Skip to Content

He’s the man behind the world’s most successful TV show, as well as the owner of six platinum albums (!?) and is worth tens of millions.

But David Hasselhoff is tanking big time these days, hitting a new low this week when he was told he was too drunk to fly after staggering around a VIP lounge at London’s Heathrow Airport. Scotland’s Daily Record says the former Baywatch star was spotted drinking at 8 a.m. and babbling incoherently before ultimately being denied permission to board the plane.

The Hollywood Gossip Logo

A spokeswoman for Hasselhoff said he was not drunk, but suffering from the effects of antibiotics. He caught a later flight, but the episode made a mockery of his claims that he had beaten the battle with the bottle. He attended the Betty Ford Clinic for alcoholism treatment in 2002, but was convicted of drunken driving in 2004.

Friends are blaming his fall from grace on the bitter divorce he is going through with actress Pamela Bach, which became official yesterday. The 16-year marriage crumbled in January, with divorce proceedings taking a nasty turn when Bach accused the Hoff of breaking her nose and screaming at her in front of their two teenage daughters.

“The only person who broke my wife’s nose was a plastic surgeon,” David hostilely shot back, also accusing his wife of drug abuse and filing for sole custody of their children.

She denied his claims and won a restraining order against him.

But the divorce isn’t the only part of Hasselhoff’s life to take a nose dive. Despite a vast personal fortune, his career seems to be spiraling downward as he lurches from one debacle to the next. They include being booted out of Wimbledon after trying to barge his way into the players’ lounge demanding beer. Man, even Pamela Anderson hasn’t let herself go this bad.

“All I want is a drink. Do you know who I am?” witnesses say the actor yelled.

That came only a few days after a bizarre accident in a London hotel, in which the star says he hit his head on a lamp, causing a shard of glass to sever four tendons in his hand. A member of staff nearly fainted when The Hoff emerged naked from the bathroom looking for help as blood poured from his dome.

Hasselhoff made a fortune by buying the rights to Baywatch from NBC and turning into the world’s most-watched TV series. But since the days of Mitch Buchanan, the Hoff has lost his golden touch. He was offered the chance recently to be a judge on America’s Got Talent, the new series created by Simon Cowell of American Idol fame.

But now he’s got other ideas.

“It’s not my cup of tea. Simon Cowell conned me into it. I’m trying to get a sitcom, or maybe even my own show, Travels With The Hoff,” he said.

He’s even planning to follow up his recent appearance in Chicago on the West End stage with a musical of his own life. Hasselhoff: The Musical is set to open later this year in Australia. His latest single, “Get Outta My Car,” is also being released down under. The incredibly campy video sees Hasselhoff shamelessly sending himself up as he cruises around in KITT with a chick half his age.

This endless material for parody has seen him become a favorite on the Internet. In a recent poll, he was named as the celebrity most likely to be mentioned in an email, ahead of stars such as Brad Pitt and Britney Spears.

That’s just as well because, if his current career path continues, self-mockery will be the only way he’ll be in the public eye.