Charlie Sheen‘s time in the Hollywood spotlight led to some career highs and lows that were addressed in his two-part Netflix documentary, aka Charlie Sheen. The actor comes clean on why his father, Martin Sheen, and his actor brother, Emilio Estevez, decided to reject appearing in the project.
The Two and a Half Men star’s wild years were on full display with stories told from the perspective of fellow stars, friends, colleagues, and family members. Actors like Sean Penn and Denise Richards lent their time to tell stories of Sheen. The actor admitted at a panel, according to People, that both his father and brother watched the documentary before it officially aired and unanimously decided they didn’t need to be included.
“[Martin] saw it and loved it and was just, he was laughing, he was crying, he was so engaged and he comes up to me afterwards and says, ‘I’m already in it. I’d much rather be young, handsome in this thing than this guy right now, you don’t need this old guy in your movie,'” explained Sheen.
While Sheen begged to differ about his father’s sentiment, it was also the first time the family had gotten together to watch the documentary. When it came to Estevez, director Andrew Renzi explained that The Breakfast Club actor simply wanted the spotlight to be on his brother.
“He wanted Charlie to have the project,” Renzi said. “…It was just Charlie’s moment and we were in it.”
Sheen chimed in, saying that his brother also felt they were his stories to tell and bring to light. Renzi also added that part of the reasoning why Estevez and his family decided not to appear was because Charlie’s stories have been well documented. During the height of Sheen’s infamy in Hollywood, there wasn’t a news or media outlet that didn’t report on the actor. Many would agree that he was on the cover of a tabloid magazine every week.
“If I’m putting myself in their shoes without them saying this directly to me, this is their life that they’ve lived for a long time and there was probably going to be a whole bunch of crap that they just didn’t want to have to sit there and have to talk about,” the director said.
In return, Martin also surprised Renzi by saying something that he will “always respect” in terms of “just him being a father.” Martin warned Renzi that one of his reasons for staying out of the film was because, “‘…If this goes sideways, I need to be able to stand beside my son because I always have. And if I’m in this thing, I can’t, because I will have been complicit in this thing that you created.'”
Sheen has been sober for several years, with aka Charlie Sheen documenting his childhood in Hollywood, becoming a mega star, to the darkest moments of his drug addiction, and sobriety.
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