Michael Barrymore: ‘I would have died if I hadn’t come out’
By Nick Levine
Michael Barrymore has said he believes he would have died if he hadn’t come out as gay in 1995 – because he had become so dependent on drink and drugs “suppressing” his sexuality.
The comedian and TV presenter, now 62, famously came out on stage during a night out at The White Swan pub in East London in 1995 – and he recalled that night during an interview with Jeremy Kyle on ITV earlier this afternoon (June 9).
“At this point, there’s rumours going around the business that I may be gay… When the drag act got up on the stage in the pub, his opening line, he said ‘What do you think about Barrymore then?’ not knowing I’m there… and he said ‘He’s not here is he?’ and I don’t know what made me do it, I just stepped up on the stage and said ‘Yeah I am actually’ and the whole place erupted and I think I got carried away on the acceptance of this crowd of people… and I started singing ‘Start spreading the news, I’m leaving today, start spread it again and tell them I’m gay.’”
Asked by Kyle if he is glad he came out, Barrymore replied by saying: “No one has ever asked me that.”
He then said: “If I hadn’t [come out], I truly believe I would have died because I believe that my drinking and my using was getting worse because of it so… I came out, I didn’t do that very well, it was a bit spectacular, you can’t have your cake and eat it, it doesn’t matter who you are.”
However, during the interview with Kyle, Barrymore also admitted that coming out, in fact, failed to curb his drinking.
“I did truly believe that my drinking problems, [or] anything else that I took was because I was suppressing the fact that I may or may not be gay – or it was getting more and more [apparent] that I was,” he admitted. “Then when I did come out, actually the drinking got worse so I found out it was nothing to do with that at all.”
During the interview, Barrymore also spoke extensively about the late Stuart Lubbock, who was found dead in Barrymore’s home in March 2001, and the loss of his ex-wife Cheryl, who died of lung cancer in 2005. Watch an excerpt from Barrymore’s interview with Jeremy Kyle on ITV today below: