Austin Butler thought he was dying after losing his eyesight while traveling to shoot “The Bikeriders.”
In an interview with Men’s Health published Tuesday, Butler explained that he went temporarily blind on the way to shoot the 2024 film about a biker gang. He explained that he was jolted awake by a sudden headache that led to his eyesight vanishing for several minutes and only returned after he willed it.
“It felt like the life was being sucked from my body,” Butler said. “I suddenly felt a euphoric sensation, and I actually genuinely thought I was dying.”
That’s only one from the list of ailments Butler revealed he juggled while working on sets. He had a grain-sized piece of glass removed from his foot eight months after first experiencing pain at the tail-end of working on “Dune: Part Two.” He said he was forced to walk with his toes curled under to deal with it. Upon wrapping “Elvis” he got slammed with a virus that put him briefly in the hospital and left him bedridden for a week.
He chalked most of the maladies up to sleep deprivation and exhaustion from how he prepares for his roles. Butler told the publication that he is getting better at not sacrificing his health for his craft thanks to working and speaking with Hollywood heavyweight Laura Dern.
“She’s helping me more and more to see that you can come out the other side, and maybe bits of you have healed, and synthesized, and metabolized,” he said of Dern. “It can be therapeutic, in a way.”
He finished: “You don’t have to destroy the light.”
Butler’s upcoming film looks to be as taxing as his previous roles but hopefully have been less of a burden on his body. He will appear in Darren Aronofsky’s latest film “Caught Stealing” where he plays an ex-baseball player who gets embroiled in the dealings of a New York City gang thanks to his next door neighbor.
“Caught Stealing” lands in theaters Aug. 29.
