The Howard Stern Show's Artie Lange, who has publicly spoken about his addiction to heroin, fell off the wagon as was reported by Page Six last week. Artie spent his one-week summer vacation from the show in rehab. Sadly (as the above video shows, grotesquely), the Stern fans often feed Lang's addictions by cheering-on his excesses. That is one of the tragedies of Comedy as an "art" -- small a -- form, is that it rewards the buffonish. Today Artie was on-air discussing how it all happened. From Marksfriggin:
"Howard and the guys were back from their week long vacation this morning. Howard started the show off talking about being back live and saying that he got an e-mail from Bubba telling him it was time to get back to work. Then he brought up what went on with Artie over vacation.
"... Howard wasn't able to get a hold of Artie so he figured he was out having fun. It turns out Artie wasn't out having fun. He got a note from Jimmy Kimmel telling him that Artie was in rehab. Howard figured that he'd know before Jimmy would but Jimmy knew that he didn't show up to the Bob Saget roast. Artie said that he really wanted to go to that and it was the first time he's ever missed anything like that.
"... Howard said he didn't know about the rehab but he figured that maybe the sleeping on the air was part of the problem after he heard that. Howard said that he just thought Artie was tired when he'd fall asleep on the air. Artie said that he fell off the heroin wagon. He said he fell off about 7 weeks ago. Robin said she knew that he was off last week when he was nodding off.
Artie said that it wasn't all from the drugs when he'd nod off on the air. He said that he had a whole story to tell and asked Howard if he wanted him to talk about it now. Howard said he was going to hold off a while but he could if he wanted.
"Artie said that about 2 weeks before he went to Afghanistan he was told that he could handle this tour he was going on. Artie said that he had gone out a couple of weeks ago and hung out with the wrong crowd in Jersey. He said that he ended up getting some heroin and that was it.
"... Artie said that they'd go into this place called High Que and there would be a bunch of shitheads in there that they could beat. He said that a lot of them were high school kids who were just losers. Howard and Robin found that to be pretty amusing. Artie said that he and his buddy would pretend that they didn't know each other and they'd get into a 3 way 9 ball game and he could set up his buddy so he could have the easiest shot at the 5 and the 9 and they could make like $600 to split in a night.
"Artie said that there are some of those guys he used to play with that haven't moved on in life. He said that one of them plays in this league and he's afraid to go because there are some shady types out there. Artie said he was drinking that night and he really shouldn't have been. He skipped the Subutex that night so he could drink and that wasn't a good idea. Artie said he got drunk that night and shot pool with a bunch of guys who he used to know or just recognized him. He said that he had a lot of pressure on him and he knew that he was in a danger zone. One guy asked him if he wanted some heroin. The guy knew his past but he wasn't a friend.
"Artie said that he hasn't done coke since August 4, 1997 but people will still put it in his hand and offer it to him. Howard said that this is basically like Satan putting the stuff into his hand. Artie said that he had a wad of money on him and he bought a couple of bags of heroin that night. He paid like $40 per bag. Robin asked if that's all it costs to ruin your life."
The full, sad story here (Good luck, Artie).
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