“Army Wives” star Kim Delaney, who’s been to rehab for alcohol abuse twice, might be checking in a third time after her speech at the presentation of the Liberty Medal Award to former SecDef Robert Gates. She slurred her way through an occasionally incomprehensible speech before being escorted off the stage, but it’s the stuff that people could understand that got her in trouble:
Delaney rambled on the podium about “having served in active military duty family for five years. I’ve seen soldiers come home with painful life-altering injuries borne of their time and service,” she slurred. “I’ve attended numerous military funerals, including that of my best friend’s son.”
Only later in the speech, did she clarify that these experiences were storylines from her Lifetime series: “I do that as a job. It’s all make believe,” she said. “I have the luxury to do all of this on a television show.” [E!]
Fortunately for Delaney, the military has a pretty great sense of humor about things like this. My favorite anecdote about that is the CACO team — the personnel who notify family of combat wounds — who wore their dress blues to a family’s house and were all, “We’re sorry, ma’am, but your son stepped on a mine and lost both his legs in Afghanistan.” And then when the mother started crying, they broke into laughter and said, “No, no, we’re just kidding. That was just a prank we played on you. He’s actually dead.”
Of course, I just made that up in my head just now. Not too different than what Delaney did, except my story was shorter and had a better punchline.
