Natasha Lyonne, looking frail and petite, was surrounded by friends as she attended the premiere of a documentary about Saturday Night Live boss Lorne Michaels in Manhattan on Thursday night.
“She gave everything to get here,” one friend admitted of the beloved star. This week, the incident comes just hours after she was seen by Page Six “rejuvenated” after being forcibly removed from a Delta plane. On Friday, Lyon claimed to have taken the sleeping pill Lunesta after boarding the flight.
Leung, who was sitting in first class, refused to comply with flight attendants’ requests to close his laptop and fasten his seatbelt, forcing the plane to return to the gate. When a Delta Airlines employee boarded the plane and asked the actress if she needed medical treatment, she asked, “Where am I?”
Those closest to the director of the hit Netflix series Russian Doll have reportedly been worried about her for some time, and the latest incident has them even more worried about her health.
This year has been a year of change for Leon. She revealed in January that she had relapsed after a long period of sobriety.
The former child star’s publicist broke up with his girlfriend earlier this year. She is not currently working with CAA’s top agents and her Peacock show “Poker Face” has not been renewed for a third season, sources claim.
We reached out to Ms. Lyon’s new spokesperson, but CAA said she remains a customer.
Friends are now desperately trying to help the actress, who is set to star in the new season of HBO’s “Euphoria,” get back on track.
Lyonne, 47, has spoken in the past about nearly dying from heroin and alcohol addiction in the 2000s, a problem that led to her friend, actor Michael Rapaport, evicting her from his West Village home. In 2005, she was admitted to a Manhattan hospital with a collapsed lung due to hepatitis C, infective endocarditis, and intravenous drug use, and later underwent open-heart surgery.
She spoke openly about her struggles and drinking. In fact, she was one of the supporting celebs involved in John Mulaney’s intervention in December 2020, along with Seth Meyers and then-boyfriend Fred Armisen.
“Recovery is a lifelong process. To anyone who is suffering, please remember that you are not alone,” Lyon posted on X in January, admitting he had relapsed after 10 years of sobriety. “Thank you for the love and smart feet.”
The “Orange Is the New Black” alum also cited hockey player Sophie “Bumbo” Braverman as one of her driving forces. Deadline previously reported that she was set to write and direct the Braverman biopic, which is scheduled to begin production this summer.
Last month, Rion wrote to X: “I am proud to report that this child is doing much better and is back on his feet.”
She appeared sober at the party for the Peacock movie “Loan!” After appearing at an event with journalist Ronan Farrow’s boyfriend, Hammer Morgenstern. “They lean on each other in a good way,” the source said. She was photographed leaving the party with Farrow.
Meanwhile, “SNL” stars, including Sarah Sherman and late night host Seth Meyers, were also seen cheering on Lyonne throughout the night.
“She’s obviously going through a very difficult situation right now and unfortunately she’s had to do it in public to some degree and that complicates the situation,” said a friend. “This is overwhelming for you. You have no control over it… It’s really sad because Natasha has been fine for so many years.”
According to Page Six, the problem has been going on for more than a year.
Last April, Lyon announced to those around him that he was going to rehabilitate himself while preparing to launch Asteria Film Company, an AI film studio focused on ethical and copyright-cleared technology. It is unclear whether that happened. She founded the company with her boyfriend, media executive Bryn Muser.
She was scheduled to direct her feature film debut, Uncanny Valley. The film is a hybrid project featuring AI tools, co-written with Brit Marling, and set in a “parallel present,” but it’s unclear whether the film has gone into production.
I hear that the friends in Hollywood have always had a close relationship. At the Euphoria season 3 premiere in Hollywood on Wednesday, director Brian Grazer was seen supporting Lyonne as she walked the red carpet wearing a sheer top and no bra.
A few hours later, she took a Delta Airlines Redeye flight from Los Angeles to New York, where she was scheduled to record an interview with Drew Barrymore for a talk show.
Explaining the details of the incident, an onlooker told us: “At least four flight attendants came up to Natasha… They kept saying ‘ma’am, ma’am’ but couldn’t even get her attention as they bent over her face. She was very, very frustrated.”
“She was slumped in the seat in front of her with her legs up and her laptop open. Flight attendants came over and closed the laptop multiple times. They took the laptop out of her hands, set it aside, and asked her to fasten her seatbelt, which she never did.”
The onlooker said Lyon was never “obstructive” but added: “She was very out there and dangerous. In an emergency she wouldn’t be able to move. There were literally multiple flight attendants, at least four, plus the gate agent. They tried to get her attention, but no one could. It took a long time to get her to her feet.”
“At one point, one of them shook her and said in her distinctive raspy voice, ‘You scared me.'”
When Lyon got up to go to the bathroom, passengers feared she would become trapped in the car. Instead, she came out and ate a bag of pretzels.
“She was very calm and got off the plane of her own free will,” said an onlooker. “She didn’t cause a scene.”
On Friday, she wrote to It was Mori. Once I landed I was planning on heading straight to the gram for a slot with my dear @DrewBarrymore. I was looking forward to meeting Drew and the detailed combo, but I think ICE had other plans and I was detained instead. Until now, @Delta We have never had a problem with unpaid workers at @TSA.”
Lyonne was only 7 years old when she reprized her role as Opal in Pee-wee’s Playhouse. She described her childhood as unstable and turbulent.
When she was 8 years old, her boxing promoter father moved the family to Israel, where “his dream was to bring Mike Tyson to the Tel Aviv Hilton and become Israel’s Don King,” she told Rolling Stone.
She thought she might become a spy as an adult, but said, “The hypervigilance I was experiencing was less about being a child in an unsafe home and more about developing this high emotional IQ about the human condition, for better or for worse.”
After her parents divorced and she moved back to New York with her mother, she was kicked out of the Upper East Side yeshiva where she had received a scholarship for selling marijuana. He then enrolled at New York University to study film at the age of 16, before dropping out.
In the late ’90s, Lyonne rose to fame with roles in American Pie, But I’m a Cheerleader, and The Slums of Beverly Hills.
The actress said her anxiety led her to turn to drugs, and she was arrested for drunk driving in 2001 and charged with criminal mischief, trespassing and harassing a neighbor in 2004.
After attending a court-appointed rehabilitation facility in 2006, Lyon slowly began to turn his life around. “I was definitely as good as dead,” she told Entertainment Weekly in 2012.
She made a big comeback in 2013 when she played inmate Nicky Nichols in the Netflix hit OITNB. Her character’s heroin use was well known to the actress.
In Season 3, Nichols, like Lyonne, underwent heart surgery as a result of drug use. No makeup was needed to create a post-surgery scar.
“That scene was never fun for me,” Lyonne told People magazine. “I had to evoke memories of painful emotions…My experiences were very similar, but still very distant.”
Lyon dated SNL veteran Armisen for eight years before announcing their split in April 2022. “Honestly, I think we broke up because we wanted a pool,” he joked to The Hollywood Reporter. “We love each other as much as we love each other and we still talk all the time, but Freddie hates pools.”
Those who love Lyon are simply asking for her help. “She’s so talented, so amazing, so talented,” one close insider said.
“I think it took a lot of courage to go out,” a friend familiar with the situation added, referring to his appearance in New York City just two days after the plane crash. “After an incident like that, many people hide from the world and won’t see each other for weeks or months. But this shows that she’s strong and confident and she doesn’t want to be sidelined, and she shouldn’t be.”
