Denzel Washington reaches for the bottle after losing the Academy Award for Best Actor to Kevin Spacey in 2000.
The 69-year-old “Gladiator II” star, who had already won an Oscar in 1989, received a fourth nomination for his role as Rubin Carter in the 1999 film “The Hurricane.”
But in addition to Spacey — who was nominated for “American Beauty,” Washington was up against Russell Crowe for “The Insider,” Richard Farnsworth for “The Straight Story” and Sean Penn for “Sweet and Lowdown.” .
Spacey ultimately emerged victorious and earned his second Academy Award.
“At the Oscars, they called out Kevin Spacey’s name for ‘American Beauty,'” Washington said. esquire magazine,
“I remember looking back at him and there was no one standing except people around him. And everyone else was looking at me.”
“Not that it was that way. Maybe that’s how I understood it. Maybe I felt like everyone was looking at me. Because why would everyone be looking at me? Thinking about it now, I don’t think they were,” he said.
Washington said he “went home that night and drank.”
“I had to,” he said. “I don’t want to say, ‘Oh, she won my Oscar,’ or anything like that. It was not like that.”
“And you know, there was talk in town about what was happening across the street, and that’s between him and God. I have nothing to do with him. I pray for him. That’s between them and their creator,” he said.
Washington, who has received a total of 10 Oscar nominations in his career so far, has won a total of two Academy Awards.
After winning a Best Supporting Actor Oscar for “Glory” in the 1990s, Washington picked up his second for “Training Day” in 2002.
“I went through a time when (my wife) Pauletta watched all the Oscar movies — I told her, I don’t care about it. Hey, ‘They don’t care about me? “I don’t care,” he said.
“You vote. You keep an eye on them. I’m not seeing that. I gave up. I became bitter. My pity party. So I’ll tell you, for about fifteen years, from 1999 to 2014, when I poured drinks, I was bitter.
Elsewhere in the interview, the actor talked about his past drug and alcohol use and admitted that it “did a lot of damage” to his body.
Washington, who has been sober for about 10 years, said his unhealthy habits started with alcohol.
“Wine is very complicated. It is very slow. It’s not like there’s going to be a sudden surge,” he told the outlet. “I never got into heroin. Never get stuck on coke. Never resorted to hard drugs. I hit dope shots just like he hit dope shots, but I never got out.”
“And I have never been addicted to alcohol. I had this ideal idea about wine tasting and all that – that’s what it was like at first. And this is a very subtle thing. I mean, it’s the best wine I’ve ever had.”
Washington said he often blows away thousands of dollars worth of premium wine bottles, which he keeps hidden in the home’s wine cellar.
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