As friends and relatives of the late Mark Salling mourned his death on Wednesday, inevitable comparisons emerged between his death and that of his late Glee co-star Cory Monteith.
The pair both started out as fresh-faced singing stars on the hit show in 2009 and rocketed to international stardom together because of it.
Often appearing on-screen together, they formed a close friendship which Salling, who hanged himself near a riverbed in Sundland, California, on Tuesday, missed painfully after Monteith’s accidental drug overdose death in 2013.
Before either fell from grace – Monteith into drug use and Salling into child pornography – they sang together in a haunting duet on the show.
Mark Salling and Corey Monteith sing their final duet in Glee in 2010 – a haunting rendition of the Beck song Loser
At the time the pair filmed the duet, they had both been catapulted to global stardom by the smash hit show. Monteith was however struggling with drug problems which stuck with him since his youth. It is not known if Salling had yet developed his sickening addiction to child pornography
The performance was in 2010 and the song, disturbingly, was the Beck song Loser whose chorus begs: ‘I’m a loser baby, so why don’t you kill me?’
It emerged on Wednesday in the wake of Salling’s death and as his friends and confidants told how he never recovered from Monteith’s death five years ago.
‘Mark took Cory’s death extremely hard and never got over it.
‘He was so heartbroken and hurt by Cory’s death and that he didn’t ask for help and he was vocal about those feelings,’ one friend, who wanted to remain anonymous, told US Weekly on Tuesday.
Canadian-born Monteith had struggled with substance abuse for years by the time he died in a Vancouver hotel room in July 2013 at the age of 31.
Salling, like the rest of the Glee cast, was devastated by his death.
He regularly shared tributes to Monteith on social media and, in a bare display of his grief, begged ways for them to see each other again.
‘What I would do to have you back bro,’ was one of his messages to his late friend.
The pair are pictured in 2012, one of the final photographs of them together before Monteith’s death in 2013
Friends say Salling never properly recovered from Monteith’s accidental overdose and that he was vocal about wish wish that Monteith should have confided in him that he was using drugs again
Salling was not seen at a memorial lunch that other stars from the show held for Monteith in the immediate aftermath.
Lea Michele, who dated both Monteith and Salling, was not seen there either.
In the same year as Monteith died, Salling was sued by former girlfriend Roxanne Gorzela who said that he had forced her into unprotected sex.
The incident happened in 2011 – two years before Monteith’s death and when both still appeared on Glee and when both still held the adoration of their fans.
They settled the lawsuit in 2015, the same year that Glee was taken off the air. Salling paid the woman $2.7million.
In December of that year, he was arrested after police received a tip from an anonymous former girlfriend about the child pornography he possessed.
Salling’s body was found near a riverbed in Sundland, California, on Tuesday morning. He had hanged himself
Flowers were seen arriving at his home on Wednesday as news of his death spread
When they searched his home, officers found tens of thousands of images of children, some of whom were as young as three, being abused.
In December of last year, Salling pleaded guilty to the charges as part of a plea deal which would see him go to jail for between four and seven years.
He was due to be sentenced in March.
According to sources close with him, the star felt he had ‘nothing to come back to’ after prison and that he had been living a depressed life.
His desperation was made plain in a 911 call made by his worried relatives at 3am on Tuesday after they realized he as missing.
They told the operator that he was ‘depressed and suicidal’ and that he had not been seen since 11.30pm the night before he died.
Glee stars have been mixed and hesitant in their remarks since Salling’s death.
The show’s former vocal coordinator Tim Davis tweeted candidly about his feelings given Salling’s child porn conviction.
The show’s former vocal coordinator Tim Davis tweeted that ‘having compassion’ for the actor ‘in no way minimizes his crimes’. The message was quickly re-tweeted by multiple Glee actors
Matthew Morrison who played Will Schuester or ‘Mr Schue’ on the popular musical television show posted a jarring photo of himself flanked by Salling and Cory Monteith. He captioned the sad photo with three emojis, two angels flanking a sad face – in a clear tribute to the two stars who have now passed
He wrote: Today we lost another Glee cast member. Yes, he committed crimes against children.Yes, it’s horrific. But Mark Salling was a broken man, no doubt an abuse victim himself. I loved Mark, and am sad when I consider the devastation of his parents.
‘PLEASE withhold your cruel comments.’
He went on to argue that his comments did nothing to detract for the sympathy he felt for Salling’s victims.
Salling is pictured hiding in the back of a car after being arrested in December 2015 on child pornography charges
Salling was photographed wearing the same clothes he wore for weeks back in October, while he was out buying cigarettes and soda at his local 7-11 store
‘Let me be clear. Having compassion for Mark Salling in no way minimizes his crimes, nor does it minimize the pain and devastation of the victims of those crimes. I’m just saying stop adding to his family’s pain.
‘This was their son. If you’re without sin, feel free to cast stones,’ he added.
Iqbel Theba, who played the high school principal on the show, said solemnly: ‘Oh Mark,’ then tweeted a photograph of the cast winning a SAG Award in 2010.
Mark Morrison depicted Salling and Monteith as angels, sharing a photograph on Instagram with two halo-bearing emojis not long after the news spread.
Salling’s suicide leaves uncertain what will come of the restitution he was ordered to pay each of the victims in the child pornography he possessed.
It is not clear how many children are involved – he possessed tens of thousands of images – but Salling was due to give each $50,000 after being jailed.
That order is now void because of his death. Now, the victims’ only hope of getting the money is by suing his estate but it is not clear what was left of it when died.
Salling was still living in a small home, by himself, which his neighbors thought he had left after his 2015 arrest.
When he was arrested in 2015, his parents paid the required 10 percent of his $20,000 bond.
Former Glee star Mark Salling is pictured outside court in December where he pleaded guilty to possession of child pornography. It is the last time he was seen in public