and Jennifer Grey danced each other’s hearts in the 1987 cult classic Dirty Dancing, but the late actor definitely didn’t have the time of his life on the set of the film that made him famous.
On the pages of his memoir The Time of My Life — available Tues., Sept. 29 — Patrick reveals that the co-stars didn’t get along quite so well when the cameras weren’t rolling.
“We did have a few moments of friction when we were tired or after a long day of shooting. [Grey] seemed particularly emotional, sometimes bursting into tears if someone criticized her,” Swayze says of Grey’s needling mood swings. “Other times, she slipped into silly moods, forcing us to do scenes over and over again when she’d start laughing.”
“I was on overdrive for the whole shoot – staying up all night to do rewrites, squeezing in dance rehearsals, shooting various scenes – and was exhausted a lot of the time,” he recalls. “I didn’t have a whole lot of patience for doing multiple retakes…”
Nonetheless, Jennifer managed to impress Patrick with her performance. He credited her with doing “truly phenomenal job,” adding that “in many ways, she made the movie.”
Swayze went from Broadway dancer to Hollywood star in box-office hits like Dirty Dancing and Ghost. He died on September 14 after a nearly two year battle with pancreatic cancer.
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‘Dancing With The Stars’ Pays Tribute To Patrick Swayze, Celebrity Dancers Ashley Hamilton And Macy Gray Eliminated
Posted on 24. Sep, 2009 by CSS.
Dancing With The Stars wrapped up its three-night season premiere on Wednesday with two eliminations — and a tribute to a dancing cowboy.
Ashley Hamilton, the son of former DWTS competitor George Hamilton and model Alana Stewart, was the first from the celebrity males to go. Also eliminated was Grammy-winning singer Macy Gray, which took last season’s winning professional Jonathan Roberts out of the competition.
In addition to the eliminations, Dancing paid tribute to Patrick Swayze. The late actor — who died of pancreatic cancer last week — was a supporter of the program and even visited DWTS during its first season.
Several of the show’s professionals recreated some of Swayze’s most memorable numbers for the touching tribute.
“We’re honored and privileged to be able to do that for him, his family, and all of his fans,” Derek Hough said.
Professional Maksim Chmerkovskiy added, “I wish we could also do a Michael Jackson tribute.”
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Whoopi Goldberg Slams Suzanne Somers Over Her Statements “Chemo Killed Patrick Swayze”
Posted on 24. Sep, 2009 by CSS.
Whoopi Goldberg is firing back at Three’s Company star Suzanne Somers for comments the actress made alleging the chemotherapy Patrick Swayze used to treat his pancreatic cancer ultimately killed him.
The Dirty Dancing star died last week after a nearly two year battle with the disease. Shortly after, Somers came under fire for comments she made about Swayze in an interview with Toronto’s National Post.
“They took this beautiful man and they basically put poison in him,” Somers told National Post columnist Shinan Govani. “Why couldn’t they have built him up nutritionally and gotten rid of the toxins in his body?”
Somers – who used holistic methods to treat her breast cancer in 2001 – responded to incident on her website Monday.
“In a casual conversation at a private party (with someone who never identified himself as a reporter) at the Toronto Film Festival last week, I was asked about this beloved actor. It was never my intention to make an official statement about his passing,” Suzanne wrote. “I was not informed or aware I was being interviewed. I would never have been so insensitive as to offer a public statement so close to his untimely passing. I sincerely apologize if my comment has caused any additional pain to his family during this difficult time. I send my deepest condolences for their loss.”
The public rebuttal hasn’t stopped Whoopi from taking Suzanne to task over her remarks.
“In case she doesn’t know, Patrick did everything and went everywhere to try and stay healthy as long as he could,” The View co-host said of her Ghost co-star on Wednesday. “That he’s been gone a week and this statement came out is bad timing and bad taste and Suzanne, you know better,” Whoopi continued. “And I’m not sure that’s not what you meant to do, but you should have thought about it”
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Suzanne Somers Claims, “Chemotherapy Killed Patrick Swayze”
Posted on 21. Sep, 2009 by CSS.
Yes, you read the post title correctly- Suzanne Somers is claiming that because Patrick Swayze underwent chemotherapy to fight off his Pancreatic cancer-the star is now deceased.
The former Three’s Company star gave her opinion on the Ghost star’s death while speaking at a party for Tom Ford’s movie, A Single Man, at the Toronto Film Festival last Thursday. In a new interview with Toronto National Post columnist Shinan Govani , Suzanne — who has a book coming out on cancer — said:
“They took this beautiful man and they basically put poison in him. Why couldn’t they have built him up nutritionally and gotten rid of the toxins in his body?”
In 2001, the Thighmaster frontwoman revealed she was battling breast cancer. After having surgery to remove the lump followed by radiation treatment, she refused chemotherapy against the advice of her doctors in favor of alternative treatment.
“I hate to be this controversial,” she continued. “I’m a singer-dancer-comedienne. But we have an epidemic going on, and I have to say it.”
I do believe it is in very poor taste to make comments like this especially within days of the actors death. I understand her stance on cancer and her book that is coming out will better shed light on that for everyone-but to speak out on Patrick’s courageous fight against pancreatic cancer was off-putting to say it nicely.
Everybody knows that getting diagnosed with pancreatic cancer is literally a death sentence- only 5% of those diagnosed are still alive within two years of their diagnosis.
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Patrick Swayze Penned Love Letter To Wife Lisa In Upcoming Memoir “The Time Of My Life”
Posted on 17. Sep, 2009 by CSS.
The late Patrick Swayze left behind a touching love letter to his wife of 34 years, Lisa Niemi, in his upcoming memoir, The Time of My Life. The actor passed away after a battle with pancreatic cancer on Monday. He was 57.
Once voted PEOPLE Magazine’s “Sexiest Man Alive,” Patrick Swayze could have had his pick of girls — but there was only one that he ever wanted. From the moment Swayze, then 19, saw Lisa Niemi, 16, in his mother’s dance class, he knew she was the one for him.
“All these girls were studying with my mum and I used to go and check them out in their leotards – it was like being in a candy store,” he recalled later. “She didn’t buy any of my nonsense. We spent half our dates in total silence as she wouldn’t talk to me if she thought I was putting on an act.”
In 1975, the sweethearts tied the knot in the backyard of Lisa’s Houston home.
“How grateful I am that you chose to love me,” the actor wrote, according to ABC’s Good Morning America, which played an audio clip of the actor reading from his memoir on Wednesday.
“I know that because of you, I’ve found my spirit. I saw the man I wanted to be. You are my woman, my lover, my mate and my lady. I loved you forever, I love you now and I will love you forever more.”
Patrick was diagnosed with stage 4 pancreatic cancer in January 2008 and underwent chemotherapy, all the while continuing a grueling work schedule, playing FBI agent Charles Barker in the A&E drama The Beast.
Patrick & Lisa’s book, The Time Of My Life, is due out Sept. 29 from Simon & Schuster.
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Jennifer Grey Speaks About The Passing Of Patrick Swayze: “Patrick Swayze Was A Real Cowboy”
Posted on 16. Sep, 2009 by CSS.
Jennifer Grey, who appeared alongside Patrick Swayze in his 1987 breakout film Dirty Dancing, is remembering the late actor, who died Monday evening after a nearly two year battle against inoperable pancreatic cancer.
“Patrick was a rare and beautiful combination of raw masculinity and amazing grace,” Jennifer said in a statement to The Insider. “Gorgeous and strong, he was a real cowboy with a tender heart. He was fearless and insisted on always doing his own stunts, so it was not surprising to me that the war he waged on his cancer was so courageous and dignified. When I think of him, I think of being in his arms when we were kids, dancing, practicing the lift in the freezing lake, having a blast doing this tiny little movie we thought no one would ever see. My heart goes out to his wife and childhood sweetheart, Lisa Niemi, to his mom, Patsy, and to the rest of their family.”
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Patrick Swayze Passed Away.
Posted on 14. Sep, 2009 by CSS.
Patrick Swayze has finally succumbed to pancreatic cancer. He was 57 years old when he died.
Swayze was diagnosed with cancer in January of 2008. Less than 5% of people diagnosed with pancreatic cancer are still alive five years after diagnosis, so this day has been coming for awhile unfortunately. I think it was incredibly courageous of him to fight as hard as he did. He will definitely be missed.
Patrick Swayze was the star of tons of guilty pleasure type movies, including Ghost, Road House (a personal favorite), and Point Break.
Patrick’s publicist stated that he died with his family by his side.
