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Dane Cook reflected on the shame he felt while fighting against his family for a fortune that was stolen from underneath his eyes.
After finding success on stage and screen, and during one of the peaks of his career, the comedian discovered that he was essentially broke and his older half-brother, Darryl McCauley – who also served as his business manager – was on the run with a fraction of his fortune.
Cook, 54, exclusively told Fox News Digital that the betrayal not only devastated him financially, but also impacted his mental health as he attempted to reconcile his brother’s actions while finally speaking out in the new documentary, “Funny Money: The Dane Cook Story.”
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McCauley was arrested in 2008 after going on the run with nearly $3 million of his brother’s money, only for investigators to discover that Cook’s business manager actually stole nearly $12 million over the course of his working relationship with his brother — by hiding it in spaghetti sauce jars.
“It was the scarlet letter of humiliation that I felt like he branded on me,” Cook said.
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“It was like, forget about all the, you know, the criminal, all of it. It’s like, he knew I was the kid on the playground with the terrible cystic acne who hated myself and … self-loathing, and like, a lot of stuff that I guess as adults we feel like it’s woe is me, but it was very real to me and it was hard.”
Cook noted that the health and wellness aspect of his entire career was “trying to regulate that and share not only through my comedy, but the back channels of MySpace or the communication of like, ‘I’m just like you, but I just did it.'”
“It was the scarlet letter of humiliation that I felt like he branded on me.”
“That’s happening back channel,” he said. “Publicly, I’m the bell of the ball, all the cool stuff that’s happening there, but he knew, only he knew that I’d come home every day after school with panic attacks and dreading the next day having to go to school because I was just so scared of people.”
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He added, “I was so scared to be around other kids.”
McCauley pleaded guilty in 2010 to multiple counts of larceny, forgery and embezzlement, while his wife, Erika McCauley also pleaded guilty to larceny charges. In addition, they were both ordered to pay restitution, a fee which Cook waved against Erika for her participation in the documentary.
“It’s like, the money can come and go, and fame can come and go, and that’s life. There’s so many things that are out of your control,” he said. “But that part that he knew about of me was, like man, he let that happen to me.”
While Cook resented his brother’s action, the comedian also warned that he’s “the son of a different dad” as McAuley was his older half-brother.
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“I’m the son of George Cook, and he forgot that I am my father’s son,” Cook declared. “We are conditioned, I think, the DNA of the Cook family is like, we put wins in the win column, and we take our losses and we reconfigure.”
“It’s like, the money can come and go, and fame can come and go, and that’s life. There’s so many things that are out of your control.”
“We don’t sit in them and go, ‘Oh, the engine broke,’ and tell people we used to have a good engine. That’s just not, that’s not me. That’s not us.”
He added, “I think part of him probably sitting in that courtroom when I read that impact letter was going like, ‘D–n, I think he’s going to come back stronger from this,’ but neither of us knew when at that time, or if.”
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While Cook isn’t sure if he’ll ever see any of the money his brother stole or speak to him again, he found support from his sisters and wife Kelsi.
“This documentary wouldn’t be here without her,” Cook said of his bride of three years. “I wouldn’t have a deeper faith … She’s brought faith back into my life in ways that were just absolutely lovely.”
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He added, “I was already living the best, happiest life I could at this point, even before this entire thing came together … so an embarrassment of riches and I just want people to enjoy this moment with us.”
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