Hollywood - Celebrity coroner Dr. Bradley Rippington, known as the "Coroner-to-the-Stars," shocked the film community yesterday with the announcement of his retirement at the age of 46.

"I’ve been feeling pretty burned out for a long time," Dr. Rippington told this reporter just after he had concluded an autopsy of Chico Ramone, the 12th member of the proto-punk band The Ramones to have died of a heroin overdose. "When I started in this business it was a different world. Lucille Ball, Red Skelton, George Burns—now those stars had real class. Talk about sweet autopsies. Stars who work clean make my life a whole lot easier. But these lowlife scumbags nowadays. Rap stars, River Phoenix, John Belushi. My god, you don’t wanna go sticking your hands in their vital organs even if you’re wearing five layers of playtex."

When asked at what point he made his decision to retire, Dr. Rippington replied, "It wasn’t any one thing in particular, but I guess it really all came home when I was doing Lew Wasserman’s autopsy. Now there was a real gentleman. Eighty-nine years old but the liver and spleen of a teenager, not even a drop of barbiturates or PCPs. End of an era. Then I got back to the office and I checked out who was in the death pool. Yeah, I know it’s tacky, but every coroner’s office has got a death pool and if I’m lyin’ I’m flyin’. Well, the pickin’s didn’t look too good: Snoop Doggy Dogg, Alabama (yeah, you know those country-western bands get wiped out in tour bus crashes all the time), Winona Ryder (god, imagine all the crap she’s snorted) and Marlon Brando. I said to myself, not Brando, the dude must weigh like 900 pounds by now. That’s it. I’m not gonna do Brando’s autopsy. No way, Jose. So I threw down my scalpel and went over to Balboa Beach and looked at the waves for five hours. I’ve been at peace with my decision ever since."

In honor of his many years of service to the Hollywood community, the Motion Picture Academy announced today that it will present Dr. Rippington with the Irving Thalberg Lifetime Achievement Award during the 2003 Oscar broadcast.