Martin Sheen Got ‘Dangerously Drunk’ Filming ‘Apocalypse Now’ Scene on His Birthday
Martin Sheen is best known as a talented character actor. He started his career in the entertainment industry in the late ’60s, acting in a variety of film and TV projects before really hitting his stride in the late ’70s. While the star has always worked consistently in Hollywood, he was nearly sidelined by a crippling addiction to alcohol. On occasion, his drinking made its way into his onscreen roles. For one iconic scene in the 1979 epic Apocalypse Now, Sheen actually admitted he was drunk while filming.
‘Apocalypse Now’ was an early hit for Martin Sheen
By the time Apocalypse Now was released in 1979, Sheen was already an established presence in Hollywood. Throughout the decade, Sheen acted in many TV projects, cementing his reputation as a strong character actor. His skill at portraying conflicted leading men convinced director Francis Ford Coppola to cast him in his psychological war drama as U.S. Army Captain Benjamin Willard.
Apocalypse Now has become notorious for the difficult filming conditions that plagued the cast and crew. From allegedly using real bodies as props for certain scenes to chronic illnesses, the film was plagued with problems from start to finish. The chaos on set clearly extended to the actors. Sheen admitted that in his most famous scene from the movie, he was “dangerously drunk.”
What scene in ‘Apocalypse Now’ did Martin Sheen film drunk?
The character of Benjamin Willard, as played by Sheen, is a veteran assassin who has been to Vietnam two times previously. During his introductory scene in the film, Willard can be seen staggering around his hotel room in a drunken breakdown. As Sheen later explained in an interview at the Dubai International Film Festival, as reported by BuzzFeed, he was actually quite drunk when he filmed the scene. “I was so dangerously drunk I could hardly stand up,” Sheen admitted.
“I went very deep into my own personal pain and alcoholism and self-loathing and all of the things that make up a human being,” Sheen said, describing how he was intent on portraying Willard as a dangerous, unpredictable man.
At the penultimate moment in the scene, Willard punches a mirror. That was an accident, as Sheen revealed, explaining how he was closer to the mirror than he realized. While Coppola wanted to stop filming after Sheen’s hand started bleeding, the actor insisted on continuing the scene. “And so I did and I just showed a completely broken, desperate guy, which was a reflection of who I was at the time,” Sheen said.
Martin Sheen was able to get sober when trying to help his son through addiction
Sheen went on to fight his alcohol addiction for years. He had several unpleasant run-ins with other performers during that time, including Melissa Gilbert. He approached the child star when he was “hammered” and told her that she should consider getting out of acting. However, once Sheen’s own children started to experience addiction issues of their own, he was able to tackle his alcoholism head-on.
As Sheen told AARP in 2008, he ultimately joined Alcoholics Anonymous when his son, Charlie Sheen, needed support. “I only got involved with AA when I was trying desperately to find a way to help Charlie, because I didn’t have any skills…it was a great discipline,” Sheen explained. These days, Sheen is one of Hollywood’s most respected and beloved stars.
