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While she was recovering, Cheyenne became pregnant by Drollet, the scion of a prominent Tahitian family. Eight months into the pregnancy, she told Christian that Drollet was beating her. Christian confronted her boyfriend with a .45-cal. handgun at Brando's California estate, and in the ensuing struggle, Drollet was killed. "The messenger of misery has come to my house," Brando told attorney William Kunstler that night. Christian, who was represented by both Kunstler and Robert Shapiro, was sentenced to 10 years for manslaughter, but with time off for good behavior, he may be out of prison as early as next January.
Cheyenne once claimed she was "the most beautiful, most intelligent and richest girl in Tahiti," and there are those who agreed with her. But she was also probably the most anguished. In the past few months, the onetime model gained so much weight that she began to resemble her corpulent father. Her behavior was so erratic that when she recently invited three friends out for coffee in nearby Papeete, she paid for the coffee by writing separate checks.
Cheyenne was devastated when a judge ruled three weeks ago that Tuki would have to remain in the custody of Cheyenne's mother. It was while her mother was at Easter services that she took her life. Brando decided against flying to Tahiti, but, ever the domineering parent, he tried to have Cheyenne buried on his private atoll of Tetiaroa. Instead, she was laid to rest in the Drollet family crypt in Faa'a. CHEYENNE WITH DAG FOR ETERNITY, read the headline in La Depeche de Tahiti.
The death of Brando's daughter happens to coincide with his re-emergence on screen in Don Juan DeMarco. As an added and cruel irony, his last scene in the movie is a dance on the beach of a tropical island with his wife (Faye Dunaway). Their paradise looks a lot like Tahiti.
--Reported by Al Prince/Papeete and Jeffrey Ressner/Los Angeles