Denzel Washington has revealed that he is 10 years sober and after drinking two bottles of wine a day for over a decade, has "done a lot of damage" to his body.
The actor was 60 years old when he cut alcohol out of his life. He had developed a drinking pattern in the late 1990s that would span 15 years, and while he never got "strung out" on alcohol, he was drinking far more than the recommended amount.
"Wine was my thing, and now I was popping $4,000 bottles just because that's what was left," Washington, 69, told Esquire magazine. "And then later in those years, I'd call Gil Turner's Fine Wines & Spirits on Sunset Boulevard and say, 'Send me two bottles, the best of this or that.' And my wife's saying, 'Why do you keep ordering just two?' I said, 'Because if I order more, I'll drink more. So I kept it to two bottles, and I would drink them both over the course of the day."
At one point, Washington even built a 10,000-bottle wine cellar. He "had this idea of wine tastings and all that."
"Which is what it was at first. And that's a very subtle thing. I mean, I drank the best," he said of tricking himself into thinking alcohol wasn't an issue despite drinking two bottles of wine per day.
"I've done a lot of damage to the body. We'll see. I've been clean," Washington added. "Be 10 years this December. I stopped at 60, and I haven't had a thimble's worth since. Things are opening up for me now — like being 70. It's real. And it's OK. This is the last chapter — if I get another 30, what do I want to do? My mother made it to 97."
Washington said he has also adopted other healthy habits, like eating clean and working out with a trainer.
"I'm doing the best I can. And not only alcohol — forget all that. Strength," he said. "About two years ago, my good friend, my little brother, Lenny Kravitz, said, 'D, I wanna hook you up with a trainer.' And he did, and he's another man of God.
"I started with him February of last year. He makes the meals for me, and we're training, and I'm now 190-something pounds on my way to 185. I was looking at pictures of myself and Pauletta at the Academy Awards for 'Macbeth,' and I'm just looking fat, with this dyed hair, and I said, 'Those days are over, man.' I feel like I'm getting strong. Strong is important."
Zoe Papadakis ✉
Zoe Papadakis is a Newsmax writer based in South Africa with two decades of experience specializing in media and entertainment. She has been in the news industry as a reporter, writer and editor for newspapers, magazine and websites.
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