My celebrity romance

My former roommate, Allison Martin, now Hansen, who used lived with me here in Los Angeles sent the following to me in an email with the Subject: It could have been you...

He acts like a child. She always makes him the bad guy. After less than a year of marriage, this is what it's come down to for Gary Coleman and Shannon Price.

While the 40-year-old Diff'rent Strokes star and his 22-year-old bride of eight months aren't getting a divorce, they will be airing this and other marital laundry on TV's Divorce Court, the Associated Press reports.

"If he doesn't get his way, he throws a temper tantrum like a 5-year-old does," Price complains, according to a transcript of the show obtained by the AP. "He like stomps the floor and yells, 'Meehhhh,' and starts throwing stuff around. He bashes his head in the wall, too."

Coleman counters that "the male is always the bad guy," but acknowledges he does have his demons.

"It's not her fault," he says. "I always feel like I have the weight of the world on my shoulders every day I get up. … There are days I don't even want to get up." – Mike Fleeman

Yup. It could have been me.

In 2002, I was working on a production shoot for Bette Midler's Tour. It was a one-day shoot in Hollywood and we had a very small crew. We were shooting in Judge Judy's courtroom, Bette Midler was present and as well, Gary Coleman was cast as the bailiff. By the way, before the shoot, we were explicitly told not to say, "Whachyu talkin' 'bout, Willis," to Gary. I was super bummed.

In the course of the day, I rubbed elbows with everyone on set and all of the crew and of course, with Bette and Gary. I can't remember what it was I was doing, but somehow, I found myself alone in the make-up room with Gary and in the course of our conversation, he asked for my phone number, which I gave to him. Why I gave it to him, I do not know, but to this day, I do not regret it.

Back in 2002, we still had land lines and answering machines. I can't tell you what a treat it was for my roommates and I to come home to messages from Gary, most of which exceeded the 2-minute limit on our machine. He talked about different things, but he mostly rambled on about how he couldn't leave his phone number because if he had to change his phone number one more time because of all the harassing phone calls he would likely receive from fans, he would blah, blah, blah. We loved crowding around the machine and re-playing the messages over and over again.

It was over the course of two months that he would call and leave messages and give the same explanation. He never really figured out that no one was home during the day...doy. But, finally, one miraculous day, he had apparently grown enough trust in my answering maching to leave his number, though very reluctantly...of which he explained in detail.

I eventually called him back one evening, but since I choose not to go on dates that start at 10 pm, I never actually went out with nor did anything with him. Ever since then, he's always held a small, very small, place in my heart.

My one celebrity romance. Ask him and he might deny it, believe me or do not, but I will say this, of all the people I could lie about, uh, why would I choose Gary Coleman? Though, it kind of does make for a better story! I know, I get all the good ones...I still have his number in my phone for anyone who wants it!