Aka Charlie Sheen: Untreated crazy over time doesn’t get better, it gets worse.

Charlie Sheen, aka Carlos Irwin Estévez, has lived a turbulent life to say the least. Sheen’s
Hollywood career has spanned decades, starring in era-defining films such as Platoon and
Wall Street (1987). Like many stars of that era, Sheen pivoted his career to the world of
sitcoms. This landed him quite comfortably in the starring roles of Spin City (1996-2002)
Then Two and a Half Men (2003-2015), where Sheen would eventually negotiate a reported $2
million an episode.

This month (September), Sheen turned 60 years old. He celebrated this milestone by sitting
down in a diner and speaking to a camera for a two-part Netflix docuseries, aka Charlie
Sheen. Sheen talks candidly about his successes and his many, many, many failures.
The docuseries is a classic three-act Hollywood setup. Sheen is the golden boy who falls into
a hedonistic world of debauchery, until, eventually, he reaches his redemption arc, the one the
audience of the documentary is supposed to be witnessing. Director Andrew Renzi takes
great pains to encourage the audience to feel the emotional weight of this journey, using
footage from the Sheen family’s home videos and scenes from Sheen’s own Hollywood
movies. Sheen himself is affable and a surprisingly good storyteller. For a man who has
consumed four or five “tennis ball-sized” amounts of cocaine in one evening (regularly) he is
very articulate. The now sober father of five, and grandfather of three, speaks candidly of his
murky nights around Malibu, employing the services of many sex workers and even
befriending a notorious Madam. Sheen hypothesises tha,t because after every downfall an
amazing career opportunity arose and every manic breakdown appeared to be lauded by fans,
there seemed to be “no genuine consequences”. Sheen speaks candidly about his past. But is
it candid enough?

Sheen’s Two and a Half Men co-star, Jon Cryer (Alan Harper) puts it best during his cameo
in the docuseries, speaking about Sheen: “You wanted to like him because he was really
charming and smart…” but “There’s always this tightrope, I don’t know the whole story….is
he the guy he appears to be? Or is there something much darker going on?” Those words are
the subtext of the entire docuseries.

Sheen’s childhood friends, co-stars, and even two ex-wives speak rather highly of him. He is
proclaimed to be an incredibly talented and charismatic man who is/was deeply troubled and
insecure. Sheen walks the tightrope between arrogance and confidence, grateful and entitled.
Collumnist Maureen Callahan discussed Sheen’s docuseries on her YouTube channel and
claims Sheen had “sanded down so much of his own sordid past”(‘The Nerve with Maureen
Callahan’, 2025). Callahan proves this by reading excerpts from Sheen’s father and elder
brother’s (veteran actor Martin Sheen and actor and filmmaker Emilio Estévez) book: Along
the Way: The Journey of a Father and Son (2012). The dual memoir contradicts the rosy
picture Sheen paints of a glitzy, Hollywood-adjoining childhood.

Yet, even in the docuseries, darker stories seep through the cracks, although they are quickly
glazed over. Such as Sheen, reportedly, accidentally shot his ex-girlfriend, the late actress
Kelly Preston, when she moved his clothes from the bathroom floor and a gun fell from his
pocket. Sheen often carried around guns and, by his own admission, threatened individuals
with them. Sheen’s favourite drug dealer, ‘Marco’, is interviewed for the docuseries about
Sheen’s extreme drug use and how he ironically helped Sheen get clean.
A surprise to many was that Sheen’s ex-wife, actress Denise Richards, was interviewed. Sheen
and Richards had an extremely public and acrimonious divorce in 2006. Richards claims she
didn’t want the docuseries to be a “glossed over piece of shit”.
Despite whatever Sheen did or didn’t include in his docuseries, it is an interesting watch
which, much like the man in question, will leave you with way more questions than answers!

***stars.