Jamie Dornan has opened up about coping with depression after losing his mother and four of his friends within one year.
The actor revealed he turned to alcohol after his mother passed away from pancreatic cancer when he was just 16 and four of his friends died in a car accident a year later.
Speaking on the Out To Lunch with Jay Rayner podcast, Jamie admitted he’s “still dealing with both” tragic losses.
He explained, “Yeah my mum died when I was 16. That was obviously a life-altering, insane, horrendous thing to happen.
“Then four of my mates killed themselves in a car crash when I was 17.
“I had a very rough couple of years that I guess I’m still dealing with both of those things today, every day.
“But I guess they were very acute still then, and I drank a lot of everything, but I had this summer where I’d go out a lot, drink, not really achieve anything.”
He said he didn’t realise he was coping with depression until he went for a job interview after dropping out of a university degree in marketing one summer.
Jamie explained, “I remember having this idea that I wanted to change and I knew I wasn’t on the right path and I needed to do something else.
“I got into an interview once and I was explaining what I got up to that summer, and the interviewer goes, ‘So you’re depressed,’ and I was like, ‘Oh s**t yeah,’
“I’d never seen it that way, but I must have been depressed.”
It’s #OutToLunch time. In this edition I take the marvellous #JamieDornan for 50 shades of beef to the @GuineaGrill. We talk childhood in Northern Ireland, breaking into the film biz, the best roast potatoes and modesty pouches. https://t.co/lglwRVi3rx pic.twitter.com/zSCKuBjtJv
— Jay Rayner (@jayrayner1) April 30, 2019
The actor also revealed that he almost rejected the role of Christian Grey during the podcast.
He said, “You are presented with this incredible opportunity that is going to have a big impact on your life and change many things – to be honest mostly financially, but also career, it’ll open so many doors – but you know it’s going to get panned.”
