David Gest, the idiosyncratic music producer who was found dead in luxury London hotel The Four Seasons on Tuesday, was ‘strung out’ on sleeping pills and was taking "really strong pain medication” in the days leading up to his death, sources have claimed today.
There are also unsubstantiated claims circulating in the UK press this morning that the 62-year-old music producer been on a cocktail of prescribed drugs including steroids to treat pneumonia.
Pneumonia can often be an agonizing condition and in severe cases patients are given powerful opiate-based medications such as morphine to blunt “sympathetic responses” to the condition such as high blood pressure and a racing heart.
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In a ghoulish twist, it has been revealed that his forthcoming tour was to be titled, “David Gest Is Not Dead but Alive With Soul” – a reference to the fact that a fake death rumor circulated after he had to pull out of a UK reality show on health grounds.
Set to start in July, a poster for the tour features Gest emerging from a coffin with “Born 11.5.1953. Died in the CBB House 11.1.2016” written on it. He had appeared on Celebrity Big Brother earlier in the year, but left the competition early due to concerns over his health
According to a report in the Mirror, Friends who spoke to Gest in the last month said he had been taking a variety of drugs which left him disorientated.
One said: “He seemed strung out and went off the radar at times.
"He was taking some really strong medication because he was suffering from nasty chest problems that just wouldn’t go away.”
The music producer, once married to Liza Minnelli, famously produced the 2001 musical television special "Michael Jackson: 30th Anniversary Celebration: The Solo Years" which featured the final reunion of the Jackson 5 performers.
