Courtney Love's Hospital Drama

Fri., Jul. 22, 2005 12:35 PM PDT by Joal Ryan

As far as a Los Angeles court is concerned, Courtney Love is staying the drug-free course.

A progress report hearing Friday determined that the Hollywood hellion, rushed to the hospital late Wednesday night, had passed all tests as required by her guilty plea last year to a misdemeanor drug charge, L.A. City Attorney's Office spokesman Frank Mateljan said.

Speaking to reporters outside the court, her lawyer, Michael Rosenstein, said his oft-troubled client was, in the judge's words, "progressing well." The charge will be wiped from her record if she completes a yearlong drug-treatment program.

Love, who was not required to be in court, was not. As E! Online columnist Ted Casablanca reported Thursday, Love was resting at home following a medical scare that saw her taken by ambulance from Hollywood's Roosevelt Hotel to Cedars-Sinai Medical Center. At one point, a source close to Love told Casablanca, the 41-year-old rocker-actress "flatlined."

Love's publicist, meanwhile, insisted things were not as dire as all that. "Courtney was feeling sick, nauseous, dizzy and a little faint. Her friend called 911 out of concern, and they took her to the hospital, and she was released immediately," the rep said.

That explanation differed with the initial account from authorities. The Los Angeles Fire Department said its paramedics rushed to the Roosevelt after receiving a call about an apparent drug overdose. The incident also warranted a police response at the hotel. Shortly after midnight Thursday, detectives took a confidential report on a person identified only as "Courtney L.," Los Angeles Police Sgt. Catherine Plows said. No further information was released.

But the late-night incident "in no way affected" Friday's court proceedings, Mateljan said. Another progress hearing was scheduled for January.

Love has been keeping court dates, not to mention a lower profile on the police blotter, since completing court-ordered rehab last summer. Last week, she told the New York Daily News she was clean and sober and working out with Stacked star Pamela Anderson.

"[Anderson] runs with me up the steps of Pepperdine University," Love said in the paper. "She's like my personal trainer."

As headlines about Love's troubles waned, interest in her expanded waistline increased. But to the Hole singer, the extra pounds were signs of her found-again sobriety. "I was really, really thin because of what I was doing," she told the Daily News. "When all these little teenyboppers finally go into rehab, they're going to get fat, too."

Friday's hearing was the by-product of Love's most recent pre-rehab days, in general, and an October 2003 meltdown, in particular. The latter incident saw her, in the span of one night, arrested on felony drug charges after allegedly smashing windows at an ex-boyfriend's house, then rung up on misdemeanor drug charges after overdosing hours later at her Beverly Hills home.

More run-ins with the law followed--she chased a woman with a flashlight, she clocked a clubgoer with a microphone, she skipped a court date without permission. Throw in an emergency hospitalization and financial woes, and even Love sounded tired of all the drama when she regained custody of her 12-year-old daughter, Frances Bean, in January.

"Life is about choices," Love said in a statement at the time, "and I've chosen to move forward with my life in a healthy and positive way."

Love is the widow of Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain, who killed himself in 1994.