On this day in history in the Hot Springs, Arkansas summer heat of 1956, Roger Clinton, Jr. was born to an alcoholic car salesman named Roger, obviously, and a woman named Virginia Cassidy. Ten years earlier and with her first of four eventual husbands, Virginia had given birth to her first child, William Jefferson Blythe III, but he’d ultimately come to be known as Bill Clinton, the Governor of Arkansas and the 42nd President of the United States of America. As he’s written and discussed many times over the years, Bill was always the protective type of older brother, keeping Roger safe from his abusive dad and later from those pesky things known as permanent records.
While Bill has moved on to a post-Presidency role of advocacy for countless global initiatives, receiving just about every prestigious award a man can receive, Roger’s legacy has always remained as the black sheep of the family who had to be pardoned by his older brother, the president, for a cocaine possession charge. Over the years, Roger would dabble in entertainment but he was always Roger Clinton, Bill Clinton’s big, ol’ dipshit brother and the go-to name in lists about hiiiiiiiilariously embarrassing celebrity brothers. Today, I propose we change that.
As long as there are people out there who would call themselves celebrities, there will always be embarrassing celebrity brothers. They’re like the death and taxes of famous people whose parents forgot condoms on multiple occasions. But we shouldn’t get hung up on the past when there are so many other brothers going out of their way to humiliate their very serious celebrity siblings, some even within the last few years. That’s why I wanted to develop this Roger Clinton Sh*ttiest Celebrity Brothers Power Rankings so that we can continue to honor the classic douchebags while also welcoming newer and equally deserving scumbuckets into the fold. With that, our first ever inductees into the Sh*tty Brother Hall of Fame:
Roger Clinton, whose highlights include the aforementioned 1985 cocaine possession arrest, while being dubbed “Headache” by Bill’s Secret Service team. Additionally, his “band” once performed in North Korea, and his greatest acting credit was as Professor Bloom in Bio-Dome.
Billy Carter (above), the alcoholic brother of President Jimmy Carter, and the man who gave us the classic “Holy Crap, Did He Really Just Say That?” moment when, after he’d visited Libya and then hosted a delegation of Libyans in Atlanta, he explained:
“The only thing I can say is there is a hell of a lot more Arabians than there is Jews.” He also argued that the “Jewish media [tore] up the Arab countries full-time,” and defended Libya against charges of state-sponsored terrorism by saying that a “heap of governments support terrorists and [Libya] at least admitted it.” (Via PBS)
Political beliefs aside, Billy was quite a pain in Jimmy’s peanut-loving behind, and he’d end up in a California rehab center just a few weeks later. It’s impossible to imagine how this may have played out in this Internet era.
Additionally, I’m giving a Lifetime Achievement Award to my dear personal friend Frank Stallone. I bet that some of the people reading this expected ol’ Frank to be No. 1, but I’m honestly concerned for the leader of Frankster’s Gangsters after he checked into rehab last month. I want nothing but the best for Sylvester Stallone’s brother, including a manager who understands how the art of public relations works.
But not all celebrity brothers can be as pleasant as Clint Howard or squeaky clean as Jim Hanks, and that’s why I’m awarding Honorable Mention status to the following brothers who have done their best to make their own names by reminding the world that while their brothers may have left us, they’re still here and that’s kind of the same thing. So a certificate of excellence in the field of mooching should be sent to Don Swayze, all of Chris Farley’s brothers and especially Jim Belushi, as soon as we get around to caring enough to put a stamp on their envelopes. Charlie O’Connell was also briefly considered for an honorable mention, but we don’t really want him or Jerry O’Connell making movies anymore, so he can be content by simply having his name mentioned.
Without further ado, I present the first installment of the Roger Clinton Sh*ttiest Celebrity Brother Power Rankings…
10) Miley Cyrus’s half-brother Trace Cyrus
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Trace Cyrus could be sitting on a cure for every disease known to mankind, while he records an album that will inspire world peace for the next 1,000 years. I just can’t get past that tattoo. But then, I suppose it’s not his fault that Hollywood readily identified that this world is full of people who would make his adoptive father and half-sister wealthy enough to act like the biggest a-holes out of Nashville.
9) Jimi Hendrix’s younger brother Leon Hendrix
Jimi Hendrix’s little brother doesn’t get the respect he deserves when people talk about the guys who have made their names by riding family coattails, especially since he has tried desperately (and failed) to sue his sister Janie for a cut of that Jimi Hendrix coin. So he spends his time playing small shows with a guitar that he barely knows how to play while invoking the spirit of his late brother, because it’s not the most depressing thing that you’ve ever seen at all.
8) Cheryl Cole’s brother Andrew Tweedy
In 2011, at the age of 30, Andrew Tweedy was arrested and sentenced to six years in prison for his role in planning a robbery of a post office near his home in Newcastle upon Tyne. The brother of English pop star and X-Factor judge Cheryl Cole, Tweedy secured a fake pistol for his gang as they raided the post office while wearing balaclavas and waving machetes, because life is nothing but a Guy Ritchie movie. Their total haul for the stupid crime? £2,000. So how did these geniuses get caught? Easy, the cops found the getaway car at Tweedy’s home, where he also hid the fake gun, balaclavas and machetes.
7) Daniel Baldwin
It’s hard to pick a Baldwin brother to really represent this list when they’re all so spectacularly flawed, between Alec’s big, stupid mouth and Stephen’s strange, Hulk Hogan-esque insistence of sexualizing his daughter. But only one of these brothers has ever been arrested for running through a hotel naked, screaming his own name, so I guess the honor goes to Daniel, who still somehow manages to get acting gigs every now and then. We could really make the case for establishing a wing of the Clinton Power Rankings Hall of Fame for celebrity families like the Baldwins and Cyruses, but that will have to wait for next year. It’s important that we remember Daniel’s outstanding achievements in vehicular stupidity throughout the 00s, as well as his status as the guy who was kicked off of Dr. Drew’s Celebrity Rehab for trying to bang a porn star.
6) Chef Gordon Ramsay’s younger brother Ronnie Ramsay
Gordon Ramsay’s younger brother served 10 months in an Indonesian prison for heroin possession charges and then returned to England to live life on the streets. Gordon, to his credit, has written about the pain he’s dealt with over his brother, who allegedly threatened the lives of both Gordon and his kids over the years for the sake of money. When their father passed away, Gordon bribed Ronnie with money for heroin just to get him to show up and pay his respect. Sure, that might sound counterproductive, but Gordon also paid for five stints in rehab for his brother, so at least the guy tried.
5) Christopher Nolan’s brother Matthew Nolan
In 2010, Matthew Nolan’s lawyers reportedly argued that the brother of the Dark Knight Trilogy director shouldn’t have been punished for plotting an escape from the Metropolitan Correctional Center in Chicago, because not only did his dumb idea of a rope made of bed sheets make his plan impossible, but anyone who had to spend his days locked in a little cell would have done anything to get out of there, no matter how illegal it was. So why was Matthew even there in the first place? Because he was arrested by the FBI in 2009 on charges of kidnapping and murdering an accountant named Robert Cohen in Costa Rica back in 2005. And even before that, Matthew was accused of using his brother’s name to obtain loans totaling $1 million from banks. Basically, if Chris ever runs out of ideas, he just needs to call his brother.
4) Hayden Christensen’s brother Tove Christensen
Perhaps you know Tove Christensen best for his role as the associate producer on Fred Durst’s 2007 directorial debut, The Education of Charlie Banks. No? Haven’t heard of that one? That’s strange. Well, then maybe you remember him from that time he tried to teach his girlfriend how to be a Hollywood stuntwoman. Back in 2009, Darth Vader’s brother was arrested and charged with felony assault after he reportedly assaulted his girlfriend in front of people and then got in his car to drive off. She reached in the window to get her purse and he hit the gas, resulting in her being dragged 30 feet. Since then, though, Tove has bounced back to produce some other movies that you’ve also never heard of.
3) Reese Witherspoon’s brother John Draper Witherspoon
A real gem of a human being, Ol’ John Boy (above, wearing his finest sh*t-eating grin) was arrested in the early hours of a Saturday morning way back in 2002, when he allegedly welcomed himself into a neighbor’s home and tried to sexually assault her. John had actually been busted the week before on charges of reckless driving and DUI, but he cemented his future as “Reese Witherspoon’s dickhead pervert brother” with this awful story:
“I woke up with him kissing my face and my neck, and I was wearing overalls at the time, and he unlatched one side of the overalls, had his hand down my underwear and was trying to get my pants off when I woke up,” the alleged victim said, according to Nashville’sWKRN-TV News.
In court, Witherspoon appeared to show little concern for the charges against him, the station reports. His bond was set at $24,000. (Via People)
It’s a shame that he didn’t know to use the “Don’t you know who I am?” defense that his sister would later bust out in her own run-in with the law.
2) Kathy Griffin’s older brother Kenny Griffin
In 2009, Kathy Griffin released her autobiography, “Official Book Club Selection,” and she described how having a known pedophile for an older brother affected her growing up, which she obviously talked about in her interviews leading up to the book’s release.
“My brother Kenny who is now passed away and was a pedophile and went to prison and obviously wreaked a lot of havoc on my parents and the family…had an extremely profound impact on me. Maybe in some ways, the most influential relationship of my life. Meaning, when you grow up in a house with someone with that, I don’t know if you call it energy, but he was violent. I saw him beat his wife right in front of me. You know, he was a pedophile. He was extremely sexually inappropriate with me ever since I was a teeny kid. It kind of shapes the way you see the world. For me, it is definitely tied into my trust issues I have with guys. […] In a way, it maybe even contributed to me having a really dark sense of humor.”
Well, I guess it’s nice to be able to honor people posthumously. Perhaps if Kenny was still with us, he’d have locked up the No. 1 spot. Instead, that goes to the brother of one of our favorite actors.
1) Terrence Howard’s brother Antonio Howard
In February of 2011, police in Conshohocken, Pennsylvania were called to the home of then-40-year old Antonio Howard after complaints of a “domestic disturbance.” Once they arrived, Antonio greeted the cops with his dog, a 100-pound mastiff, as he threatened to unleash the animal on them if they didn’t leave him alone. That ultimately led to him pleading guilty to “three counts each of terroristic threats and recklessly endangering another person and one count of ethnic intimidation,” according to the Montgomery News. Big deal, the guy was hammered drunk and used his pissed off and mistreated dog to threaten the police – who among us hasn’t done that? It turns out that once Antonio had been arrested and the officers took him away, all while his two sons heckled and insulted the police, his wife went back inside their home and was later attacked by the dog, because it was still so pissed off.