While millions of Americans gather for turkey and pumpkin pie each November, Hollywood's elite often find themselves embroiled in scandal and tragedy during the Thanksgiving holiday weekend. This seemingly cursed period has witnessed some of Tinseltown's most shocking moments, from mysterious deaths to very public meltdowns.
The Tragic Cases That Haunt Hollywood
The mystery surrounding Natalie Wood's Thanksgiving weekend death has haunted Hollywood for more than four decades. On November 28, 1981, the West Side Story star's body was discovered floating near Catalina Island after spending an evening aboard a yacht with her husband Robert Wagner, friend Christopher Walken, and captain Dennis Davern.
Although initially ruled an accidental drowning, the case resurfaced in 2009 when Davern came forward with new information. Wagner was later named a 'person of interest' after the captain recalled a heated argument between the couple shortly before Wood's disappearance. Now 95, Wagner has never faced trial, though authorities reclassified the case as 'suspicious' decades later.
Modern Scandals and Public Meltdowns
Thanksgiving 2009 brought another high-profile implosion when Tiger Woods' world unravelled following reports of an affair with Rachel Uchitel. In the early hours of Black Friday, Woods crashed his 2009 Cadillac Escalade outside his Florida home, striking a fire hydrant and then a tree mere feet from his driveway.
Police found Woods drifting in and out of consciousness with facial cuts and blood in his mouth. His wife Elin Nordegren arrived and reportedly smashed the rear window with a golf club to extract him. The incident triggered a massive public scandal, with multiple women coming forward alleging affairs, ultimately leading to the couple's 2010 divorce and Woods entering sex-addiction rehabilitation.
The holiday chaos extended to Halle Berry in 2012, when a violent confrontation erupted outside her Hollywood Hills home during a custody exchange of her then four-year-old daughter Nahla. Her ex-boyfriend Gabriel Aubry had just dropped off their child when a physical altercation broke out with Berry's then-fiancé Olivier Martinez.
The fight hospitalised both men: Aubry sustained a fractured rib, facial bruising and a black eye, while Martinez suffered hand and neck injuries that required him to wear a brace. Police booked Aubry on suspicion of misdemeanour battery, though prosecutors eventually dropped the charges.
Relationship Breakdowns and Career Crises
Just before Thanksgiving 2016, Kanye West abruptly cancelled his Saint Pablo Tour after walking offstage during bizarre rants in Sacramento. The following day, after his physician expressed concern for his mental state, police and paramedics responded to his home. Kanye was transported by ambulance to Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center, reportedly handcuffed to a gurney as part of a standard psychiatric hold.
Sources indicated the breakdown resulted from severe sleep deprivation, dehydration and mounting paranoia, with Kanye allegedly believing people were 'out to get him.' Kim Kardashian flew back from New York and spent the week coordinating his care, though the incident became a defining moment in their relationship, which ultimately ended in 2021.
Robert Downey Jr faced his own Thanksgiving disaster in 2000 when police arrested him in a Palm Springs hotel room with 4.5 grams of methamphetamine and cocaine - just months after completing a prison sentence for similar offences. The bust derailed his career resurgence on Ally McBeal and forced him into another round of rehabilitation, though his path to redemption eventually led to his iconic role in Iron Man.
Thanksgiving has also proven fatal for numerous celebrity relationships. Pamela Anderson and Kid Rock divorced just four months after their July 2006 wedding, with their split coming shortly after the release of Borat, in which Anderson appeared. Jessica Simpson and Nick Lachey announced their separation on Thanksgiving 2005, while Will & Grace actor Eric McCormack and his wife Janet Holden ended their 26-year marriage during the 2023 holiday season.
Historical Hollywood Tragedies
Hollywood's Thanksgiving curse isn't merely a modern phenomenon. Two days after Thanksgiving in 1942, Boston's Coconut Grove nightclub erupted in flames, killing 492 people in what remains America's deadliest nightclub fire. Among the victims was Western star Buck Jones, who had visited a children's hospital just hours before the blaze.
Whether it's sudden deaths, public meltdowns, career-derailing arrests or shocking breakups, Thanksgiving has consistently proven to be a perilous time for Tinseltown's brightest stars, cementing its reputation as Hollywood's unluckiest week of the year.
