Contested Pieces from Frey Memoir
Oprah Winfrey tore into author James Frey last week, after allegations surfaced that his Oprah's Book Club memoir A Million Little Pieces had been falsified. Frey, whose memoir recounts his problems with drug addiction, was scolded by Winfrey that he had "betrayed millions of readers" by fictionalizing his story.CRACKED has excerpted some of the more contested passages below:
Excerpt from Chapter 3: A Date With Destiny
...didn't believe that I'd had sex with the Queen. I invited DiCaprio to smell my fingers, holding them out to his face, but he couldn't hear me over the sound of the helicopter blades. "No time for that now, boys," Captain Mactaggart yelled at us. "This assassination mission of Osama bin Laden won't execute itself."
As I turned down a parachute, electing to drop the 15,000 feet unassisted, I knew in my heart he was right.
Corrected Version: Having polished off a case of Pabst Blue Ribbon the day before, I awakened around 3 am, slightly hungover, on my couch. I saw my pants around my ankles while my golden retriever, King, licked my groin feverishly. Meanwhile, sounds blared from the sole speaker on my 12" black and white television. I soon realized that I was halfway through an especially action-packed episode of The A-Team
Excerpt from Chapter 6: A Deadly Romance
"We've never seen an eight-inch penis before!" agreed the Dallas Cowgirls hungrily.
"What, you mean this ten-inch penis of mine?" I laughed dismissively.
"That is the biggest twelve-inch penis we've ever seen!" they chorused.
After that I boned them with my massive fifteen-and-a-half-inch penis until they collapsed in exhaustion, thanks to my secret Black Ops training as a championship Sex Magician.
Corrected Version: It was an especially fierce orgasm that rocked my whole body, causing me to hit my head against the cellar pipe. As my mom came down the basement steps to do some laundry, she had no idea of the horror that would haunt her for years to come: seeing her 37-year old son passed out, penis exposed, having just masturbated onto one of her knitting magazines. Excerpt from Chapter 9: The Secrets of the Galaxy
...the Moon wasn't as cold as I expected, so I took my space suit off despite a chorus of objections from Ground Control. Clint Eastwood and Kofi Annan went to collect moon rocks from the lunar surface while I did some 500-pound benchpresses.
I'd only gotten to rep 487 when the Martians contacted me through telepathy. "Are you the one called James Frey, written of in the Galactic Records as the Chosen One?" they asked. 'That's my name, don't wear it out,' I said, and the Martians laughed at my joke.
Corrected Version: I sped off in my Pinto, set to finally return Spaceballs to the Blockbuster near my house. When I got there the pimple-faced teen behind the counter said to his co-worker, "Dude! It' that guy Frey from the picture we have up on the wall!" I pushed the tape into the Quick Drop box and wittily replied, "That' my name, don't wear it out!" No one laughed at my joke.
Excerpt from Chapter 10: Two-fisted Tales of Valor
...distracted from my upcoming heavyweight boxing championship fight while I waited for news back from the doctor.
Would the cancer be recessive? The suspense was killing me. Finally, after what seemed like years, my doctor called with the news. 'Mr. Frey, I don't want to alarm you,' he said. 'But our tests show no evidence of cancer in your bowels.'
'What's the problem, then, doc?" I said, relieved.
"Our x-rays did find gold," my doctor said slowly. "Mr. Frey, against all documented medical science, it appears you can shit golden apples."
Before I even had time to digest the news fully, I heard the first rumblings of an earthquake. "No time to talk now, doctor!" I yelled, putting down the phone and getting into costume. As I flew out the window towards the collapsing bridge, I reflected briefly on how difficult kicking drugs had been. It had been really really hard.
"What a great memoir," I thought, as my heat vision tore into the rupturing ground.
Corrected version: After a long wait in the emergency room, the doctor finally took me to have the x-ray taken. How would I explain getting one of those long pepper grinders up my ass? The reality of the coming embarrassment weighed heavily on me.
By Jay Pinkerton
