What About Your Friends: Where Was Chilli and T-Boz?

June 7, 2007 at 4:48 pm | Posted in Editorials/Opinions | Leave a comment

by Rebecca Murphy
 
I saw VH1’s “Last Days of Left Eye” documentary about three times.  The first time I missed the entire first half.  The second time I saw the second half, but missed a few vital segments of it.  The third time, I caught the second half in its entirety… and finally understood why the speculation arose that Left Eye was mentally ill.  First, she burned up her unfaithful boyfriend’s sneakers (and ended up burning down the house).  Angrily burning up a boyfriend’s shoe collection is normal for an emotionally unstable female who becomes this way because of the scars and bruises of an unhealthy relationship.  So I let that pass.  But when I saw how she was cutting her arm with the word “LOVE” and then later tore over her arm again with the word “HATE,” saying something like “I knew there was going to be a little bit of blood,” I knew something was kind of… wrong. Then came the weird “Tarzan” role play in the jungle with some other boyfriend.  Then she told a few of her closest friends that she “felt a spirit was haunting” her, and said to the camera that sometimes she thought she was gonna die.  Then came her withdrawal from TLC, and when Chilli and T-Boz were asked by MTV where Left Eye was during one of her no-shows, Chilli cynically responded “She’s not feeling well,” alongside a few other smart-alec comments, smiling and such, as if they were kind of making fun of her. 

This brought to mind that when she got sent to rehab after burning down her ex-boyfriend’s house, they never mentioned or showed in the documentary Chilli or T-Boz there supporting her. Besides the retrospective documentation of their public appearances, I never once saw Chilli or T-Boz with Left Eye at all.  Not once. 

Not to say that they didn’t have their own lives.  But you would think that there would’ve been more support.  And I can’t say that they never visited her in that rehab center.  But why wouldn’t they reflect that in the documentary?  Apparently, they knew that Left Eye was probably a bit sick and only wanted to deal with the creative Left Eye rather than the real Lisa Lopes. A damn shame.

Concreteloop dismissed the “mental” rumors to defend Left Eye, saying that she was not crazy but rather “spriritual,” but let’s be real.  R.I.P… but she was a bit mental. What exactly was wrong with her? Could’ve been anything, but it’s too late to tell.

It was quite evident that she was sick, tired, let down, and through with where her life was at that moment, and after a car she was riding in hit a boy and killed him, well, that was basically the stick that broke the camel’s back.  And to add salt to injury, the little boy’s last name was Lopez. 
 
Days later, if that, she was riding in this car (above), where, seconds after this scene in the documentary, she drove off the side of the road.

As for Chilli and T-Boz, I may only be speculating, but those comments they made when asked about her, and the fact that they were barely present throughout the more recent parts of the documentary shows that “What About Your Friends” was a song they DEFINITELY did not write.