Just like Kim Kardashian, Nicole Richie too rose to fame when she shared screen space with the heiress, socialite and DJ Paris Hilton. The two appeared on the reality TV series 'The Simple Life' between 2003 and 2007. The childhood best friends scoured the city for high labor and low-paying jobs.
Right from cleaning rooms to doing farm work as well as serving meals in fast-food restaurants, Nicole and Paris did it all, while complaining and sometimes joking about the struggles they were taking on. Apart from being known for the TV show, she was also known for her tryst with drugs.
“I kind of took matters into my own hands and was creating drama in a very dangerous way. I think I was just bored, I had seen everything — especially when you’re young, you just want more," she told Diane Sawyer in 2007. Her experiments with psychotropic substances resulted in alcoholism, cocaine, and heroin addiction in her early 20s. Her feeble appearance also set the rumor mills buzzing about an eating disorder.
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She also had a couple of run-ins with the law when she was young. In 2002, she was arrested for unruly behavior at a nightclub, and the following year, she was arrested in Malibu for possession of heroin and driving unlicensed. This event led to her enrollment into an addiction treatment center but it was clear that she had fallen off the wagon as she got arrested after failing a sobriety test and was charged with driving under influence.
By that time people knew Nicole for being friends with Paris, appearing on the TV show, her addiction to drugs, and being the daughter of a famous father, legendary musician Lionel Richie. But what many people didn't know back then and some might even realize this just now is that Nicole was Lionel's adoptive daughter and the musician knew her birth parents very well.
Who are Nicole Richie's birth parents?
According to Biography, Nicole's mother Karen Moss was a backstage assistant for Lionel and her biological father Peter Michael Escovedo was a member of Lionel's band and brother of pop percussionist Sheila E.
What led to Lionel Richie adopting Nicole Richie?
Lionel first saw Nicole in 1983 at a concert that Prince was headlining. He saw a then 2-year-old Nicole on the stage playing the tambourine and it didn't quite sit well with him. He later discovered that her parents were facing difficulties at home.
“We [were] a little worried that the little kid can’t go on tour because a 2-year-old needs to be stationary — they can’t keep going on the road,” Lionel said during a Huffington Post series titled 'Talk to Me' in 2016 where he and Nicole interviewed each other. “I don't know how we got into the conversation, ‘Well, why don't you just kind of keep the kid here?’” he said.
He and his first wife Brenda Harvey-Richie took care of Nicole for two years and it was during this time that they realized that her biological parents weren't actually doing great even then.
“It was actually getting worse, the family situation was falling apart," Lionel explained. He was determined to help Nicole feel at home completely and also assure her that he would always be there for her but Nicole had her own reservations and never fully accepted him in the role of her father initially.
"I remember you had abandonment issues for obvious reasons. You'd been handed around to every relative in the family," he told Nicole during the interview. "I remember what I said to you. I said, 'I’m never, ever going to leave you.'" he said.
Did Nicole Richie reconnect with her birth parents?
About being adopted, Nicole has said, “My parents were friends with Lionel. They trusted that they would be better able to provide for me.” An event that helped Nicole bond with her biological parents was when she got pregnant and realized that she didn't want to keep resenting them and wanted them in her life.
"When I found out that I was pregnant, there was just something inside of me that felt a responsibility to mend any issues that I’ve had with my parents in the past, because, listen, I’ve put them through a lot," she told Chicago Tribune.
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