Comedian Rodney Dangerfield, whose hallmark is the complaint that he gets “no respect,” testified on Tuesday that a story in the weekly tabloid newspaper The Star that alleged he used cocaine and marijuana was untrue.
Dangerfield, 72, is seeking a multimillion-dollar award against the tabloid over a September 1990 article headlined, “Rodney Dangerfield ‘Swills Vodka by the Tumblerfull, Smokes Pot All Day and Uses Cocaine.”‘ The story said the incidents happened during a 10-day stay at Caesars Palace Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas in March 1988.
Dangerfield, whose films include Easy Money, Back to School and Natural Born Killers, testified before U.S. District Judge Robert Lew in his non-jury libel suit against the paper.
Outside the courtroom, he told reporters the story was “ridiculous and untrue.”
A lawyer for The Star, Vincent Cox, said the tabloid’s story was based on court testimony and documents stemming from a successful breach-of-contract lawsuit Dangerfield filed against Caesars, plus anecdotes.
Included among the anecdotes, which Dangerfield testified were untrue, was an allegation that he had run around nude in his hotel suite with a pair of naked women.
