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CNN Live Sunday

Jason Priestley Hospitalized After Auto Racing Accident

Aired August 11, 2002 - 17:14   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

KRIS OSBORN, CNN ANCHOR: You may know him as an actor, the former star of "Beverly Hills 90210," Jason Priestley also has a long- standing passion for auto racing and that has landed him in the hospital. Priestley had to be airlifted from the track at the Kentucky Speedway earlier today and taken to a nearby hospital after he crashed his race car head on into a retaining wall during a practice run.
So, Priestley suffered head injuries and multiple fractures. CNN Medical Correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta joins us now to talk about the injuries and some of the potential implications.

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Right.

OSBORN: So, injury to the feet and possibly the spine.

GUPTA: That's right and maybe even a head injury is what I'm hearing as well. These are all significant injuries. First of all, just starting at the feet, starting at the bottom, foot injuries are important because first of all it takes a lot of force to actually fracture one foot let alone both feet, and oftentimes that force, the same force that fractures the feet can actually be transmitted to the spine.

I'm going to hold up a spine here in a minute and just show you some of the fractures that can actually occur from such an injury, not only from the feet but also fro the seatbelt as well. If you can see the spine here, this is the pelvis. This is the lower part of the spine over here. The force is actually transmitted up and then actually can sometimes rupture, burst, a couple of these bones in here.

Now sometimes the bones will just be broken and not actually go backwards and push on the spinal cord, but sometimes that can happen as well. We don't know what the situation is with him at this point, whether or not he was moving his legs.

He also sounds like he suffered a head injury, and one thing I wanted to point out, Kris, is you know we see a lot of these car wrecks where the cars are sort of they go through the air and they're tumbling and people sort of get out of the car and they seem like they're doing OK, whereas quick head-on collisions into the walls can be much more dramatic, the reason for that being there's a quick acceleration and a quick deceleration, so the head actually bounces forward and then quickly bounces backward. That can be a very significant injury to the brain, so those head-on collisions, especially at the speeds we're talking about, over 150 miles an hour, can be very significant. So we'll have to wait and see how he's doing.

OSBORN: Well and about that head injury, one of his long-time friends told me today the family is very concerned about wanting the swelling in the head to decrease to a point for them to make an assessment about the seriousness possibly of the head injury. What about that kind of swelling?

GUPTA: That's right. The brain unlike other places in the body is surrounded by a hard bone, the skull, and when the brain actually swells, it really has nowhere to go except into the skull and that can be very dangerous. Sometimes surgeons actually have to put a little drainage fluid system in to try and drain some of the fluid so the brain doesn't swell too much. But the point they're making is that until that swelling goes down, until the brain comes back down to its normal size, it's going to be hard to tell how he's going to do from all that.

OSBORN: And lastly, doctor, I suspect in just a general sense, the speed of 180 miles an hour around these racetracks, what kind of damage can that do to the body when they crash?

GUPTA: Well you know certainly all kinds of damage. You know we've heard about the feet. We hear about the spine. We heard about the head. One thing I was mentioning earlier, just the seatbelts and the damage to the internal organs, you can imagine, Kris, if you will just a lap belt and all of a sudden you're thrust against that in that same sort of spring forward motion, backward motion again, that can cause damage to the spleen, to some of the internal organs as well.

You know on a more positive note, it did sound like some of the folks around him, one of the paramedics did almost smile around that. I don't know if he cracked a joke when he was being taken off. You saw some of the pictures of him in a neck brace.

OSBORN: Yes.

GUPTA: And a back board, that's all pretty standard procedure after any kind of accident.

OSBORN: So in stable condition but still serious?

GUPTA: That's right. I guess that brain swelling is going to be a critical, critical factor.

OSBORN: Dr. Gupta thank you so much for your perspective on that.

GUPTA: Good seeing you again.

OSBORN: Well Jason Priestley's career has extended far beyond his teen hit drama, sometimes even taking him behind the camera. Let's take a look. (BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

OSBORN (voice-over): Most of us came to know him as nice guy heartthrob Brandon Walsh on "Beverly Hills 90210." But long before millions followed his every move, in fact since he was five years old, Jason Priestley wanted to be an actor. He grew up in Vancouver, Canada, then made his way to Hollywood. Several years back, Jason told CNN he's a Canadian who's OK with his all-American image.

JASON PRIESTLEY, ACTOR: I think that just has to do with being from Canada, you know, all us Canadian guys are nice guys.

OSBORN: Adored by millions on "90210" as the smart, good kid, Priestley sought to break out from his Brandon Walsh persona. He appeared in scores of movies, including 1993's "Tombstone," and this movie in 1997 "Love and Death on Long Island."

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: All those babes don't want to see you lonesome.

PRIESTLEY: Sure, like I'm Mr. Popular.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well I'm going to make you Mr. Popular and that's a promise.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

OSBORN: But in addition to countless TV and film appearances, Priestley took on other challenges in the entertainment business, producing and directing a handful of films including a Rocumentary (ph) about the Bare Naked Ladies in 1999 called "Bare Naked in America."

From heartthrob to thrill seeker, outside the Hollywood world Priestley sought extreme action, racing cars, beginning in 1991, winning his first race in 1998. Priestley says he loves the sport but loves his Hollywood life and lifestyle too much to race full time.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

OSBORN: Well, Jason Priestley is not alone. A number of actors have turned to race car driving. Joining me to talk about Priestley's career and an odd new entry into reality TV programming, a separate issue in the world of entertainment, is Marc Peyser, a Senior Editor at "NEWSWEEK." He is in our New York Bureau. Hello, Mark.

MARC PEYSER, SENIOR EDITOR, NEWSWEEK: Hi, Kris.

OSBORN: Well a number of actors, Tom Cruise, Paul Newman, have all very seriously gotten into race car driving. A friend of Jason Priestley's told me today he had to work very hard but ultimately won the respect of race car drivers in the world of race car driving. That's tough to do. PEYSER: Yes, it's true. I mean Jason Priestley has taken it very seriously for quite a while, as you mentioned before. He's been at this for more than ten years, much more seriously than I think Tom Cruise did. I mean this guy is driving at 180 miles per hour on sort of a quasi you know moving his way up in the ranks of pro races, so obviously he wasn't looking to become a full time race car driver, but he took it very, very seriously.

OSBORN: I wanted to ask you about that. I mean obviously we hear a lot of fans that are showing up to show support for him, the dangers of the sport as well.

PEYSER: Yes, I mean you know it's 180 miles an hour. I wouldn't drive 180 miles an hour. You can see what happens. This is not the first accident he's had by the way this year. He was also into racing race boats. He liked to go fast and he had a race boat accident earlier this year too I think in April. So the guy actually has a taste for speed but it doesn't always like him.

OSBORN: Well I wanted to shift onto another topic in the entertainment world, a very different topic, that of reality television. Anna Nicole Smith's show doing amazing ratings, before I get your reaction to it, it's the kind of thing that is really tough to set up so let's just listen to it.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Hey kids just pulled up and asked her if this was porno.

ANNA NICOLE SMITH: Yes, I'm doing a porno movie and I've got, let me see, I'm doing two girls and one, two, three, four, five, six guys. I'm doing a porno with seven guys and two girls and a dog.

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Oh boy, that's not fair.

SMITH: Fun porno.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

OSBORN: Mark, compelling television?

PEYSER: Well I guess to some people it's compelling television. I mean she's one of the oddest people to come to television in quite a while, certainly since Ozzy Osbourne himself got his own reality TV show. It was obviously compelling in the first week in the ratings.

We'll see how people feel about it. The second installment is tonight. She's very unusual. It's hard to really know what to think of her if she takes herself seriously or if she knows that there's sort of a joke being made about her here.

OSBORN: Well that's really the key question, I guess, the second installment because the initial bounce in the ratings could be attributed to just an interest in reality television currently just in general. PEYSER: I think people are fascinated by Anna Nicole. I mean her true Hollywood story was one of the most watched ones ever. It was YE decided to give her her own reality show, so people are fascinated with her. She's sort of a plus-size train wreck in her life.

She's gone from being a Playboy playmate to this celebrated lawsuit where she married this really, really old guy who died and now she's fighting with his son for the inheritance. I mean she's just all over the place. You really can't believe what you're seeing sometimes.

OSBORN: So given her colorful demeanor and history of experience, there could be some longstanding interest there?

PEYSER: Well I'm certainly interested to see what she'll do next. She was somewhat pathetic but funny and odd in the first one, in the first episode. You don't see people like this on TV certainly in scripted shows, so I think people will be curious to see where it goes from here.

OSBORN: Thank you very much, Marc Peyser, "NEWSWEEK" joining us from the New York Bureau. Thanks so much. It was a pleasure talking to you.

PEYSER: Thanks, Kris.

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