Son calls O'Neal a narcissist on CNN

LOS ANGELES, Aug. 4 (UPI) -- Ryan O'Neal's estranged son, Griffin, says the U.S. actor banned him from Farrah Fawcett's funeral last month.

"She was a great friend," Griffin O'Neal, 44, said of Fawcett on CNN's "Larry King Live" Monday night. "I came from a not-so-nice kind of a world. We were a kind of a battling and kind of crazy family. And she was so nice. ... And the crazy, sad part was that she stayed nice all the way to the end. And it broke my heart when I was not allowed in to say goodbye to her."

Fawcett, O'Neal's longtime companion, died of anal cancer June 25. O'Neal, 68, whose drug and legal issues have eclipsed his career in recent years, made headlines this week when he admitted to Vanity Fair he didn't recognize his own daughter, Tatum, at Fawcett's funeral and asked her for a drink and if she had a car.

When King asked Griffin about the Tatum story, he replied: "(Ryan) was flirting with everybody. ... My dad is getting up in the years now. I don't think he really recognizes people that he's known for years."

"His daughter?" King asked.

"It was his daughter. He didn't realize it was her," Griffin said.

Griffin -- who has had his own issues with drugs and brushes with the law -- claimed in the CNN interview his father was irritated when he found out Fawcett had cancer because the attention "was diverted to Farrah."

Ryan, he said, is an "absolute complete narcissist in every way."

In a statement given CNN, O'Neal's publicist noted Griffin's estrangement from his father and Fawcett. "Therefore, there is no way he would have any knowledge of what was going on in their lives," the publicist said.