HAPPY IN HIS FINAL HOURS

A hotel employee, who gave her name as Oi, said Carradine was in good spirits in the final few hours he was seen alive.

"He was in the hotel lobby, relaxing and playing the piano -- he looked very happy," she told Reuters television.

Tiffany Smith of Carradine's Los Angeles-based talent manager Binder & Assoc. repeated assertions that the actor's family believes Carradine could not have committed suicide.

"It's not where he is in his life right now, he was completely full of life, extremely happy to be going to Bangkok and doing this film," she said.

Smith declined comment on media reports about the possibility of an accidental death by autoerotic asphyxiation, pending the police report.

When long-time family friend and Carradine's former lawyer Vicki Roberts, who represented the actor in a past divorce, was asked whether he had a history of using autoerotic asphyxiation, she replied: "No, absolutely not."

Roberts said details of the way the actor was found in his hotel caused her to suspect foul play, but she conceded she was only reading news accounts out of Bangkok.

Meanwhile, Smith said Carradine's family was making arrangements to have his body flown back to Los Angeles, but as of Friday there were no details on when that might occur.

Carradine is married to Annie Bierman and he comes from a family of performers, including actor Keith Carradine, whose father is the late character actor John Carradine.

He enjoyed a long career on Broadway, TV and in movies such as Quentin Tarantino's "Kill Bill: Vol. 1" and "Kill Bill: Vol. 2." But he was most famous for his role in "Kung Fu," playing a martial arts specialist known as Caine who wandered through the American Old West seeking wisdom and beating up bad guys.