'He Pulled The Trigger': Richard E. Grant Just Recalled The Terrifying Time His Dad Tried To Shoot Him When He Was 15 Years Old

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21-02-2025

This article mentions alcohol misuse and gun violence.
British actor Richard E. Grant has spoken candidly about his father trying to shoot him when he was a teenager — with Richard only escaping unscathed because his dad was drunk and did not have good aim. The 67-year-old star, who is known for his roles in everything from Spice World to Saltburn, opened up about his difficult childhood in a recent appearance on the Begin Again with Davina McCall podcast.
Speaking to the host, Richard reflected on growing up in Swaziland, now Eswatini, a small country in Southern Africa. He explained that his father got custody of him after his parents split, which made him feel 'rejected' by his mom.
And despite his father becoming a 'monster' after he developed an addiction to alcohol, Richard maintained that, in hindsight, he would still choose to live with his dad.
'[A friend asked me] would you have preferred to have lived with your mother, who is sober, or your father, who became an alcoholic [and] tried to shoot me when I was 15 when I emptied all his Scotch supply down the sink,' Richard began. 'I said I'd prefer to have lived with my father.'
'Even though he became an alcoholic after my mother left, the person that I knew and loved by day outweighed the monster that he turned into when he'd down a bottle of Johnnie Walker,' Richard explained, confirming that his dad would drink a bottle of the whisky a day. 'By 9 o'clock at night, there'd be a personality switch and he'd become unrecognizable.'
Davina then asked the star if he ever felt 'safe' growing up, to which Richard shared: 'I felt safe; I found a surrogate maternal figure in my piano teacher, she fulfilled everything that my mother didn't, so I felt safe with her. But in my own family life, I never felt safe, never.'
'If you have a parent that's an addict, it's schizoid because who they are when they're sober and who they are when they're not…' Richard then trailed off. 'The part that I remember now, about my father, was when he was sober.'
'But when I'm doubtful, which is every day at some point, the voice of: 'You're not good enough, you're useless, you're ugly, you have no talent…' that's what comes. I have to consciously go: 'Shut up!' because that is what he'd say when he was drunk. That is what you remember,' he went on.
The star then detailed the terrifying moment that his father aimed a gun at him and pulled the trigger when he was 15 years old, recalling: 'When my father tried to shoot me, I'd emptied all his Johnnie Walker Scotch into the scullery. I thought: 'If I get rid of all of this, somehow that might stop his drinking problem for at least a week.''
"I was halfway through [pouring] the eleventh bottle, gun at the back of my head. I ducked, went off, ran to the garden,' Richard went on. 'He finally found me, and said: 'I'm going to blow your brains out,' I said: 'Go on, do it, just get this over and done with.''
When Davina asked if he actually said that, Richard confirmed: 'Oh yeah, I did. I was so angry at this point. Then he pulled the trigger, but because he was drunk, it wavered. So it went straight past.'
And this isn't the only time that Richard's dad is said to have tried to shoot him, with the star telling Radio Times in 2023 that he faced a similar near-miss when he sneaked out to watch 'triple-X' rated movie A Clockwork Orange at 15 years old.
'You couldn't see it until you were 18 years old,' Richard explained at the time. 'So I snuck in by telling the woman who was at the box office that she looked just like Elizabeth Taylor."
The publication reports that when Richard got home from the movie theater, his drunken father was so angry he pulled a gun on him and took a shot that, fortunately, also missed.
Despite this, Richard kept a relationship with his father until he died from lung cancer at age 52, when Richard was 24 years old. And during a past appearance on BBC Radio 4's Desert Island Discs, Richard explained why he chooses to remember his father for more than just his abuse.
He said: 'My memory of him is so much more than remembering that part of him, because I knew that that was something that was entirely brought about by addiction rather than the man that I absolutely worshipped and loved."
On the other hand, Richard acknowledged having an 'incredibly complicated relationship' with his mom after she died at 93 in 2023. He said in a video that was posted to X at the time: 'She was somebody that was, for me anyway, emotionally withdrawn, and withheld her approbation or approval of anything, so nothing was quite good enough."
"What that proved to be is a great motor for ambition and determination to try and prove yourself, and be the best that you possibly can," Richard went on. "And yet, ironically, whatever she did, she demanded and got applause and approval from everybody around her, including me."
Richard then revealed that after years of estrangement, he spent time with his mom after his wife passed away in 2021, but it did not go well. He said: "I went to stay with her for a couple of weeks, six weeks after my wife had died, with Covid restrictions being lifted, and she sent me a very terse email at the end of the trip, saying 'I regret to say all of this was an absolute disaster. We only have two things in common, books and classical music.'"
"Do I feel sadness that she has died? I feel resignation more than anything, but most of all gratitude, for having given me life," he concluded.
Richard — who has a dual British and Swazi nationality — moved to the UK from Eswatini in 1982, one year after his father's death, and got his big acting break in the 1987 movie Withnail and I.
You can watch Richard's recent comments in the video below:
@beginagainpod
Search 'Begin Again with Davina McCall ' on Youtube, Spotify and Apple Podcast. In this episode of Begin Again, renowned actor Richard E. Grant shares a deeply personal and shocking story about a time he tried to help his father's alcohol addiction by throwing away his drink down the sink in the hope of saving him. In a shocking moment, his father tried to shoot him, but narrowly missed as he was under the influence. #beginagain #podcast #davinamccall #actor #drinking #drink #richardegrant #themaskedsinger #celebritynews #father #parents #child #shock #story #childhood #trauma #emotional #family @Davina McCall
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