Tom Holland says he has been sober for over a year
Actor Tom Holland opened up about how a recent role he played led to him taking a break from drinking. He revealed that filming the upcoming Apple TV+ crime thriller The Crowded Room changed his views on his own mental health. As a result, he has been sober for the last year and four months, he said.
In an interview with Entertainment Weekly on May 9, the Spider-Man actor said the role greatly impacted him. “I’m no stranger to the physical aspects of the job doing the whole action-movie thing,” he said. “But the mental aspect, it really beat me up and it took a long time for me to recover afterwards, to sort of get back to reality.”
Holland’s character in the show is based on the life of Billy Milligan, who suffered from a dissociative identity disorder. He was arrested in the summer of 1979 in connection with a shooting at Rockfeller Centre in New York City.
“I was seeing myself in [the character], but in my personal life,” Holland said. “I remember having a bit of a meltdown at home and thinking, like, ‘I’m going to shave my head. I need to shave my head because I need to get rid of this character.’ And, obviously, we were mid-shooting, so I decided not to… It was unlike anything I’ve ever experienced before.”
The Last Call actor, who also acted as an executive producer on The Crowded Room, said the show provides “an insight into the power of the human mind” and “the ways in which we can deal with trauma.”
Acknowledging how he can now “recognise triggers” like social media that “stresses” him out, he added, “Learning about mental health and the power of it, and speaking to psychiatrists about Danny and Billy’s struggles, has been something that has been so informative to my own life.”
“[I hope Crowded Room viewers] have more respect and more sympathy for people who are going through mental health issues,” the actor added. “I hope that people will feel educated about the powers of mental health, the struggles, [and] our incredible abilities to survive.”
The series will premiere on June 9 on Apple TV+ and will also feature Amanda Seyfried, Sasha Lane, Will Chase, Lior Raz, Laila Robins, Christopher Abbott and Henry Eikenberry.
Earlier in March, supermodel Bella Hadid celebrated being five months alcohol free on TikTok during a weekend getaway to Las Vegas.
5 months alcohol free
“I have done my fair share of drinking. I loved alcohol, and it got to the point where even I started to, you know, cancel nights out that I felt like I wouldn’t be able to control myself,” Hadid told InStyle in January 2022.
