The 'Impeachment: American Crime Story' star recently opened up about her past drinking issues and staying clean since she was 29.
Edie Falco is opening up about living a clean and sober life. The Impeachment: American Crime Story star is reflecting on why she began drinking, and how she decided to stop.
In a recent interview with The Guardian, Falco, 58, revealed that she's been sober since she was 29, after finding herself in a place where she was controlled by her alcoholism.
Falco revealed that she didn't even begin drinking until she was in college, and sought alcohol as a way of compensating for her shyness, which was impacting her confidence level.
"I was a non-drinker for years, then I had my first drink at college and I found nirvana," Falco recalled, explaining that booze felt like "the answer to all my problems, and the cause of all my other problems."
Falco said that her primary vice was alcohol, largely due to her finances. Drugs were too expense.
"I was a big fan of cocaine if it was around, but I could never afford any," Falco shared. "Marijuana just gave me anxiety."
However, her moment of clarity came several years later, while in the last year of her 20s, while hungover. Falco woke up after a night of heavy drinking and found she'd drunkenly forgotten to even close her front door, which had been open all night. This lapse in judgement and personal safety was the tipping point that led to her quitting all together.
Years later, Falco was cast as a high-functioning drug addict in Nurse Jackie, but said it was not her idea to make the character an addict, as "that stuff’s way too close to me."
"I had a hard time with the idea of a comedy about addiction," Falco added. "I said to them, ‘If the last season isn’t about her going to meetings and getting help, she has to be dead at the end, so people know what it’s like.’"
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