By Steve Gorman
Medical examiners conducted an autopsy on Wednesday on the body of actor Chris Penn, but said they would be unable to determine how the 40-year-old brother of Oscar winner Sean Penn died until toxicology tests were complete.
Penn, found dead on Tuesday at his oceanside home in Santa Monica, west of Los Angeles, weighed more than 300 pounds and had a history of drug abuse, said Craig Harvey, a spokesman for the Los Angeles County Coroner's Office.
The autopsy, conducted hours before Penn's latest movie, "The Darwin Awards," premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in Utah, revealed no signs of foul play or suicide, pointing instead to natural or accidental causes of death, Harvey said.
"He does have a history of drug use," Harvey told Reuters. "We don't know how recent, or if any drug use occurred up to the time of his death. We just need to rule it out before we close the case."
He added: "It could be a contributing factor, it could be a primary factor or it could be not a factor at all."
Harvey said Penn's health may also have been a factor. Standing more than 6 feet tall, he weighed 310 pounds (140 kg), the coroner's spokesman said. His body was found by a housekeeper in bed in the condominium where he lived alone.
A publicist for Sean Penn issued a statement on Tuesday saying the family "would appreciate the media's respect of their privacy during this difficult time."
'Not Just Sean's Little Brother'
At the Sundance premiere of comedy "Darwin Awards," several actors in the film, including longtime friend Winona Ryder, paid tribute to Penn and called him a master character actor who would be sorely missed by his friends and colleagues.
"I really hope people go back and watch his movies. He was such a fantastic actor," Ryder said. "He's not just Sean's little brother. He was Chris Penn."
With her voice cracking in front of a packed house, Ryder, who had known Penn for 19 years, called Wednesday a "really, really sad day."
Finn Taylor, who directed "Darwin Awards," in which Penn had a small role as a Minnesota hunter who fakes the theft of his truck to collect insurance money, said Penn "gave an incredible performance in the film that's going to make a lot of people laugh for a years to come."
Penn was a character actor who specialized in blue-collar, tough-guy roles and appeared in dozens of films, including "Mulholland Falls," "Murder by Numbers" and the 2004 film "Starsky & Hutch." He also co-starred in the short-lived CBS television drama "The Brotherhood of Poland, New Hampshire."
In one of his best-known performances, Penn played baby-faced criminal Nice Guy Eddie Cabot in director Quentin Tarantino's "Reservoir Dogs." He also co-starred with his brother in the 1986 film "At Close Range."
In 1996, Chris Penn won the best supporting actor award at the Venice Film Festival for his role as a Depression-era gangster in "The Funeral," co-starring Isabella Rossellini.
But his career was largely eclipsed by older brother Sean, who gained fame for a brief but highly publicized marriage to pop star Madonna and went on to accumulate an acclaimed body of work that included four Oscar-nominated performances. He won an Academy Award as best actor for the 2003 film "Mystic River."
In a 1996 interview with Reuters, Chris Penn said he was "very proud" of and "very close" to his older brother. Another brother, Michael, is a musician.
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