Cory Monteith

**Cory Monteith** (May 11, 1982 – July 13, 2013) was a Canadian actor and musician

## Early Life

Monteith was born in Calgary, Alberta, on May 11, 1982, the younger son of Ann McGregor, an interior decorator, and Joe Monteith, a soldier who served in the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry. He had an older brother named Shaun. Monteith's parents divorced when he was seven years old, and he and his older brother were raised by their mother in Victoria, British Columbia. After the divorce, he saw little of his father due to military service, and he had social difficulties at school. From age 13, he used alcohol and marijuana and started being truant from school.

After attending 16 schools, including alternative programs for troubled teens, Monteith dropped out altogether at age 16. By that time, his drug and alcohol dependency had increased and Monteith turned to petty crimes, such as stealing money from friends and family, to fund his addictions. His mother and a group of friends staged an intervention when he was 19, and he began attending a rehabilitation program. Monteith stated, "I'm lucky on so many counts. I'm lucky to be alive." He eventually received his high school diploma in 2011 from an alternative school he attended in his youth in Victoria.

Before breaking into show business, Monteith worked various jobs, including Walmart people greeter, taxicab driver, mechanic, school bus driver, roofer, and a drummer for a few bands.

## Death

On July 13, 2013, Monteith was found dead in his room at the Fairmont Pacific Rim hotel in Vancouver. He was 31 years old. Monteith was scheduled to check out that day following a seven-night stay, but when he failed to do so, hotel staff entered his room and discovered his body around noon. The Vancouver Police Department stated that the cause of death was not immediately apparent, but ruled out foul play. An autopsy was completed by the British Columbia Coroners Service on July 15. The preliminary autopsy report stated that Monteith died from "a mixed drug toxicity" consisting of heroin and alcohol, and that his death appeared to have been accidental. The final report, released by the British Columbia Coroners Service on October 2, 2013, confirmed these findings. It noted that Monteith also had codeine and morphine in his system at the time of his death, and that he was found with drug paraphernalia that included a spoon with drug residue and a used hypodermic needle, as well as two empty bottles of champagne. The coroner wrote that Monteith had experienced intermittent periods of drug abuse and abstinence throughout his life, and that "after a period of cessation from opioid drug use, a previously tolerated drug concentration level may become toxic and fatal." His stay in rehab only months before his death, and his attempt to stay off drugs resulted in his lowered tolerance to the drug.

Monteith's body was cremated in Vancouver on July 17, following a private viewing by his immediate family and girlfriend Lea Michele. On July 25, Michele and *Glee* creator Ryan Murphy held a celebration of life for Monteith in Los Angeles, attended by cast, crew, and creators of the show, as well as colleagues from the show's network and studio. After consultation with Michele, who also plays Monteith's love interest on *Glee*, showrunners postponed production of *Glee'*s fifth season to August rather than late July. Consequently, the season premiered a week later than planned. The season's third episode, "The Quarterback", aired on October 10, 2013, and served as a tribute to Monteith, focusing on the death of his character Finn Hudson. The show then began a brief hiatus, which lasted until November 7, 2013, due to the extra time that was needed to decide how to proceed with the show following the death. After "The Quarterback" aired, Murphy noted that he had decided to "keep mentioning Finn...We don't just say this is done and we're never going to go back to it, so that resonates throughout the year.

## Trivia

* On July 8, 2020, Naya Rivera, Monteith's *Glee* co-star and close friend, accidentally drowned, and her body was recovered on the seventh anniversary of his death.