Tuesday 10 July 2012

Sam Shepard: 'Speed and booze together make you quite . . . omnipotent'

INTERVIEWER
Have you struggled with drinking?
SHEPARD
My history with booze goes back to high school. Back then there was a lot of Benzedrine around, and since we lived near the Mexican border I’d just run over, get a bag of bennies and drink ripple wine. Speed and booze together make you quite . . . omnipotent. You don’t feel any pain. I was actually in several car wrecks that I don’t understand how I survived.
At any rate, for a long time I didn’t think I had a problem. Alcoholism is an insidious disease; until I confronted it I wasn’t aware that it was creeping up on me. I finally did AA in the hardcore down on Pico Boulevard. I said, “Don’t put me in with Elton John or anything, just throw me to the lions.”
Via

Portrait of the Artist: Sam Shepard and the Anxiety of Identity

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