Art Imitates Life Imitates Art?

My apologies to Oscar Wilde, but he obviously never met Charlie Sheen. Or watched his TV show, for that matter.

Besides making me laugh out loud, which, let's face it (if you know me), is not that hard to accomplish, much of the allure surrounding the CBS comedy "Two and a Half Men" is the fact that it's obvious to most viewers over the age of 30 that co-star Sheen is not acting when playing the role of Charlie Harper. Aside from the uncanny first-name thing, Sheen also seems to re-enact much of his 20s and 30s (and, so far, his 40s), which he spent in an almost constant Hollywood haze of women, booze and drugs.

Hats off to him for surviving this long, and having a grand old time doing it, but I always suspected that the show's success had a lot to do with our society's love affair with having a front row seat to a train wreck. Except, in this case, we could do so under the guise of good ol' fashioned vaudevillian humor. What made the show ever more cute, besides the precocious young nephew Jake played by Angus T. Jones -- that is until Jake grew into a grunting, disgusting, idiotic teenage sloth, and then he just bugged, which might just be the writers' poking fun at the spiraling downfall of our youth and society (but that's for another blog, another day) -- was that Sheen was obviously playing with his reputation as one of Hollywood's premier bad boys.

The joke was that he was now a respectable husband and father. Kind of.

Regardless of what actress and ex-wife Denise Richards may have to say on the subject, of course, as we all know, Sheen wasn't reformed. Alas, he's headed back to jail after he pleads guilty to misdemeanor domestic violence against his new wife (and apparent party bud) Brooke.

Now I'm not one to judge, just making some observations here like any decent journalist, and for not knowing the guy I find him very likable in a self destructive way. But the Christmas Day incident that gave rise to the charges plus another curious occurrence in February of someone apparently stealing one of his cars and plunging it off of Mulholland Drive into a canyon all curiously unraveled amid a contract renegotiation for a few more seasons of "Two and a Half Men" plus some serious dough to the tune of $1 million per episode. Sheen was using the bargaining chip that he might just walk away from the top-rated show after seven seasons to get back into movies.

Sorry, Charlie, but aside from your cameo in "Ferris Bueller's Day Off" as -- tah-dah! -- yourself, (again), and, of course, "Wild Thing" in Major League and "Wall Street," you're not getting a get-out-of-jail-free card because of your two-steps-backward roles (with Emilio) in Men at Work and Terminal Velocity (oh, yes, and Hot Shots! Part Deux).

But, in the end, he renewed for even more money. All despite his legal troubles. Good for him I suppose, but maybe it was all just a ploy to convince the producers that he still had it in him. OK, make no maybe about it. That perhaps was his best acting job of them all. But then again, inspiration comes in many different forms.

I'd bet a round of shots that the beverage Sheen is almost constantly seen pouring for himself on the TV show is, like himself, is very much the real thing. And Sheen is making quite a lucrative living at being himself.

Now, Oscar, that's art.