Alec Baldwin hasn’t done drugs since 1985 — and he couldn’t be happier about it.
The actor was having a casual chat about Frank Sinatra in an episode of the “Our Way with Paul Anka and Skip Bronson” podcast released Wednesday, when the conversation turned from the Rat Pack to Baldwin’s decadeslong sobriety after Anka asked if Baldwin was “a drinker.”
“I don’t discuss this a lot, I discuss it every now and then when it makes sense,” he said. “I’m 39 years sober. I got sober Feb. 23, 1985. Because, as I tell people — and you’ll appreciate this — I was in Los Angeles in ’83, and I had a two-year, daily white-hot problem.”
“Every day for two years, I think I snorted a line of cocaine from here to Saturn,” he continued. “We did one on the rings of Saturn, then we … took it back home. I mean, cocaine was like coffee back then — everybody was doing it all day long. I did a lot of coke.”
The native New Yorker had yet to land major roles in “Beetlejuice” or “Working Girl,” which came to define his early silver screen career, when he decided to become drug-free. However, he revealed that he knew alcohol would become his newfound crutch after quitting drugs.
“I stopped,” he told Anka. “And ’cause I stopped doing drugs, my drinking increased — which they tell you that’s going to happen — and that did happen. I just started drinking. And the thing I miss is drinking. I don’t miss drugs at all, but I do miss drinking. I like to drink.”
Seth Wenig/Associated Press
Elsewhere in the interview, Baldwin talked about how he navigates turmoil while being sober.
“New York relaxes me, I walk around and I see aspects of it that I’ve never seen before,” he said, adding, “I do try to meditate, but meditating with seven children is like trying to play ping pong on the deck of an aircraft carrier. It’s a real pain in the ass, man.”
While he’d already curated a lengthy resume of public flare-ups and personal controversies for years, Baldwin only recently faced the most consequential incident of his life — when 42-year-old cinematographer Halyna Hutchins was fatally shot on set during filming for “Rust” in 2021.
Baldwin was rehearsing with a gun when the firearm went off, killing Hutchins and injuring Joel Souza, the director of the movie.
Baldwin, who co-produced and stars in the upcoming film, has since been charged with involuntary manslaughter for the shooting and could face up to 18 months in prison if found guilty. He has pleaded not guilty and is set to go to trial in July.
Hannah Gutierrez-Reed, the movie weapons supervisor for “Rust,” was recently sentenced to 18 months in prison after being found guilty of involuntary manslaughter for the incident.
Need help with substance use disorder or mental health issues? In the U.S., call 800-662-HELP (4357) for the SAMHSA National Helpline.