Larry Birkhead slammed the upcoming biopic about Dr. Sandeep Kapoor who was implicated in Anna Nicole Smith’s death.
“We absolutely object to any of Anna Nicole’s, my life, my daughter’s life being used in a movie,” the photographer, 53, said in an interview with Entertainment Tonight published on Thursday, July 9. “And being made characters out of someone [who] was a doctor that supposedly people were supposed to trust.”
Birkhead claimed that he reached out to Kapoor to discuss how the film could impact his and Smith’s 19-year-old daughter Dannielynn. (Birkhead and Smith met at the Kentucky Derby in 2004, and began an on-and-off relationship that lasted until her death in 2007.)
“I actually have had conversations with this doctor and his representatives,” he claimed. “I warned them about the harm and the emotional distress that this puts on not just myself but also, most importantly, Dannielynn, and how this could impact her and the things that she sees.”
Birkhead also claimed that he is making an effort to stop the film’s production.
“I have filed a complaint with the California Medical Board over Dr. Kapoor’s participation in this movie,” he said. “I’m just going to let the process, you know, play itself out, and see what they have to say about that.”
In 2007, Smith died following a drug overdose. She was 39. Two years after her death, Kapoor was charged with conspiracy, excessive prescribing of opiates and sedatives to an addict and fraudulently obtaining drugs by using false names.
Kapoor was acquitted by a jury on all counts during a highly publicized trial in 2010. Several years later, Kapoor later wrote his memoir, Trust Me, I’m a Doctor: My Life Before, During and After Anna Nicole Smith, and recalled his experiences with Smith and the trial. Kapoor’s book is the inspiration for the biopic starring Kal Penn as Kapoor and Abbie Cornish playing Smith.
Birkheaded added he did not approve of Cornish playing his late ex-girlfriend.
“I recently saw the actress that is portraying Anna,” he told the outlet. “I’m sure she’s probably a nice girl and a great actress but I don’t think she quite embodied Anna Nicole.”
While Birkhead isn’t convinced that Cornish has what it takes to play Smith, Penn shared that he was impressed with his costar’s performance.
“She really embodied Anna Nicole in a very striking way,” Penn said of Cornish in an interview with Variety on Tuesday, July 7. “She was a completely different person. I briefly met Anna Nicole a handful of times way back when I was starting my career, and she was on a reality show. I never really had any conversations of any note with her but it definitely brought me back to that time. Abbie is excellent. She’s phenomenal in this role.”
Read the full article here
