Celebrity Ripped Club: 8 Non-Athletes Who've Gotta Be On Steroids
So, let's get this straight: A baseball player gets caught using steroids, and suddenly Congress puts the whole government on hold to have hearings about it. But, if a rapper uses steroids, apparently we're supposed to think it's no big deal.
Well, it's a big deal to us, and we're sensing a gross double standard, here. We're going to blow the lid off a steroid scandal that stretches far and wide in the world of non-athletes, and we're not going to let our total lack of evidence slow us down.
Dr. Dre
Before & After:
Here's Dre in the studio, looking like a fat kid who just got busted up to his forearms in leftover birthday cake ...
... and here's Dre presenting at last month's VMAs. We had to embed the video because pictures just don't do it justice.
His muscles were so unexpectedly huge. His formerly fat head is so disproportionately small compared with the rest of his body. And, the long, grey underwear shirt is such a bizarre choice for a hip-hop mogul, that we were literally positive he was wearing Kevin Nealon's costume from the Hans and Franz sketch.
We're still not 100 percent convinced that he wasn't.
He Claims:
He's spent two hours in the gym everyday for the past four years.
So Is It Steroids?
A Los Angeles Times article reports he has cut his body fat from 29 percent to around 6 percent in the last few years, and also describes Dre pumping his arms and saying, "I feel like I can kick a brick wall down now." Nope, everything sounds pretty normal there.
The ridiculous "I'm not on steroids, I just spend all of my time in the gym" argument is a classic denial strategy that has been employed by the likes of Barry Bonds and Lance Armstrong. It's basically the equivalent of saying, "I'm not on cocaine because I stay up all night dancing like a douche bag and gritting my teeth." We bet this guy spends a lot of his time in the gym, too.
While the L.A. Times article doesn't come down on either side of the steroid debate, we're going to side with the hip-hop bloggers, who have taken the much bolder stance of, "nigga look like the incredible hulk. gay shit," and more specifically, "yeah dre is full off that act right JUICE. Lol".
Couldn't have said it better ourselves.
Why Would He Do It?:
From 50 to the Game to Busta Rhymes, Dre's entire Aftermath label is full of guys who look like, and wear shirts about as often as, professional wrestlers. Regardless of the reason, it makes us long for the days when rappers wore North Face in the summer and let their glocks do the talking for them.
Carrot Top
Before & After:
In Chairman of the Board Carrot Top was just a skinny guy surfing his way through corporate America in eye-damaging clothing ...
... then he played the scrawny guy in no less than 1,000 AT&T ads.
Then, possibly in preparation for a joke that involved some especially heavy props ...
... he turned himself into a monster from a horror movie.
He Claims:
Well, he has this video which is supposed to detail his diet and workout routine. However, Top seems confused by the high-protein cooking ingredients and doesn't seem to know how to work most of the exercise machines.
Incidentally, the video was also advertising a product called "Plasma Ball," which we almost ordered because we thought it would let us shoot balls of energy like in Street Fighter 2. It turns out it's just a workout supplement.
So Is It Steroids?
In body builder slang, vascularity is the degree to which your veins bulge through your skin, and according to the body building forums we frequent, the veins bulging from CT's arms, shoulders, neck, face and eyeballs indicate he's getting chemical assistance other than the two-drink minimum at the comedy club.
Then again, this is the same body building forum where someone said, "Like or hate his shtick, it's pretty physical so I can see where he'd have to be in shape." So, we may not be dealing with guys with MDs behind their names, here.
Why Would He Do It?:
We couldn't figure out why a comedian would need to make himself so physically imposing. Then, we put it all together.
He's got a nickname that corresponds to his looks;
His incessant visual punning gives him an annoying gimmick;
He appears to have some recent chemical burning of his face and corresponding spackle makeup.
That's right: Carrot Top is a Batman villain.
Charlie Sheen
Before & After:
Charlie Sheen as a skinny stockbroker in Wall Street ...
Then, when cast to play the parody Rambo role in Hot Shots! Part Deux ...
He Claims:
He worked out with a trainer in Maui for eight hours a day (according to this and this).
So Was It Steroids?
Our first impression watching Hot Shots! Part Deux was that they did an incredible makeup job with Sheen and the latex muscle suit. The skin looked very realistic and ... holy shit! Dude, that's really him!
It took Sheen just five months to go from regular guy to looking like a bulging freak of nature. So, supposedly, if you start in October you can have a Stallone-esque physique by around Valentine's Day.
We're not buying it. The average CRACKED staffer works out about four hours a day and when we flex for each other in the hall, we're not seeing bodies like Sheen had. Toss in Sheen's history of drug use and it's easy to imagine he took some chemical shortcuts.
Why Would He Do It?
His salary for the film gave him 4 million reasons. Plus, the role called for a Rambo look and we're assuming he didn't want to spend several months in the sun with latex pecs glued to his chest.
Madonna
Before & After:
As recently as 2006, Madonna was just a pretty lady who looked insanely good for her age.
But, as she passed into her late 40s, she began to exhibit the standard symptoms of menopause such as the muscular biceps of an 18-year-old Golden Gloves boxer and a set of shoulders you could land a goddamn jet on.
She Claims:
"I mix it up -Pilates, yoga. I do it six days a week. Actually, Sunday is horse riding. There is no such thing as a day off."
So Is It Steroids?
Unless Madonna defines "horse riding" as wrestling a wild stallion into submission and then eating its raw flesh, we're guessing she didn't get those arms riding horses. Yoga is even more laughable.
Marion Jones' pretty face allowed the mainstream media to ignore that veins like the roots of a sequoia tree were bulging from her awkwardly huge muscles. The fact that there are two pretty awesome boobs hanging between Madonna's shoulders shouldn't distract you from their alarming "male-gymnist-mid-pummel-horse-routine." quality.
Also, if Madonna's arms aren't manly enough for you, check out this close up of her hand clutching a water bottle as though it were trying to escape from her death grip.
Why Would She Do It?
Madonna has tried on just about every female identity ever created, from the virgin right up through cougar. With nowhere to go, she's ready to move on to men's identities and is apparently starting with Lou Ferrigno.
Christian Bale
Before & After:
Here's Christian Bale as the uncomfortable, borderline-translucent skeleton in The Machinist ...
... and then he was cast to play Batman, so he needed to bulk up.
Damn. And, he only had six motherfucking months to do it. That's 120 pounds to 220 pounds in half a year.
He Claims:
He gorged himself as quickly and as often as possible on ice cream, pizza and milkshakes, often eating five meals in a sitting, and worked out steadily. Bale was so excited about eating pizza after his Machinist diet of cigarettes and Draino, that he reportedly got too big and had to trim down for Batman.
Right, just so we're clear, that picture above is the trimmer version of Bale.
So Was It Steroids?
We're undecided on this one. Sure, the situation is almost identical to Charlie Sheen's, but Bale is a sworn method actor and Sheen is a creepy-looking drug addict (or was at the time).
Being a method actor means that doing a whole bunch of crazy, ridiculous shit to your body is just part of the process. Bale got real-life skinny because his character in The Machinist was insanely skinny, so it might stand to reason that he would only take steroids if Bruce Wayne took steroids. This theory on Bale's strict method does imply that his process also included dressing up in a bat suit, stalking around Manhattan and murdering muggers, but he's so intense that we're actually willing to believe he'd do that.
What we can't get over is the claim that he got that physique on ice cream, pizza and milkshakes. First of all, who was his nutritionist, Chuck E. Cheese? After he ate all the pizza and ice cream did he spend three hours doing laps in the ball pit followed by 250 reps on the Whac-a-Mole?
We're not going to call this for one side or the other because of our man-crush on Bale, but if you're going to show up on set looking like that, at least come up with a believable diet--woodchip and shark egg omelets, for instance.
Why Would He Do It?
He saw the shape Carrot Top had gotten himself into and knew that he had to get ready.
Danny Bonaduce
Before & After:
Let's watch as Danny Bonaduce evolves from adorable little freckled kid ...
... to regular-looking adult ...
... to something between a semiprofessional wrestler and a burned-out exotic dancer.
He Claims:
Steroids. On camera.
So Is It Steroids?
We're thinking it might be.
They did several episodes about it in his reality show Breaking Bonaduce, where they took a camera and basically watched Bonaduce being addicted to things for several weeks. Steroids, alcohol and, most of all, cheap, tawdry fame.
Why Would He Do It?
Danny apparently decided years ago he was going to devote his entire life to being dysfunctional and scary. He roughed up a transvestite back in 1991. He apparently enjoyed the feeling of causing weird and damaging confrontations wherever he went. At some point, he decided to transform his body into a machine that could take scary and awkward behavior to a superhuman level:
We're thinking the whole Bonaduce thing isn't going to end well.
Edward Norton
Before & After:
Edward Norton hit Hollywood as the willowy accused murderer in Primal Fear ...
... and soon after emerged in American History X as a racist superman who looked like he could bring back segregation with a single flex of his pectoral muscles.
He Claims:
He says he worked out for three months and ate lots of protein to add the 30 pounds of muscle for the role. That's right, guys. If you look like the before picture in October, you can look like the after by Christmas--minus the swastika tattoo, hopefully.
We don't buy it.
So Was It Steroids?
We're not the only ones who suspected 'roids. Apparently Arnold Schwarzenegger contacted Norton asking if he had done a cycle of steroids to get that big. We're thinking Arnold is probably something of an expert on the subject.
Why Would He Do It?
Conveying American History X's complex theme (that racism is wrong) required a chiseled and menacing figure to represent white supremacy. And, let's face it, if white supremacists all looked like the "before" picture up there, it'd be hard to take racism seriously as a problem. Society could simply put racism in a headlock until it made a tearful apology.
Sylvester Stallone
Before & After:
Sylvester Stallone has really been in shape his whole career. Here, he is just casually hanging around his house.
Here, he is once he finally got approval for Rocky Balboa ...
... and here he is training with Tony "The Grizzly Bear" Mahoney between takes.
So, what's our point? Well, remember Rocky III when an aging Rocky had to fight the young upstart Clubber Lang? Well, here's what Clubber Lang looks like today.
Sure, Stallone has always been in shape, but he's 60 fucking years old. It doesn't help his case that, while promoting this film, Stallone was stopped at an Australian airport and charged with illegally importing a steroid known as HGH (human growth hormone).
Other celebrities can definitely learn how to defuse their own drug situations by studying Stallone's clever use of words. Sly's use of steroids is just a "minor misunderstanding," Britney Spears is guilty of "confused drinking," and Andy Dick has a "silly cocaine hobby."
So Is It Steroids?
Yes and no, though mostly, (if not totally), yes. Stallone did plead guilty to possession of testosterone and human growth hormones, but he also said it was a "mistake" made because he was "ignorant about local laws." Ignorance, as authorities have repeatedly pointed out to the CRACKED staff, is no excuse, particularly when "Don't do steroids" isn't exactly a "local" law.
Why Would He Do It?
Do you remember all the subtle, character nuances that make Stallone's movies so iconic and inspirational? Of course you don't, because there aren't any.
Now, do you remember when Rocky punched all those guys and, in later movies, those other guys? And, do you remember when Rambo made someone explode with a single arrow and laughed off fatal bullet wounds? Fuck yeah, you do! It's pretty simple; Stallone gets work because he's an enormous ass-kicking machine with indecipherable speech patterns. If Sly ever hoped to get another job, especially at his age, steroids were probably the only course of action.
