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‘What Happened, Brittany Murphy?’ Documentary: Simon Monjack Secretly Fathered 2 Children and More Reveals

October 14, 2021

It’s been more than a decade since beloved actress Brittany Murphy died at age 32, but fans haven’t stopped looking for answers about the events leading up to her death.

HBO Max’s new documentary, What Happened, Brittany Murphy?, released on Thursday, October 14, attempts to shed some light on the late star’s life, with interviews from friends and colleagues who knew her well.

“Brittany never said an unkind word about anybody, ever,” Marti Faulkner, a friend of the Murphy family, says in the film. “She was very funny.”

Amy Heckerling, who directed the Georgia native in the 1995 classic Clueless, told director Cynthia Hill that the actress’ pleasant attitude came through on camera. It was one of the reasons she decided to cast Murphy, then just 17, as Tai.

“She just felt like a sweet girl who kind of didn’t fit in with the others, and was just trying and being nice but, like, was lost in this world,” Heckerling, 67, explains. “And that’s exactly what I was looking for.”

Though the Uptown Girls star was known for her roles in movies including Drop Dead Gorgeous, Sin City and Girl, Interrupted, her career began a downward turn around the same time she wed Simon Monjack in May 2007. With the exception of her voiceover work for King of the Hill, most of her later roles were in direct-to-video thrillers and horror movies.

In What Happened, Brittany Murphy?, several of the subjects interviewed make it clear that they think Monjack was at least partly to blame for the Just Married star’s waning career. (The London-born producer died in 2010, just five months after his wife.)

“I did start to feel some red flags,” says Alex Merkin, who directed Murphy in Across the Hall, one of her final films. “There was something — I don’t want to say worshipping — about their relationship, but it did feel like it bordered on that. It’s something that felt completely unhealthy, something that felt delusional on some level. A manipulative ploy on his part to control her and to keep his hooks in her.”

For more hot celebrity news, listen to Us Weekly editors dish on top topics & trends with these clips from the Hot Hollywood Podcast!

After Murphy died, the Los Angeles County coroner said that the primary cause of her death was pneumonia, but her late father, Angelo Bertolotti, believed that something more sinister was at work. In 2013, he claimed that a toxicology report showed the presence of heavy metals in her system, leading him to believe that she was poisoned.

The documentary addresses those claims but ultimately concludes that the initial coroner’s report was correct. “This was not something that she just got a day or so before,” Dr. Lisa Scheinin, a retired deputy medical examiner, said of Murphy’s pneumonia. “She was walking around with this for some time.”

Keep scrolling for more revelations from the new documentary:

Credit: Rtn/Mediapunch/Shutterstock

'What Happened, Brittany Murphy?' Documentary: Simon Monjack Secretly Fathered 2 Children and More Reveals

It's been more than a decade since beloved actress Brittany Murphy died at age 32, but fans haven't stopped looking for answers about the events leading up to her death. HBO Max's new documentary, What Happened, Brittany Murphy?, released on Thursday, October 14, attempts to shed some light on the late star's life, with interviews from friends and colleagues who knew her well. "Brittany never said an unkind word about anybody, ever," Marti Faulkner, a friend of the Murphy family, says in the film. "She was very funny." Amy Heckerling, who directed the Georgia native in the 1995 classic Clueless, told director Cynthia Hill that the actress' pleasant attitude came through on camera. It was one of the reasons she decided to cast Murphy, then just 17, as Tai. "She just felt like a sweet girl who kind of didn't fit in with the others, and was just trying and being nice but, like, was lost in this world," Heckerling, 67, explains. "And that's exactly what I was looking for." Though the Uptown Girls star was known for her roles in movies including Drop Dead Gorgeous, Sin City and Girl, Interrupted, her career began a downward turn around the same time she wed Simon Monjack in May 2007. With the exception of her voiceover work for King of the Hill, most of her later roles were in direct-to-video thrillers and horror movies. [jwplayer Ej0bpE3O-zhNYySv2] In What Happened, Brittany Murphy?, several of the subjects interviewed make it clear that they think Monjack was at least partly to blame for the Just Married star's waning career. (The London-born producer died in 2010, just five months after his wife.) "I did start to feel some red flags," says Alex Merkin, who directed Murphy in Across the Hall, one of her final films. "There was something — I don't want to say worshipping — about their relationship, but it did feel like it bordered on that. It's something that felt completely unhealthy, something that felt delusional on some level. A manipulative ploy on his part to control her and to keep his hooks in her." For more hot celebrity news, listen to Us Weekly editors dish on top topics & trends with these clips from the Hot Hollywood Podcast! After Murphy died, the Los Angeles County coroner said that the primary cause of her death was pneumonia, but her late father, Angelo Bertolotti, believed that something more sinister was at work. In 2013, he claimed that a toxicology report showed the presence of heavy metals in her system, leading him to believe that she was poisoned. The documentary addresses those claims but ultimately concludes that the initial coroner's report was correct. "This was not something that she just got a day or so before," Dr. Lisa Scheinin, a retired deputy medical examiner, said of Murphy's pneumonia. "She was walking around with this for some time." Keep scrolling for more revelations from the new documentary:

Credit: Mcp/Shutterstock

Murphy Was Seriously Ill Before Her Death

Scheinin says that the actress was also suffering from severe anemia in addition to pneumonia at the time of her death. "Any decent doctor would have her in the ER, hooked up to a transfusion as quick as they possibly could, because this is a life-threatening situation," she explains. "The anemia in itself would've been fatal even without the pneumonia. The pneumonia was fatal, and then you're adding this to the equation."

Credit: Jss Images/BEI/Shutterstock

What the Coroner Found

When examining Monjack's nightstand after Murphy's death, the coroner says they found approximately 90 bottles of medication prescribed to different names including "Lola Manilow," a possible alias for the actress.

Credit: Matt Baron/BEI/Shutterstock

Secret Children

Before his marriage to the Summer Catch star, Monjack fathered two children that Murphy didn't know about. Elizabeth Ragsdale, the mother of the second child, speaks out for the first time in the documentary and says that her son is now 18. "I know why Brittany chose Simon," she says in the film. "He worked his spell on her, and she fell for it like I did."

Credit: Jss Images/BEI/Shutterstock

Monjack Shared a Bed With His Mother-in-Law

For the final three years of her life, Murphy shared her home with Monjack as well as her mother, Sharon Murphy. A reporter who went to the house after Brittany's death claims in the movie that Monjack told her he sometimes slept in the same bed as his mother-in-law. "Sharon crawls in with me sometimes and we just cry," he said, according to the journalist.

Credit: Gregory Pace/BEI/Shutterstock

Monjack Told a Lot of Stories

Filmmaker Allison Burnett recalls Monjack making many outrageous claims that later turned out to be false. According to Burnett, Monjack told him that he'd previously dated Elle Macpherson and Madonna, owned 17 Ferraris and was dying of terminal brain cancer until an experimental treatment involving shark fins saved his life.

Credit: Paul Hawthorne/Starpix/Shutterstock

Brittany's Friends Tried an Intervention

Another reporter says that the actress' friends and family tried to separate her from Monjack at one point, but their intervention failed. After that, it was like she "disappeared," according to friend Lisa Rieffel. "Simon took her away," she continues. "He made sure no one could get to her."

Credit: Dave Allocca/Starpix/Shutterstock

Spending Problems

Roger Neal, a publicist for Monjack and Sharon, says that Monjack burned through $3 million of Brittany's money in just three years.

Credit: Gregory Pace/BEI/Shutterstock

Monjack's Isolation Tactics

By the time of Brittany's death, Monjack was working as his wife's agent, manager and makeup artist. Trista Jordan, who worked as the makeup artist on Brittany's final film, said that she was told the star's husband would be doing her makeup when she arrived on the set of Something Wicked. Jordan adds that Brittany was so thin while filming that she looked "like Bambi."

With reporting by Diana Cooper

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