JERRY ORBACH - ORBACH'S SON LASHES OUT AT FATHER'S WIDOW

ORBACH'S SON LASHES OUT AT FATHER'S WIDOW

The son of late actor JERRY ORBACH has lashed out at his father's widow after claiming she cut him and his brother out of a $10 million (GBP5million) inheritance.
Orbach died after succumbing to prostate cancer in 2004 at the age of 69, leaving behind two sons and his second wife, Elaine Cancilla.
And his 39-year-old son, Chris, has accused his stepmother of manipulating the former Law + Order star into cutting his children out of his will.
According to the New York Post, Orbach writes in a letter to Cancilla, all that was left to him were "two sweaters, a pool cue, a few CDs and a pocketknife from the estate of one of television's best-known faces - a man who happened, incidentally, to be my father."
He also allegedly attacks his stepmother for her decision to donate Orbach's eyes to the Eye Bank Association of America, adding: "Having to leave my father's deathbed so that some guy with an ice box could shuck his eyes out while they were fresh still makes me sick and furious to this day."
But Cancilla-Orbach is refuting the claims, insisting: "(I was) in shock when I received the letter. I stood there in my kitchen having four pages of this vomit being thrown at me by someone I thought I had a relationship with. I don't hate Chris, but I don't understand why he's doing this. Everything he says is untrue.
"Jerry always said he was so proud that at age 69, he didn't need glasses. He said, 'If I can give anything back, I want to give my eyes. I can't give my liver because I drank too much, and I can't give my lungs because I smoked too much. But I can give my eyes.'
"So on his deathbed, when they asked if he was an organ donor, I said, 'Take his eyes.' Chris knew nothing of this. He knew nothing of what his father and I discussed for 25 years."
Orbach, an actor and musician, tells the newspaper he regrets that the matter has become public but stands by his letter.
He says, "It's a very melodramatic gesture. But I no longer saw the sense in maintaining a relationship with Elaine."