EastEnders legend admits he’d ‘sit up all night smoking crack’ before beating drug addiction
EASTENDERS legend Danny Dyer admitted he’d have sleepless nights “smoking crack” at the height of his drug addiction.
The actor, 46, revealed that froze on stage during a Broadway show after a drug bender the night before.
Danny said he was left in tears after the performance after realising that he had messed up and suffered a panic attack backstage.
“I’d never been to New York. And so when we transferred from the Almeida to the Lincoln center in New York, I got very excited,” Danny said on How to Fail with Elizabeth Day and bonus episode Failing With Friends.
“Well, I took a lot of drugs out there. And this is the other thing I’d never dried. I take it very seriously, my work, and I love it, and I strive to be better every night.
“And, you know, I’d never got in a situation, I’d heard about people that had dried on stage, you know, because it’s a massive thing and all that, and it never happened to me.
“Anyway, I thought that I could sit up all night, smoking crack, and then walk on stage, and of course you can’t fucking do that, it’s a ridiculous idea.
“And I interjected. Like I’d done, you know, many, many nights before, you know, like I’ve done this play so much, matinees, and I just didn’t have a clue what to say.
“And the worst thing was the other actors, who knew I’d been out, looking at me.
“I come behind their little bonkette thing and I interject and they all turn to me.
“So their, their faces are away from the audience and it was just their horror.
“As if to go, come on then pr***, and that made me worse because I thought oh s*** actually, I’m not just letting myself I’m letting all that… because it must be horrible if you’re in a scene with somebody and you know, you’re doing your bit and it’s going well and they dry, ’cause then you f*****, ‘cause they’re f***ing you aren’t they as well.”
Danny, who played Mick Carter on BBC One soap EastEnders, said he was an emotional wreck following the incident.
He went on: “I’d never had that feeling before. I loved showing off. And then all of a sudden it’s like, so my lips started to go, cause I was going to cry.
“Cause I thought, you know, obviously cause I hadn’t been in a bed.
“Felt really vulnerable.
“And then Andy De La Tour, shouted the line out and I snapped into this and I did it and I said it and then I have to go off stage because I have to come back on again in a bit and I come off stage going, I can’t go back on I can’t, I just did a major major panic attack but I just had to get on with it.
“I thought, f***, you put yourself in this situation now get on with it.
“You know, and even when Keith Allen’s looking at you going, f*** you now, mate, you know, you’re in trouble.
“And then Harold came up to me after and he sort of gave me a cuddle and that made me worse, made me cry.
“And I was like, and he went, if ever there’s an ensemble piece, it’s this Danny.
“And I was like, yeah, f*** me. I’m sorry.
“But it was a wake up call. And I’ve done many plays since that fears never left me since. I carried on, did the play, s*** myself every night.”
Danny said the death of his father really triggered him and lead to him pushing the self-destruct button.
“It did for the duration of the play. I thought, I’m not doing that again,” he shared.
“I’m quite good at pressing the f*** it button. For many years.
“And when I had a lot of therapy in rehab, I realised it did go back to abandonment issues of strong male figures in my life, like my dad left, that fucked my head up, then I became really close to my granddad who died of cancer when I was 16, you know like six months.
“He got prostate cancer and then I nursed him and he just fucking deteriorated – big, strong f****** man. So that done me.
“And then, and then Harold came into my life and then he died of cancer.
“And I think that I learned from, well, I thought, I thought, well, I’m just going to f******* press the fuck it button before they die on me or, you know, I’ll, I’ll beat them to it.
“That’s what I learned in therapy and a lot of therapy and that, and that’s what I sort of, you know, it was abandonment issues for males.”
Back in 2022, Danny previously told The Sun he feared he would die if he didn’t get help when his life was on the brink five years ago.
Danny went to show bosses at the time and told them he desperately needed to take time out after his relationship with wife Joanne Mas hit the rocks in 2017.
He admitted he had spent years being “a c*** to her” and was taking so many drugs he had to make the desperate cry for help to producers of the BBC soap.
Danny and Jo met as kids, growing up on the same council estate in East London, and had daughter Dani, 26, when he was just 18.
The couple went on to have daughter Sunnie, 15, and son Arty, eight.
Failing with Friends is available wherever you get your podcasts.