Jim Morrison’s Brother Reflects on His Final Days in Rare Interview More Than 50 Years After Rocker’s Death

The brother of late Doors rocker Jim Morrison is reflecting on the star’s final days in Paris — and what inspired him to take off for the City of Light in the first place.

Members of Morrison’s inner circle were interviewed in the new docuseries Before the End: Searching for Jim Morrison (out now), including Andy Morrison, who offered rare insight into his older brother’s possible mindset ahead of his death in July 1971 at age 27.

“His lifestyle [killed him]. Obviously he drank too much,” Andy says in the docuseries. “I think by that time he was overweight and, you know, if you’re not in good health and you drink too much and dabble in some drugs, it’s not that hard to do.”

Questions have swirled for decades over Morrison’s death, as it was ruled a heart attack and no autopsy was ever performed. His longtime girlfriend Pamela Courson (who died of a heroin overdose three years later) told French authorities that she found the rocker dead in the bathtub of their Paris apartment after a night out at the movies. Before the End follows filmmaker Jeff Finn as he digs into the conspiracy theory that Morrison may have faked his own death.

In Paris, Morrison grew a long beard and had gained weight due to alcoholism. His move abroad had come amid a growing contempt for fame as well as a string of legal problems; he was convicted of indecent exposure and profanity after a concert in Miami in 1969, and was sentenced to six months in prison.

Though the star was free on bond and had appealed his conviction (his Doors bandmates have denied any lewd behavior actually occurred onstage), Morrison performed his final concert with The Doors in December 1970 and packed up for Paris, hoping to focus on poetry.

“I think he actually wanted to get back into some serious writing. And maybe he’d outgrown the Doors thing, had been enough,” Andy Morrison says in the docuseries. “Whether he was 100% done, I think not. I think he just needed a break.”

Andy and his sister Anne — who are co-executors of Morrison’s estate — have preserved their late brother’s legacy over the years. In 2021, they helped publish The Collected Works of Jim Morrison, which compiled writings from dozens of notebooks, handwritten song drafts, childhood photos and more.

“I just really wanted this to be a whole collective of what he’d done and what he was,” Anne told PEOPLE at the time. “We didn’t want them to just sit there in the vault. I saw that page [he wrote] with a plan for a book and I thought, ‘OK, well that’s it. That’s what we’ll do.'”

Anne remembered her brother as a prankster “from the get-go,” and recalled him being a voracious reader, even as a child. The longtime teacher said she learned of Morrison’s death from a radio news report, and had previously worried about his substance abuse issues.

“I worried about him because he was in the drug and drinking scene,” she told PEOPLE. “But I knew I wasn’t going to change that.”

Still, she said, “It was just a joy to see Jim grow and do what he did. Except for the tragedy at the end.”

Conspiracy theories aside, The Doors guitarist Robby Krieger also spoke to PEOPLE in 2021 about Morrison’s death, saying the star was “really excited” about leaving for Paris the last time he saw him.

“When he went to Paris, supposedly to get away from everything, all he did was jump up onstage with these flipping house bands, get drunk and sing,” Krieger said. “He couldn’t stop himself from doing that. That’s why I know he’s dead. Because if he was alive, he’d be up on stage somewhere.”

Source people.com