Richard Simmons has disappeared from public life in recent years. While many of us would like to think the bubbly fitness guru is enjoying retirement and sweatin' to the oldies in private, his friends tell a much sadder, darker tale in a New York Daily Newsfeature published Saturday.

According to interviews with Simmons' friends, he has been cutting off contact with them and many suspect he is under the control of his management team and housekeeper.

"We are very concerned... He has missed funerals of close friends. He was the most reliable and caring person on the planet, and then to suddenly vanish? I have come to believe that something else is happening. I don't think Richard is in there of his own volition," a friend told the Daily News on the condition of anonymity.

Simmons' masseuse and friend Mauro Oliveira said that Simmons appeared gaunt and depressed the last time he saw him at home. He alleges that Simmons' live-in housekeeper, Teresa Reveles, kicked Oliveira out of the house and Simmons' manager threatened a restraining order if Oliveira tried to initiate contact.

"I feel that Richard is now being controlled by the very people that he controlled his whole life," Oliveira said. "Controlled in the sense that they are taking advantage of his weak mental state. Controlled in the sense that they are controlling his mail, controlling his everything. His brother, the manager and Teresa. Those three people."

For someone who seemed to relish in the spotlight, Richard Simmons' sudden disappearance from public life does seem suspicious, even if his management claims it's what he wants.

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