Charlie Sheen belongs to one of the largest power families in Hollywood. His father, Martin Sheen, is a well-known actor who has starred in many movies and television shows such as The Departed, Apocalypse Now, The West Wing and Grace and Frankie. His brother, Emilio Estevez, starred in movies such as The Mighty Ducks and The Breakfast Club as well as taking a backseat as director for a number of movies. Two other siblings have also acted and worked on a variety of projects.
Charlie Sheen has gained a reputation as a Hollywood “bad boy” through his wild lifestyle. This reputation only grew in 2011 when Sheen was dismissed from the wildly popular CBS show Two and A Half Men, which led Sheen had a highly publicized “meltdown” was covered extensively by the media. During that period, he made outlandish statements including claims that he was a “warlock” who had “tiger blood” and “Adonis DNA”, in addition to coining his now famous phrase “winning”.
While Charlie’s antics have given him the most attention, there are quite a few strange facts that most people don’t know about him and his family.
Here are 20 Weird Facts About Charlie Sheen And His Family.
Charlie Sheen's interesting collection
For years, Charlie Sheen was a collector of vintage guns and an avid target shooter. Even to the point that he had a private gun range in his basement, but it all changed after an incident in 1990. Reports at the time surfaced that his fiance, Kelly Preston, had accidentally been shot in the arm. It wasn’t until 2011 that Sheen finally clarified what happened during his My Torpedo of Truth tour.
"She explained to me when she lifted my pants off the scale in the bathroom…the tiny revolver I used to carry…it fell out of the back jeans pocket and hit the floor and shot a bullet right between her legs," he explained. "So she got hit with shrapnel from the toilet bowl."
After the incident, Sheen stopped collecting guns and has become an advocate for stricter gun control.
Martin Sheen failed his university entrance exam on purpose
Charlie Sheen’s father, Martin Sheen, has been a successful actor for over 50 years, but it wasn’t the plan that his family had envisioned for him.
After Martin’s mother passed away when he was 11 years old, him and his 9 siblings were at risk of living in an orphanage or foster home. They were able to stay together because the Holy Trinity Catholic Church in Dayton, Ohio, provided assistance and helped the children finish school.
After graduating from Chaminade High School, Martin wanted to pursue a career in acting. Against his father's approval, he had nevertheless been drawn to the profession.
Martin deliberately failed his entrance exam to the University of Dayton so that he could pursue his acting career. His dreams inspired him to borrow money from a trusted Catholic priest and move to New York.
Charlie Sheen has been accused of physical abuse
For years, Charlie Sheen has gained a reputation as an out of control party animal. His wild lifestyle and battle with addiction have been widely reported, but domestic violence overshadowed another part of his life.
Since the 1990s, there have been a series of allegations that have come from Charlie Sheen’s former partners. In 1994, an unnamed UCLA student accused him of hitting her after she refused his advances. In 1996, he was arrested after a physical incident with ex-girlfriend Brittany Ashland. In 2006, his then-wife Denise Richards filed for divorce accusing Sheen of abusive behavior. In 2009, he was arrested on charges of second-degree assault after allegedly harming his then-wife Brooke Mueller.
Sheen has denied all allegations over the years, but did plead guilty to two incidents: namely the above mentioned event in 1996 and the one in 2009.
Charlie Sheen was a star baseball player
Prior to becoming a successful actor, Charlie Sheen showed promise as a baseball prospect. He was a standout on his high school baseball team and even received a scholarship offer to play for the University of Kansas.
"He was a good baseball player, among the best at the school," Jerry Nyman the former pitching coordinator for the Tampa Bay Devil Rays told ESPN in 2011. "He might have played pro ball, and if he played pro ball he might have gone on to make the big leagues. If Charlie Sheen had chosen to go that route, who knows what would have happened?"
His major league hopes were shattered, however, when he was arrested for credit card fraud and expelled from high school just a few weeks before graduation.
Charlie Sheen has at least 12 Tattoos
One aspect of Charlie Sheen’s partying lifestyle that is discussed less often is his tattoos. He has continuously added and removed from his collection over the years, but at this point, the actor has at least 12 tattoos on his body.
Most notably, he had a tattoo done by the legendary Japanese artists Bonten Taró that depicted a Japanese deity on his forearm, later having it covered up with the logo of the Cincinnati Reds. Below his chest, he has a tattoo of an apple with the phrase “Death From Above”. “Denise”, his ex-wife’s name was tattooed on his wrist but then replaced with the word “winning”. He also has a depiction of the Peanut’s character Charlie Brown with a thought bubble that says “Mom”.
Charlie Sheen spent $500,000 on interesting things in 6 months
Charlie Sheen’s wild lifestyle has long been common knowledge, but the full scope of his exploits wasn’t known until 2011.
“He spent a fortune… his preference is to smoke [illegal substances],” a close friend told RadarOnline in 2011. “Charlie’s nightly habit would be tens of thousands of dollars of [substances] and two girls. He would typically pay them $5,000 to $10,000 for the night and would give them cash, check or money transfer. He even bought two girls cars.”
“GiGi was one of the girls who were at Charlie’s house when 911 was called,” another source said. “Charlie had previously bought her a convertible Mustang worth $17,000 and on another occasion, he paid another girl who only saw him once, an $8,000 BMW.”
Charlie Sheen's medical problems
In 2015, Charlie Sheen admitted on an episode of The Today Show that he had been diagnosed with HIV. After a series of rumors started to circulate about Charlie Sheen, the actor finally came forward and talked about his diagnosis.
“It’s a hard three letters to absorb. It’s a turning point in one’s life,” Charlie Sheen said on the Today show in 2015. “It started with what I thought was a series of crushing headaches. I thought I had a brain tumor. I thought it was over.”
Sheen has been a major supporter of HIV/AIDS charities, as well as a donor since 2006 and hoped that coming forward would help destigmatize the disease.
“I have a responsibility now to better myself and to help a lot of other people and hopefully with what we’re doing today others will come forward and say, 'Thanks, Charlie,'”
His children and ex-wives are in the clear
After he revealed his HIV diagnosis, Charlie Sheen was asked if he ever knowingly transmitted the disease to a former partner. A source told MSN in 2015 that Sheen had over 200 sexual partners after being diagnosed. The actor insisted that it was impossible that the disease was transmitted and that he was always upfront and honest with his partners. He also added that he immediately informed his former spouses and oldest child who are both HIV negative.
“It hit her hard, but she recovered. She’s tough like her dad,” he said in an interview with The Today Show. “I said, ‘I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner, but it didn’t seem like you could do anything for me and I didn’t want to burden you with all the stress.’ But she was a rock star about it.”
Charlie Sheen’s children were taken away from him
Charlie Sheen had twins name Bob and Max with his third wife, Brooke Mueller. The couple divorced in 2010 and Mueller applied for a restraining order against Sheen. After the order was obtained, police were force to take the boys from Charlie Sheen’s home.
“I am very concerned that [Sheen] is currently insane,” Mueller stated in the restraining order. “I am in great fear that he will find me and attack me and I am in great fear for the children’s safety while in his care.”
Mueller went on to allege that Sheen had taken the children from her and refused to let her see them. She claimed that when she tried to get the twins back, Sheen came after her with some incredibly aggressive threats.
Martin Sheen had polio as a child and was bedridden for a year
Martin Sheen was born in the 1940's to a Catholic family, 1 of 10 children. While growing up in Dayton, Ohio, his father worked at the National Cash Register Company.
As a child, Martin Sheen was diagnosed with polio. At the time this was a very serious disease that threatened his life. He was bedridden for over a year, but was able to eventually recover and regain the use of his legs.
In addition to his struggle with the disease, Sheen has had to deal with another medical issue from birth: "I was a forceps delivery, in Dayton, and the man made a mess of it,” Sheen told the Economist in 2010. “My shoulder was crunched up and the muscle in the arm never grew. I have hardly any lateral movement."
Charlie Sheen is opposed to vaccines
Despite his father’s struggles with a disease that was cured by a vaccine, Charlie Sheen has spoken out against vaccines and even gotten into a legal battle with his ex-wife Denise Richards over the vaccination of their children. In 2008, a letter emerged from Sheen’s lawyer to his children’s pediatrician in which he threatened to sue the doctor if he went forward with a planned vaccination.
“This letter constitutes formal written notice that Mr. Sheen does not consent to you providing any treatment to Sam and/or Lola Sheen and that Mr. Sheen reserves all of his rights to pursue appropriate action against you should you continue to treat his children without his consent.”
In a later interview Richards said, “ When I vaccinated Sam, he accused me of poisoning her. And I knew when he said that, the marriage wasn't going to work."
Charlie Sheen believes in some weird controversies
Prior to starring in the movie 9/11 in 2017, Charlie Sheen had been an outspoken member of the 9/11 conspiracy theory movement. The conspiracy theory believes that the September 11th terror attacks were not orchestrated by Al Qaeda, but instead by the United States government. On September 8th 2009, he released a video appeal to President Obama to launch a new investigation into the attacks. He also claimed that the findings of the original bipartisan 9/11 commission were fraudulent and part of the conspiracy.
“As my letter chronicles, Sir, 9/11 commission itself says they were lied to, deceived and essentially prevented from carrying out a real investigation," he said before urging President Obama to use his "power as well as the responsibility to initiate a truly independent congressional investigation into the events of 9/11 as well as its aftermath."
Charlie Sheen thought he was going to star in Born on the Fourth of July
After his breakout role in Oliver Stone’s Platoon, Charlie Sheen thought his relationship with the burgeoning director was just beginning.
"He said we were going to have a relationship like Scorsese and De Niro," Sheen said in 2001. "He said Al Pacino wanted to do [Born on the Fourth of July], De Niro wanted to -- everybody wanted to -- and ‘I'm going to give you this movie.'"
Despite the director's promises, Sheen was never contacted iabout the role because the decision was made to cast Tom Cruise instead. He then received a call from his brother, which is when he broke the news to him.
"He said, ‘Are you sitting down?'” Sheen said. “Cruise is doing Born on the Fourth.'"
Charlie Sheen and Emilio Estevez had famous childhood friends
Charlie Sheen and his brother Emilio Estevez grew up in Malibu, California and both attended Santa Monica High School. During their time there, both brothers expressed an interest in acting and made a small group of friends who made and starred in their own short films. Several members of that group went on to become celebrities namely: Sean Penn, Robert Downey Jr., and Rob Lowe.
"For the first time, I met people my own age that wanted to act, that wanted to be filmmakers," Rob Lowe told NPR in 2011. "As opposed to being beaten up for it, I found friends who were like-minded ... It was great to fall in with a crowd that had similar interests."
In his book Stories I Only Tell My Friends, Rob Lowe talked about his relationship with Charlie Sheen and described him as "a wonderful mix of nerd … and rebel."
Emilio Estevez almost went broke working on the script for Bobby
Despite being best known for his acting endeavors, Emilio Estevez is also an acclaimed screenwriter and director. He first caught the public eye in 1990 for writing, directing, and starring in Men at Work with his brother Charlie Sheen, before going on to make The War at Home with his father Martin Sheen.
After some directing work in television, Emilio turned to a passion project: Bobby, a movie about the assassination of Bobby Kennedy. Driven by his father's political passion, the script took about six years to write and almost bankrupted Emilio.
“My dad took me with him [to a rally], and I was on his shoulders, and Bobby reached out and shook my hand,” Estevez told the Associated Press in 2006. “I have no memory of it except as told. That’s where it lives, but it’s still something that happened.”
Charlie Sheen is the highest paid TV actor of all time
A successful television series can be incredibly lucrative for an actor or actress. Once a show reached a certain threshold of episodes, it is eligible for syndication and can be rebroadcast on other networks, which in turn, can generate millions of dollars for actors, showrunners, and the networks who back them.
Because there is often a lot of money on the line after a show has run for several seasons, actors have a lot of leverage to negotiate higher pay. Several cast members of The Big Bang Theory recently signed a contract worth $900,000 per episode, the cast of Friends famously earned $1 million per episode from 2002 to 2004, and Ray Romano earned $1.7 million per episode for Everybody Loves Raymond.
Charlie Sheen surpassed those amounts when he negotiated a contract worth $1.8 million per episode for Two and A Half Men.
Charlie Sheen once held a world record
Charlie Sheen has a very large following on Twitter with over 12 million followers. At one point, he had one of the largest Twitter followings in the world and made a deal with marketing agency Ad.ly, who specializes in social media promotions.
When he first created his Twitter account in March of 2011, he set a Guinness World Record for the shortest amount of time needed to reach 1 million followers. Sheen broke the record before even sending his first tweet and gained an average of 129,000 followers per day.
That record was shattered in June 2015, however, when Caitlyn Jenner joined Twitter. She broke the 1 million follower mark in just 4 hours and 3 minutes - a feat unlikely to be repeated.
He offered to be Trump’s Vice President
In 2015, Charlie Sheen tweeted that he would be willing to run as Donald Trump’s Vice President. The tweet was a response to an interview that Owen Wilson had with The Daily Beast.
“You can’t help but get a kick out of [Trump], and I think part of it is we’re so used to politicians on both sides sounding like actors at press junkets – it’s sort of by rote, and they say all the right things,” Wilson said. “So here’s somebody who’s not following that script. It’s like when Charlie Sheen was doing that stuff – like, wow! He’s answering a question completely honestly, and in an entertaining way.”
Despite his offer, it seems as if Sheen isn’t Trump's biggest fan. In another tweet that has since been deleted, Sheen referred to the president as a “shame pile of idiocy”.
Charlie Sheen has a scar on his chin that he got on-set
In 1987, Charlie Sheen starred in the crime drama No Man’s Land as Ted Varrick. The movie, written by Dick Wolf, has often been cited as the inspiration for the movie The Fast and The Furious.
When working on the set of No Man’s Land, Charlie Sheen was seriously injured after a prop related accident. A dud pyrotechnic (often referred to as a squib) hardened overnight and accidentally detonated at the wrong time. The explosion knocked Charlie Sheen unconscious. He suffered multiple lacerations across the face from the explosion and was rushed to the hospital.
He received 9 stitches and was deaf in one ear for the next four weeks. Sheen eventually recovered, but, to this day, has a scar on the right side of his chin from the incident.
Charlie walked his daughter down the aisle to a song from the Twilight soundtrack
In total, Charlie Sheen has five children from three marriages. His oldest child, Cassandra Jade Estevez, is 34 while his youngest, Max and Bob Sheen, are both eight-years-old.
In 2010, Sheen’s oldest daughter got married to her high school sweetheart at Santa Barbara’s Bacara Resort and Spa. Sheen was in attendance and walked his daughter down the aisle to the tune of the song 'Flightless Bird' from the Twilight soundtrack.
“He was clearly very proud of her,” wedding planner Jill La Fleur of La Fleur Weddings & Events, told People Magazine in 2010. “He had a big smile on his face. “He told her how happy he was for her, and then he teased the groom and made everyone laugh.”
In 2013, Charlie Sheen became a grandfather after Cassandra gave birth to a baby girl named Luna.
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