Danny Dyer revealed he had a “major panic attack” after forgetting his lines on stage while he was performing a Harold Pinter play on Broadway – having taken drugs and stayed out the night before.
The former EastEnders star was cast as a waiter in Pinter’s Celebration at London’s Almeida Theatre, before it transferred to New York’s Lincoln Center in 2001.
Dyer said he had never been to New York before and got “very excited”. “I took a lot of drugs out there,” the 46-year-old told the How To Fail With Elizabeth Day podcast.
“I take it very seriously, my work, and I love it, and I strive to be better every night and I’d never got in a situation, I’d heard about people that had dried on stage 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 f***ing do that, it’s a ridiculous idea.”
Recounting the incident, Dyer said he “just didn’t have a clue what to say” on stage and realised he was letting down his cast mates who were in “horror”.
“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, because I was going to cry.”
Dyer said someone in the cast shouted the line to him.
“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 had a major major panic attack’, but I just had to get on with it,” he said.
“I thought, f***, you put yourself in this situation now get on with it.
“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 he went, ‘if ever there’s an ensemble piece, it’s this Danny’.”
Dyer described the experience as a “wake up call”.
“I have done many plays since (and) that fear has never left me”, he said. “I think you need it because it makes you feel like you’re not bulletproof … I inflicted it on myself, but it was a major fail and it was something that I really did learn from.”
Dyer has previously spoken about the defining influence Pinter had on his life and career, and fronted a documentary about the playwright after his death in December 2008 at the age of 78.
Elsewhere in the chat, Dyer confessed to putting his wife through a lot of turmoil over the years of their relationship.
The actor started dating Joanne Mas when they were both 13. Their relationship endured multiple breakups and cheating allegations before they married in 2016, following Mas’s proposal the previous year.
Dyer, who shares three children with his wife—Love Island star Dani, 27, Sunnie, 17, and nine-year-old Arty—admitted that his behavior towards Mas hasn't always been commendable, standing by him “through a lot of s**t”.
“Well, I’ve been with the same woman since I was 13. It’s a journey,” he said. “It’s so rare, that.
“Because if you think about who you was at 13 and who you are now, to grow with somebody at the same time, at the same rate, and then you throw fame in the mix, and what happened with me, which she never wanted, and she came along for this ride with me, both from the same council estate.”
The former soap star acknowledged that his wife “didn’t really sign up” for a life of fame but has nonetheless helped him navigate the challenges of being a celebrity.
“It f****d my head up when I became really famous,” he said. “I didn’t quite know what to do with it and I suppose she stood by me for a lot of s**t and had to be very patient with me.
“And of course I do believe in the marriage vows and sickness and health and for better for worse. So it’s hard to stay in a relationship for that long with the press attention and with me being a pr**k for many years, because I was, I hold my hands up, I lost the plot for many years.”
The actor continued: “I didn’t quite know who I was and I suppose she had to suffer all that on a national level. I love her with all my heart. You know, she challenges me every day. She’s kept me very grounded. I’ll tell you that now.”
“She came to watch me in a play once and I came off stage and she went, yeah, just don’t get carried away with yourself. I thought that’s what I need to hear.”
