Josh Brolin is opening up about his sometimes turbulent time with ex-wife Diane Lane.
Josh Brolin is opening up about his sometimes turbulent time with ex-wife Diane Lane.
The 50-year-old actor was married to Lane for almost a decade, and their divorce was finalized in 2013. In a new interview with The New York Times, Brolin addresses his 2004 arrest for domestic abuse after an alleged altercation with Lane. The case was eventually dropped.
“God, I’ve never been so careful with my words. Ever. Maybe in all 50 years," Brolin now says about the incident. "And there’s no reason for me to be other than there’s no explaining it. Do you know what I mean? The only person who can explain that would be Diane, and she’s chosen not to, so I’m OK with that.”
Brolin's rep said at the time, “There was a misunderstanding at their home for the lowest-end misdemeanor charge of domestic battery. Diane did not want to press charges and asked them not to arrest him, but in cases involving the possibility of any physical contact, the police have to arrest first, ask questions later.”
Brolin says he used to want to talk about it, but now feels differently.
“I was more reactive, I was more, ‘People need to know the truth,'" he explains. "Whatever I say is going to sound like compensation for a perpetrator. I’ve gotten to a place where all that matters is that I have control over my behavior, and at that time, it was a little more chaotic.”
The Deadpool 2 star gives a little insight into his marriage to 53-year-old Lane, and says that his "hero" complex led to resentment in the relationship.
“I loved Diane,” he says. “I loved being a father figure to her daughter. It just wasn’t attainable, and in that hero mentality, you get exhausted, and then when you get exhausted, you get resentful, and then all that stuff comes out. So I feel bad that I didn’t have the presence of mind or the maturity or whatever to understand that early on.”
He also gets candid about his former approach to relationships.
“I’m going to find out all your needs and all your insecurities, and all that, and then I’m going to play on that,” he says. “Like, you need a daddy? I’ll be your daddy. I’ll be your hero.”
Brolin has since moved on. He married his former assistant, 32-year-old Kathryn Boyd, in 2016, and last month, he announced the two are expecting a baby girl together.
"She doesn’t need me," he says of Boyd, and why their relationship works. "She never needed me.”
During the interview, Brolin also discusses being sober for five years, as well as quitting smoking.
“There’s something that happens to me when I drink that all moral code disappears,” he admits. “So it’s like, if I were to take that drink, after about halfway through, I would start thinking about jumping out that window -- not to kill myself, but just because there must be somebody down there to catch me, and I wonder if I can pull it off or if I could land on that van. It just seemed like fun.”
These days, he still strives to take chances in life -- just not under the influence.
“I want to live more drunk," he says. "I want to live drunkenly. I just don’t want to take the drink.”
Brolin has definitely enjoyed a major career resurgence this summer, starring in blockbusters Avengers: Infinity War and Deadpool 2. Brolin says he's rejected what's expected of him in Hollywood.
“Like, no, I’m 50," he notes. "So what’s the thing, to start playing guys that are the next-door neighbor who’s the grumpy old dude who’s married in the rom-com, and then Jennifer Aniston goes and [expletive] the other guy who’s cooler and he’s an [expletive]?" Like, no. I’ve been offered a lot of those parts, and I’m like, no, man. Don’t want to do that. It’s not interesting to me.”
Brolin reveals there's one unexpected real-life icon he wants to play in a movie.
“I’d like to play RuPaul,” he shares.
ET spoke to Brolin last month, when he talked about working with Ryan Reynolds in Deadpool 2. Watch below:
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