Barry Keoghan opens up on addiction battles and reveals rehab stint

Barry Keoghan has opened up on his battle with addiction for the first time – and revealed he attended a rehab clinic in England to get help.

The Dublin actor’s profile has gone stratospheric in recent years, from an Oscar nomination and the lead turn in the cult smash Saltburn in 2023, to spending most of 2024 in a relationship with one of the biggest pop stars in the world, Sabrina Carpenter.

However, during a recent trip back to his hometown, the 32-year-old spoke of the private struggles behind his success for the first time.

In a wide-ranging chat with Hollywood Authentic – for which Keoghan brought the magazine on a tour of his old Dublin haunts – the Banshees of Inisherin star said his trusted driver, Niall, was the one who made sure he sought professional help when he hit rock bottom.

‘Niall literally drove me and put me on a plane himself, came with me and brought me to the rehab in England,’ Keoghan said.

The BAFTA-winning actor lost his mother to drug addiction when he was just 12, and revealed he had also ‘lost two uncles and a cousin to drugs’.

‘That should be enough to go, “OK, if I dabble here, I’m f***ed,”‘ he said.

‘But your curiosity is a powerful thing. Sometimes it’s beneficial and sometimes it’s detrimental. For me, it was detrimental.’

The Summerhill native – who, along with his brother Eric, lived in over a dozen foster homes between the ages of five and nine before going to live with his grandmother and aunt in the north inner city – said even the birth of his son Brando in 2022 ‘didn’t stop me from being curious’.

‘You go to LA, you go to Hollywood, wherever the big scene is. There’s an enormous amount of pressure, and a different lifestyle that is good and bad for you.

Barry Keoghan at the 2025 Met Gala. Getty Images

‘You’re around the scene. You just happen to be the one that ends up doing it.’

Showing interviewer Greg Williams marks on his arm from injuries incurred while high, Keoghan said he has ‘scars here to literally prove it’.

‘They’re a result of using.’ But the star insists he is ‘at peace now, and responsible for everything that I do’.

‘I’m accepting. I’m present. I’m content. I’m a father. I’m getting to just see that haze that was once there – it’s just a bit sharper now and colourful.’

The acclaimed actor did not reveal the specifics of his addiction, but revealed he has since gone back to visit the rehab facility in sobriety.

‘It was nice to see the staff again, and for them to see the change in me,’ he said. ‘They were quite emotional about it. I’m forever grateful.

‘When I say that [his driver] Niall is the best, I mean it, because no one else put me on the plane, by the hand, literally got on the plane with me.’

Elsewhere, Keoghan revealed he has a trusted confidant in Banshees co-star Colin Farrell, a fellow Dubliner in recovery from substance issues who has ‘always been there’ for the younger star.

‘Even now, through the tough times and good times. And so has Cillian [Murphy – with whom he starred in Dunkirk]’.

Barry Keoghan and Colin Farrell in "The Banshees of Inisherin." Courtesy Searchlight Pictures ⓒ 2022 20th Century Studios

In a whistlestop tour of the inner city streets and buildings that ‘shaped’ Keoghan, he brings Williams to Cineworld on Parnell Street, where he’d regularly sneak in and where he developed his love for film.

He was eventually caught and barred but recalls the day he came back for the Dunkirk premiere and had to explain he was now a Hollywood actor.

‘They were like, “You’re not allowed in.” I said, “It’s my movie, though.” They were like, “No, no. You’re not allowed in.” It was a whole thing. It was just a turning point for me.’

The ambitious actor, and now producer, spoke at length about his excitement at being cast as Ringo Starr in Sam Mendes’s upcoming four-part Beatles biopic, which also stars Paul Mescal as Paul McCartney.

He said he is growing his hair out for the role and has been learning the drums for five months.

‘I’ve got a lot of similarities to Ringo,’ he said. ‘You know, his story is absolutely beautiful. I felt he was always an outsider trying to get in, even with the lads. I can resonate with that. He always wanted approval, and – almost – to be loved.

‘It’s heartbreaking, the script that I read. It’s gorgeous.’

Describing the moment he, Mescal, Harris Dickinson (who will play John Lennon) and Joseph Quinn (who will play George Harrison) were officially presented to the world, Keoghan recalls: ‘We all had a moment backstage and it was so, so beautiful.

‘It was such an exciting thing, to step out and be announced as The Beatles.’

March 31, 2025: Paul Mescal (L) and Barry Keoghan (R) at CinemaCon 2025 for Sony Pictures. (Photos by Stewart Cook/Sony Pictures via Getty Images)

Keoghan said that, growing up without a father, he looked to movie stars for guidance on being a man.

‘I’d watch these movies at my nannie’s at night-time like Cool Hand Luke and Marlon Brando movies.

‘That was my way of learning behaviour from men. Because I didn’t have a father figure. I was looking at these men, and how they behaved. I was very fixated on how they just moved and had composure.

‘I didn’t have someone in the house showing me how to shave, or saying, “Don’t punch someone in the balls”.’

The actor said his uncle Alan ‘was very present for us for a good few years’, but tragically also lost his life to heroin, aged just 40.

During the interview, Keoghan returns to the shop where he saw an ad for inexperienced local actors that led to his first break, the low-budget crime drama Between The Canals, which came out in 2011.

Director Mark O’Connor previously told Extra.ie: ‘Barry was a kid and he was ringing me for three years every couple of weeks saying “Here, are you doing that film?” When O’Connor cast him in his next two films, Keoghan was noticed and cast in Love/Hate, from where his star continued to soar.

Visiting the bedroom he slept in before it all began in his grandmother’s flat, Keoghan said he would ‘always leave that window open, because I loved the noise of all the fighting outside, and all the windows going through, and the f***ing arguments you hear. That, for me, would be peaceful.

‘I remember being kids here and hearing my mum scream through the letterbox, asking for us, while she’s battling addiction, while she’s looking for money to score. And we were just told to stay in bed. We weren’t to go down and hug her.’

As his interviewer becomes emotional at the image, Keoghan says he is ‘not in denial anymore’.

Barry Keoghan at the premiere of Saltburn in 2023. Getty Images

‘I understand that I do have an addiction, and I am an addict. You know, when you accept that, you finally can move on, and learn to work with it.’

He will soon star in the upcoming Hurry Up Tomorrow alongside Jenna Ortega and Abel ‘The Weeknd’ Tesfaye.

And his extraordinary portrayals onscreen could be about to get even more memorable, if he is true to his work.

‘Now that I’m in a healthy place I can constructively go to places, creatively and artistically, in a way that I couldn’t before,’ he said.

‘I always say the only person that stands in my way – and this is for everything, not only acting or performances – is myself, when self-doubt creeps in.

‘I put my own obstacles in place. No one else is responsible for me achieving or getting to a place of contentedness or success. The only person that is responsible for that is me, and I’ve learned that in the course of sobriety.’

* This article was originally published on Extra.ie.