Whitney Houston wasn't as naive as those closest to her would have us believe when she met Bobby Brown, according to a revealing new documentary.
The late singer, who died in a drug-linked drowning in 2012, was painted as America's sweetheart until she was reportedly corrupted by Bobby Brown after she met the star at the Soul Train Music Awards in 1989.
But, according to Showtime documentary Whitney: Can I Be Me, which airs on 25 August (17), the singer took drugs long before she met the Every Little Step singer, and he was not the bad influence he has been made out to be.
"It's a fairy tale," Rudi Dolezal who co-directed the film with Nick Broomfield told the New York Post.
"The idea that Whitney was a great girl until Bobby came along is simply not true. Whitney took drugs and smoked weed a long time before she could even spell 'Bobby Brown'."
The documentary features unseen footage of her 1999 tour, as well as new interviews with the I Will Always Love You singer's friends and family.
Ellin LaVar, Whitney's longtime friend and stylist confirms the singer did drugs with her two brothers in the film.
"It was the thing you do. You go out, you party, you drink, you do a little drugs," she revealed. "Everybody did it. And her brothers gave it to her. It was just something you do to have fun.
In an interview with Oprah Winfrey, Whitney's brother Michael revealed that his sister started taking cocaine in her late teens. "At the time, the '80's, it was acceptable... (Drugs) wasn't a bad word like it is now."
