‘Growing Pains’ star Alan Thicke dead at 69
Canadian actor and television personality Alan Thicke died on Tuesday. He was 69.
His longtime agent and friend Tracy Mapes confirmed the actor’s unexpected passing.
“I’m in shock,” she told the Daily News late Tuesday. “I am devastated and heartbroken. Today the world lost an amazing talent. He was charming, witty, talented, an icon. I was so blessed to have him in my life.”
The sitcom star was at Pickwick Ice, a skating rink he frequents for pickup hockey games, when he began experiencing chest pains.
“He was in the building having some problems, feeling his heart,” a source at the California rink told the Daily News. “He was awake when he left the rink. He was talking when he left for the hospital.”
Thicke, who became nauseous and then vomited, was rushed to Providence St. Joseph Medical Center around noon and was pronounced dead there, according to TMZ. Actor and comedian John Ritter died at the same medical center in 2003 after doctors treated him for a heart attack, rather than an aortic dissection. A jury concluded the doctors weren’t negligent, but St. Joseph still paid settlement money to the “Three’s Company” star’s family.
The vice president of Pickwick Ice told Entertainment Tonight that Thicke requested his son take a photo of him as he was being carried away on a gurney.
“He had Carter take a picture of him, and said, ‘Make sure you get the rink in the background’ as they were taking him out of here,” Darin Mathewson told ET. “When he went by us, he gave us the thumbs up, like, ‘I’m doing good guys, I’m good.'”
The TV icon was best known for his role as dad Jason Seaver…
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