Tiger Woods Won't Help Half-Siblings?
Golf pro's half-brother says Woods hasn't responded to calls for help.
April 5, 2012— -- intro: Tiger Woods' half-siblings say their calls for help from the golf superstar have fallen on deaf ears.
Woods' older half-sibling Kevin Woods has been battling multiple sclerosis and is now confined to a wheelchair. He needs a caretaker and is in danger of losing his San Jose home. Kevin's brother Earl Woods Jr. told ESPN's Rick Reilly that calls to their famous sibling have gone unreturned.
"I leave messages. I leave updates on Kevin, but for whatever reason I don't get a response. … Kevin loves Tiger. A call from Tiger would really pump Kevin up. When he doesn't call, it just makes him feel worse," Earl Woods Jr. said.
Woods' rep did not immediately respond to ABCNews.com's request for comment.
Earl Woods Jr., Kevin Woods, and their sister Royce, share the same father, Earl Woods, as Tiger. They are the offspring of Earl Woods' first marriage to Barbara Gary.
The Woods siblings remained close with their half-brother until he turned "about 15 or 16," and his star started to rise, Earl Woods Jr. said. Since their father's death in 2006, the half-siblings have been unable to contact Woods at all. No one seems to know the reason for the rift.
Now Kevin Woods needs his famous brother's help, Earl Woods Jr. says.
"Nobody's asking for money here, but [a caregiver] really would be nice for Kevin. It would make Kevin comfortable. He wouldn't have to leave his house. … But we'd at least like to be able to find out how Tiger is, to find out if he's OK, and to let him know if we're OK," Earl Woods Jr. told Reilly.
Barbara Gary Woods, Earl Woods' first wife, told Reilly, "I'm very disappointed in Tiger. Before he got all famous, they were in touch a lot."
Earl Woods Jr. was more vehement.
"I'd like to [slap] Tiger, wake him up. I'd like to say, 'Don't come knocking on the door when you need a bone-marrow transplant.' To see this is the response we get? Maybe when you see the world like he does, you don't see what other people are going through. But, seriously? You've got problems with your knee? That's nothing compared to what Kevin is going through. Nothing," he said.
Click through to read about seven other celebrity family feuds.
quicklist: 1title: Tracy Morgan, Asia Morgan and Alicia Warden text: In February, Tracy Morgan's mother and sister bad-mouthed him to the media for refusing to help save his mother's home from foreclosure.
Asia Morgan, 41, called her famous older brother a "d*****bag," telling the New York Daily News that the gloves are off "because of the way he's treating our mother."
Morgan, 43, fired back: "I am saddened that these untrue stories about me have people questioning my commitment to my family," he said in a statement to ABCNews.com. "For reasons that are between us, I have not seen my mother in 11 years and outside of a random call here and there have had little to no contact with my sister."
"We all have personal family issues that we have to deal with in life, but I choose to deal with mine in private and not through the media," the statement concluded.
According to Morgan's mom, Alicia Warden, the "30 Rock" star has refused to help her save her northeast Ohio home from foreclosure. Warden told the Daily News that after she called her multimillionaire son for help, one of his employees called back and said, "Tracy's offering you a one-shot deal" of $2,000.
"I told her, 'Thank you, but no thank you. I'm not some person in the street,'" Warden said, adding "That was the straw that broke the camel's back."
"He's never been a nice person," said Asia, who lives near her mother. "And money's just made it worse."
Warden first approached her son about helping in February 2011, when she lost her job. She said he agreed to pay off her mortgage but changed his mind after accusing her of talking to the media -- a charge she denied.
When Morgan collapsed at Sundance, Warden learned about it on the Internet, and the world learned that he was estranged from his mother when she called the Daily News to say she hadn't seen him in 11 years, only talked to him by phone.
"My mom's house isn't extravagant, but it's her home. Her health is failing. She has diabetes, and her legs are giving out on her," Asia told the Daily News. "This would be a drop in the bucket for Tracy. She has a son that can do, and she's done everything that she could possibly could for her family."media: 15491472
quicklist: 2title: Scarlett Johansson and Melanie Sloantext: Since Scarlett Johansson fired her mother, Melanie Sloan, as her manager in 2009, Sloan's financial situation has taken a turn for the worse. And, for now, it does not appear the starlet will come to her mother's rescue.
Sloan, who managed her daughter's career from her debut in the film "North" at age 9, claimed that she could no longer afford to buy a $1.4 million Manhattan apartment that she signed a contract for in October 2011 because she no longer had sufficient income to obtain a mortgage. She was suing the apartment's owners to get back her $130,000 deposit.
The owners were fighting back. Adam Leitman Bailey, a lawyer for the sellers, told ABCNews.com in January that Sloan claimed she had the financial resources to purchase the apartment back in October, then, three weeks later, said she couldn't afford it.
"I don't understand how someone's financial situation changes so quickly," Bailey said. "We think she's committing fraud and we believe she is not due the deposit back."
ScarJo replaced her mom in November 2009 with Hollywood uber agent Rick Yorn, whose roster includes Leonardo DiCaprio, Justin Timberlake and Cameron Diaz.
"Once I got married, I felt that I needed to cut the cord," the 26-year-old star told Vanity Fair.media: 15322830
quicklist: 3title: Beyonce vs. Matthew Knowlestext: When Beyonce announced in May 2011 that she was forming her own management company and would no longer require her father's services as a manager, she said, "He is my father for life and I love my dad dearly."
But her parting with Matthew Knowles might have been less than amicable.
In court documents filed in a Texas district court in July 2011, Knowles, who managed his daughter's career for 14 years -- from her Destiny's Child days to solo superstardom -- suggested that Beyonce believed her father stole from her and, as a result, barred him from her business affairs.
It could not have helped that Matthew Knowles admitted to having an affair with Alexsandra Wright, who gave birth to their child. Beyonce's mother, Tina Knowles, filed for divorce from Beyonce's father soon afterwards.
Matthew Knowles told The Associated Press his relationship with Beyonce was "extremely amicable."
"Business is business and family is family. I love my daughter and am very proud of who she is and all that she has achieved," he said.media: 15322841
quicklist: 4title: Leighton vs. Constance Meestertext: "Gossip Girl" star Leighton Meester learned the hard way that under the bright lights of Hollywood, mother-daughter relationships can turn downright destructive.
Even after giving her mother, Constance Meester, the boot as her manager, the pair continued to battle in court. In July 2011, Leighton Meester sued her mother for custody of her younger brother after her mom allegedly spent money meant for her brother's medical bills to pay for her own cosmetic surgery.
Constance Meester, who gave birth to her daughter while serving time in a federal prison for a drug smuggling conviction, told TMZ that her daughter promised to give her $10,000 a month for the rest of her life. Leighton Meester has asked a judge to rule no such agreement exists.
The mom countersued for $3 million, alleging that her daughter repeatedly "hit her with a bottle" in December 2010 and was so crazed that her brother had to pull her off, but later dropped the suit. Leighton Meester's suit was still winding its way through the courts at the start of this year.media: 15322974
quicklist: 5title: Tori Spelling vs. Candy Spellingtext: In her memoir, "Mommywood," Tori Spelling described a dysfunctional mother-daughter relationship between herself and her mother, Candy Spelling, which crumbled after family patriarch Aaron Spelling suffered a stroke in 2006.
The legendary producer behind the hit TV shows "Love Boat," "Dynasty" and "Beverly Hills: 90210," in which he cast his daughter, left behind a $500 million estate but gave a majority of his fortune to his wife, Candy Spelling, 66, while Tori Spelling, 38, inherited a mere $800,000.
Eventually, Tori Spelling said her credit card bills had her close to bankruptcy.
"It was after '90210.' Financially, I wasn't doing well. I didn't know what the next stage of my life was. I didn't know what direction I was going to go into," Tori Spelling told ABC's Juju Chang in July 2011. "I wanted to be an adult and we had money, and I was like, 'Great.' So, I would just go buy furniture. And, 'Oh, it's this amount? OK, I guess that's what it's supposed to cost.' I didn't know. I didn't know about having a budget."
Things between the reality show starlet and her mother really became heated in 2009 when the elder Spelling penned an open letter to her daughter on TMZ.com titled, "Middle-Aged Reality Show Stars (Like My Daughter)."
In the letter, Candy Spelling criticized her daughter for having her life played out on camera and turning her kids into "reality show props."
The two have since reconciled and Tori Spelling told Chang that the birth of her children, Liam, 5, and Stella, 3, and Hattie, four months, helped to heal their shaky mother-daughter bond. She added that now she feels "grateful" she didn't get her inheritance because it gave her "that extra push" to build up her own enterprise. media: 15491898
quicklist: 6title: Tatum O'Neal vs. Ryan O'Nealtext: Tatum O'Neal was born in the spotlight, the daughter of actor Ryan O'Neal, and was an Oscar winner by age 10. But while everything seemed glamorous on film, off-screen the former child star said her life became "very toxic."
Tatum O'Neal told "Nightline" anchor Cynthia McFadden in a June 2011 interview that by the time she was in her teens she was using drugs and alcohol, had been molested several times by family friends and had tried to commit suicide.
In her memoir, "Found: A Daughter's Journey Home," a follow-up to her 2004 New York Times best-selling memoir, "A Paper Life," O'Neal, candidly talked about her addictions, struggles with living in the public eye and her strained relationship with her parents.
Father and daughter endured a 25-year estrangement. They began talking again after the death of Ryan O'Neal's longtime girlfriend, actress Farrah Fawcett, in 2009. But the relationship took a step back after the pair starred in the eight-part docu-series "Ryan & Tatum: The O'Neals," on the "Oprah Winfrey Network" (OWN) last summer.
"In fact, we're further apart now than when we started the show," Ryan O'Neal told TV Guide after the show wrapped. "So thanks, Oprah, for all your help."media: 15491752
quicklist: 7title: Madonna vs. Christopher Cicconetext: The once tight relationship between superstar Madonna and her younger brother, Christopher Ciccone, crumbled after a series of incidents.
Formerly Madonna's personal assistant and creative director, Ciccone released a detailed tell-all book, "Life With My Sister Madonna," which contained a slew of secrets about the guarded pop star.
In the book, Ciccone gave a bitter account of Madonna's marriage to Guy Ritchie and details about the pop star's super secret wedding to Ritchie in 2000. He also detailed the explosive argument over decorating that put the nail in the coffin of their brother-sister relationship.
While Ciccone partly blamed Ritchie for his estranged relationship with his sister, the openly gay Ciccone said in a 2008 "Good Morning America" interview that his view of Madonna really changed after she ambushed him with cameras at their mother's grave for her black-and-white backstage documentary, "Truth or Dare."
"At one point, if you've seen the 'Truth or Dare' movie, when she's rolling around on my mother's grave, that was a turning point for me in my relationship with her," Ciccone said. media: 14139591