The death of Danny Dyer's mentor Harold Pinter prompted a 'spiral of madness'

Daily Record

11-05-2025

The actor said he was 'lost' and 'angry at the world' after Nobel Prize-winning playwright Harold Pinter died in 2008.
Former EastEnders actor Danny Dyer has spoken of the profound impact the death of his mentor had on his mental health. He said the passing of playwright Harold Pinter sent him into a "spiral of madness".
Nobel Prize-winner Pinter cast Danny Dyer in his production of 'Celebration' at the Almeida Theatre in London way back in 2000. Dyer reminisced about staying over at Pinter's home and absorbing literature from notable scribes like WH Auden and CS Lewis in a recent interview on BBC Radio 4's Desert Island Discs, reported The Mirror.
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In 2001, 'Celebration' made its way to New York's Lincoln Centre, but Dyer faced a difficult incident onstage when he forgot his lines and had an "anxiety attack" following a night of drugs. The actor expressed his regret of disappointing his mentor, but shared how the playwright offered him comfort by wrapping his arm around him.
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The ex- EastEnders star reflected on losing touch with Pinter and learning of his passing in 2008.
Dyer recounted his reaction, saying: "I hadn't spoke to him in a while. I did go off the rails for many years, and I found out by looking on the front of a newspaper.
"Again, I'd been on a bender and I was coming home and I was going, I think I was going to buy cigarettes at the petrol garage, and I see it in the paper. 'Pinter dead'. This really sent me on a spiral of madness, really."
He spoke of his guilt, saying: "The guilt of not being around him anymore and just being lost, I was a bit of a lost soul, and again, angry at the world."
In April, US publication Deadline reported that Dyer was developing an idea for a play about his relationship with Pinter, whom he referred to as his 'mentor'.
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Dyer, who had his breakthrough in the 1999 film Human Traffic, also reflected on some of the documentaries he had made earlier in his career.
The actor presented TV series Danny Dyer's Real Football Factories and Danny Dyer's Deadliest Men in the 2000s, the latter of which saw him interview gangsters and former terrorists.
He said: "I'd made a few films and I just wasn't getting paid any money, and I was desperate to get onto the property ladder.
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"I was still living in a council estate at Custom House, living with my daughter (Dani) and (wife) Jo, and it's like, well, I'm famous, but I'm still living on a council estate.
"And so then my house became a bit like Stonehenge, my little flat, and people would just stand outside waiting for me.'
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He revealed there was a tipping point when an attempted burglary forced the family to move: "There was a moment where someone tried to burgle our house and I was like 'we can't live here no more'."
The opportunity to do a documentary with a veteran footballer came as a financial windfall, as Dyer recalled, "So I got offered to do a documentary with a real football veteran and I couldn't believe the money they was offering me, I thought, 'Oh, wow'".
Yet, despite the financial benefits of taking the job, he shared that the experience left much to be desired, saying, "Now I hated it, because I didn't have a script, it was me on my own interviewing people, and interviewing dangerous people, by the way, but it got me on the property ladder."
When quizzed on potential typecasting fears, he admitted he had no such luxury to worry: "I didn't have the luxury. You know, it's a bit uncouth, I can't watch them back now, I cringe at them."
Dyer concluded with pragmatic frankness, acknowledging the financial necessity behind his choices: "But, you know, I needed to earn money, and I needed to get a house, and I needed to do the right thing."
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