Talk:Brad Renfro/Archive 1

Death mentioned too many times
Seriously, his death doesn't have to be mentioned in different sections of this article. Oh, and plagiarizing TMZ isn't something people should be doing for an encyclopedia. Ultatri (talk) 23:48, 15 January 2008 (UTC)
 * I agree. I changed it up and removed the mention of his death in the header. It doesn't need to be in the beginning as the infobox shows that he is deceased. I also removed some unneeded info that was sourced from MySpace. Since this is a recent death, expect a whole lot of changes in the next few days. More than likely, this page will have to be protected. Pinkadelica (talk) 00:16, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Speaking of protections, I think we'll be needing that pretty bloody soon. Just revised a blatant blanking of the page.Ultatri (talk) 00:30, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
 * I'm lost on why someone would vandalize this page for Nikki Blonsky. THE evil fluffyface (talk) 00:32, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
 * As am I. But this is beginning to become ridiculous. I've done more revisions in the last 20 minutes or so than in the last week. This man hasn't been dead for a day and this page is rife with vandals. Truly, a protection is in order.Ultatri (talk) 00:36, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Agreed and done. Cheers, CP 00:46, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks so much! Two of us were attempting to revert all the changes. Pinkadelica (talk) 00:51, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

According to People.com http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20171939,00.html He died in his home in Los Angeles. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.239.218.226 (talk) 01:33, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Leon Kennedy is a Resident Evil character. Why is the link pointing to Biohazard 2? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Maryely (talk • contribs) 04:37, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
 * The Resident Evil series is known as Biohazard in Japan, hence because his appearance was in a Japanese ad, it was for Biohazard 2, not Resident Evil 2. The link is good, IMO. BookhouseBoy (talk) 06:11, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Career: beginning
I thought this was interesting: could someone add it to the article for me? Online source at bottom. Thanks, j.

In at 1994 profile of Mr. Renfro in The New York Times, Joel Schumacher, director of “The Client,” said he was looking for “a tough and savvy survivor, a kid with an authentic Southern accent, a kid from a trailer park, like the character in the movie.”

He found Mr. Renfro, then all of 10, through the Knoxville Police Department. He had a reputation as a troublemaker and had recently played a drug dealer in a school production of an antidrug play. The film’s casting director, Mali Finn, said she intended to let Mr. Renfro audition for 10 to 15 minutes, but ended up letting the tape run for an hour. Mr. Schumacher told The Times that when he viewed the tape, “I was struck by the maturity and sadness of his eyes,” adding: “I couldn’t believe a 10-year-old that good-looking and smart who had a difficult life could actually act on the screen. It was too good to believe.”

Over the next decade Mr. Renfro carved out a niche playing inarticulate, vulnerable, alienated youths in everything from glossy Hollywood blockbusters to hardscrabble independent dramas. His acting was naturalistic and emotionally transparent; he played humiliation and frustration with disarming and sometimes upsetting frankness.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/16/arts/16renfro.html?ref=movies


 * I would say maybe all of this could be summed up in a sentence or so in his career section. His death may be notable, but it isn't all of a sudden making Renfro a major celebrity who needs an exhaustive description of his life. I'd say the page is fine as it is now, with more to be added on his death as more info is released as it is clearly a notable event.Gwynand (talk) 14:27, 16 January 2008 (UTC)


 * Agreed. The material from the NY Times is well-written, but it does not seem to add significant content to the article. If that content were to be added, it would direct the attention of a section on Renfro's entire career to just the beginning of his career (his discovery). Everything else afterwards would seem trivial then. Ultatri (talk) 17:22, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Statements based on the material at http://knoxnews.com/news/2008/jan/16/officer-it-was-hard-not-to-like-renfro/ (an interview with the police officer who first sent young Brad Renfro's picture to the casting folks) also may add value to the article. Among other things, the officer said: "When we went to see 'The Client,' I told my wife, 'That's not acting. That's just Brad. He's playing himself.' He was a little hellion, but it was hard not to like him. You wanted to just take him under your wing and try to squeeze some sense into him." --Orlady (talk) 19:31, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Including a quote/point like that is a bit tricky. The Neutral Point of View states that, "[i]f a viewpoint is held by a significant minority, then it should be easy to name prominent adherents." Even if there were a number of people that believed what the officer believes, the article still requires someone who is prominent enough - a requirement that the officer may not have for the purposes of this article. Further, we don't even know if a lot of people believe the viewpoint on Renfro as held by the officer (someone that one would want to take in) - it is a difficult thing to verify. If it is a large group, then it "may" be fine. But were the viewpoint in the minority, then the WP:NPOV section states, "... a viewpoint is held by an extremely small (or vastly limited) minority, [...] does not belong in Wikipedia ... regardless of whether it is true or not; and regardless of whether you can prove it or not." Ultatri (talk) 22:00, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

Death section
Pretty much a direct copy lift of the AP story.


 * http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,323049,00.html Proxy User (talk) 05:04, 16 January 2008 (UTC)
 * Thanks for the heads up on this. I've visited the link and believe that the stuff constitues a copyright violation. I've removed the material in the section and replaced it with text that was in a previous version of the page. The '[d]ealing with copyright violations' section in the Copyright violations page states that, "[i]f some, but not all, of the content of a page appears to be a copyright infringement, then the infringing content should be removed." Violations here include not only copying an AP article, but not obtaining the proper permissions to republish said content. And seeing as the Associated Press explicitedly requires permission before reprinting materials in an online format, this stuff had to be removed. This is per the process found in said section (Copyright violations).


 * Oh, and I have tried to look at the history page for whomever included that bit in order to leave a note, but it is such a tedious process - it is a very long page. So, to the individual who copied the material from the AP article, I quote this bit from the Copyrights page: "Never use materials that infringe the copyrights of others. This could create legal liabilities and seriously hurt the project. If in doubt, write it yourself." Please and thank you. Ultatri (talk) 07:19, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

You guys are such hardassses when it comes to copyright, lol.199.80.117.25 (talk) 15:25, 17 January 2008 (UTC)

Personal problems
I've moved the information about his son out of the Death section, as that section read too much like an obituary before. It seems wrong to list it as a "problem" though - perhaps this section could be fleshed out and renamed "Personal Life" Bruiseviolet (talk) 04:21, 31 January 2008 (UTC)

Blueprint factories
I really have to question what a "blueprint factory" is. I've made blueprints myself and am at a loss as to what such a factory would be. There are only 927 google hits for the term "blueprint factory", and 815 if you exclude those containing the word Renfro. If you add two further exclusions of brand names for two specific businesses -- exclude "camshaft" and "aaa blueprint", you have only 89 hits in all of google for this term. And reviewing those hits, most of them are wonky one-offs. Quatloo (talk) 13:00, 18 January 2008 (UTC)


 * This was an easy one, I removed it... what his father did for a living is not notable, and yeah the term "blueprint factory" doesn't seem to make sense.Gwynand (talk) 13:03, 18 January 2008 (UTC)


 * His father worked at a company doing drafting/printing near knoxville —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.232.183.183 (talk) 06:05, 14 October 2010 (UTC)


 * What exactly is "Attempted possession"? Hrhadam (talk) 03:48, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

Corrections
I made some corrections to this article. First, he was arrested on December 22, not December 23. The story was published in the newspaper on December 23. Second, he has not yet faced trial, so the drug possession is only alleged at this point; it's not a stated fact.

Unrelated to the above, I think the "Brad Trivia" section should be removed. It smacks of fandom and raises POV issues. I didn't take that out, awaiting a consensus of other users. JuanOso 18:55, 23 December 2005 (UTC)


 * I removed some of the redundent facts on the Trivia section. I think listing personal facts about someone is fine as long as it doesnt get to out of control like 'Brad drinks only filtered spring water', but there is no need to repeat what was said in the first paragrapgh of the article.--David Foster 19:54, 23 December 2005 (UTC)


 * AOK David. I retitled the section "Renfro Trivia," as the first-name usage is fannish and intimates POV issues. JuanOso 20:58, 23 December 2005 (UTC)


 * I agree. Remove the Trivia section. The details about this parents and grandmother and be added to the first paragraph of the article. The girlfriend history can be added to the section noting his current relationship status. The rest, as you note is beyond trivial.

This article is linked to a CNN article, which states erroneously, "Renfro, 23, was booked for investigation of felony attempting to possess heroin." This is an error. There's no such thing in California as "felony attempting to possess heroin." The charge is "attempting to possess heroin," which is a felony. I have reworded the Wiki article accordingly. This article states the charge correctly. JuanOso 21:34, 24 December 2005 (UTC)

I've removed some rather sarcastic labels (ie, the "brilliant young men"). - AWF

Removing the section about drug arrest A persons personal substance choices are hardly news worthy and should be kept between them and their doctor. Wikipedia shouldnt be a forum for airing trivial gossip.
 * I don't know - I think getting arrested is a pretty important event in a person's life and I'd say a conviction would be even more so. I'd say that's ecyclopedic. It's not a judgment to post a fact like that. It's not like it says "bad boy Renfro got busted for his filthy drug habit". --Millard73 04:45, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

Surprisingly one of his most infamous "cult" film, Happy Campers (2001) is not included. His character is named Wichita. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 64.93.243.105 (talk) 00:47, 16 January 2008 (UTC)

I also want to clarify that the woman on the 911 call that claimed to be his girlfriend was NOT. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Ladypigeon (talk • contribs) 03:40, 28 March 2010 (UTC)

The award he won in sedona, AZ was for a film called "mummy an' the armadillo" which was not mentioned either. and about his personal/love life- he had a girlfriend of 4 or 5 years that was a costume designer, bentley hess---user:jfil23 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.232.183.183 (talk) 06:11, 14 October 2010 (UTC)

Ethnicity
"White American" is not an ethnicity. It is a color. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.255.169.124 (talk) 04:27, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

External links modified
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External links modified
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Mug shot
It is very disturbing and raising many red flags for me that the first and only picture of Brad Renfro is a mug shot. It is quite unlikely that there is no free and no mug shot picture of him. 91.83.19.111 (talk) 19:50, 3 April 2016 (UTC)


 * I totally agree. There must be a better photo we could use. 144.178.0.144 (talk) 22:43, 24 April 2018 (UTC) Darwin

Really ??? Do we have to slam the guy in the intro like that and mention a lot of the drug stuff ?
Instead of mentioning a few more movies he was pretty good in and well remembered for ? Really, that's a pretty negative intro uncharacteristic of Wikipedia. Reads like the person who wrote it really despises drug addicts and really wanted THAT to be what he's most known for. And then you have the use of his mugshot for the photo too, It's like the main writer of this really had in for Brad and drug addicts. Like someone close to them hurt them badly threw drug use and they are taking it out on this article about Renfro 96.233.52.166 (talk) 23:02, 7 October 2017 (UTC)
 * Well, to respond after having expanded the article and intro: Yes, I did add a few more of his films, but since most of what I added came from this BuzzFeed article about how the system failed him, that's what's going to be there. As for using his mugshot, it's a public domain image, which counts for a lot here. If it were the only time he had ever been arrested, I suppose you could make a case for using a more representative fair-use publicity photo, but since he did have a record of multiple arrests, you can't really make that argument. Daniel Case (talk) 03:48, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

We miss u Brad Renfro!!!!
WE MISS U — Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.199.91.46 (talk) 19:34, 11 October 2014 (UTC)


 * His fans may find this interesting...

I met him in 2004, when we did court-ordered community service together. I had never seen any of his films, but I recognized his name. We worked for the Hollywood Beautification Team and our tasks included sweeping. I don't recall if we talked, but the conversation was probably along the lines of: "Pass me that broom."

He had sort of a manic sense of humor (like Robin Williams). He made a joke about Scooby Doo. When I heard of his passing, it affected me a little more than most celebrity deaths. I felt like, "Hey! I knew that guy!" 144.178.0.144 (talk) 18:57, 15 May 2018 (UTC) Darwin

Issues
I share some of the concerns that have been mentioned on this talk page in prior years. The article seems heavy on Renfro's troubles and light on his actual work. The Buzzfeed article on Renfro is relevant and should be included, but it shouldn't dominate the article the way it did; the article is about Renfro himself and not about the film industry in general. Also, some of the information on his personal life seems a bit "he said, she said" and not completely verifiable. For example, there was an indication from someone who worked with him in his teen years that he had had an older girlfriend and was sexually active with her. I removed it on the grounds that talking about the sex life of a dead individual based on a reporter's account of the recollection of a coworker who worked with that individual some time ago seems incredibly tenuous and not very encyclopedic. We're trying to be an encyclopedia here, not The National Enquirer.

I have trimmed some of the material on Renfro's personal life and some of the Buzzfeed material. The portion of the article on his career could use some more sources and some expansion, and it has been tagged accordingly. SunCrow (talk) 10:54, 7 February 2020 (UTC)