<![CDATA[Gawker: defamer, imaginarium of dr parnassus]]> http://tags.gawker.com/assets/base/img/thumbs140x140/gawker.com.png <![CDATA[Gawker: defamer, imaginarium of dr parnassus]]> http://gawker.com/tag/defamer/imaginariumofdrparnassus http://gawker.com/tag/defamer/imaginariumofdrparnassus <![CDATA[Verne Troyer's Tribute to Heath Ledger Overshadowed by Potential For Ex-Strangling]]> Life is rough these days for Verne Troyer, the diminutive, sex-tape-making, back-tax-owing (allegedly), bomb-starring actor whose bout with the tabloids took an introspective turn Tuesday in an interview with E! Denying he had anything to do with the "unauthorized" release of his videotaped tongue-stabbing of ex-girlfriend Ranae Shrider, a sober Troyer inventoried Shrider's motivations for supposedly dropping the tryst at TMZ's doorstep — and, in the process, both defused and started harrowing rumors we could have gone the rest of our lives without conjuring:

And what of claims made by Shrider, like that she nearly drowned the Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me star in a romantic bubble bath?
"There's no incident like that. She's coming up with things and telling media anything to make it interesting. I haven't seen everything she's done...The things she says just aren't true," he adds.

Must be awkward, then, considering the former couple still live together.

"She's still in the house," Troyer says, noting that he's taking legal action to force her out, but their situation "makes it even harder, to, you know, not strangle her."

But... how would that even work? Anyway, Troyer's pulling through with the help of friends, family and his lawyer, as well as by continued (if "dehydrated") work on films including Heath Ledger's unfinished final project, The Imaginarium of Dr. Parnassus. Recalling the late actor's troubled time on set ("He couldn't sleep because he was so wrapped up in the character of Joker in Batman. ... Throughout our shoot it was the same way"), a misty-eyed Troyer nevertheless insisted Ledger was not suicidal — anything but, really, with a Ledger heart sketch eventually making the rounds as the default Parnassus crew tattoo. Troyer pointed out his own on his right hand, conveniently obscuring the small Guru Pitka likeness he drunkenly had inked during production on The Love Guru. Thank God those days are behind him.

]]> http://gawker.com/index.php?op=postcommentfeed&postId=398632&view=rss&microfeed=true <![CDATA[Terry Gilliam Curse Tempted Once Again as 'Dehydrated' Verne Troyer Rushed to Hospital]]> Believe it or not, the last person we'd expect to perpetuate the Terry Gilliam Curse recently landed in the emergency room: Verne Troyer, soon to be seen as Mike Myers' tiny bad-joke magnet in The Love Guru, was reportedly dispatched to a hospital outside Vancouver while shooting Gilliam's near-doomed Heath Ledger project The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus:

A source close to Troyer, 39, says the actor was experiencing "flu-like symptoms."... Adds the source, "He's been working really hard on the film. They just wanted to hydrate him."
A rep for Troyer denied that he was treated for a drug-related problem. "Verne is fine and doing well and is back to work," the rep tells Us.

We wouldn't normally care to speculate about Troyer's potential for relapse here (he underwent treatment for alcoholism in 2006), but with Gilliam and Us Magazine both being who and what they are, we're not exactly choking on our grain of salt. Anyway, didn't new insurance regulations after Ledger's passing require all Gilliam principals to be under strict 24-hour supervision throughout production? And how much water does Verne Troyer really need in a day, anyway?

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