Wes Bentley as Jamie Dutton

‘Yellowstone’s Wes Bentley Opens Up on ‘Regrets’ About His Drug Addiction

Yellowstone‘s Wes Bentley plays the insufferable Jamie Dutton, becoming one of the show’s most prominent antagonists over the last few seasons.

However, Bentley recently sat down for an interview with The New York Times. In the article, Bentley talks about his past drug addiction and how it affected his early career. He also talks about his path to recovery and how he must channel the “sadness” of Jamie Dutton to properly play his character.

Bentley talked about some regrets and lessons he’s learned along the way in the wide-ranging interview. However, despite all his failures and troubles, Bentley has managed to forge an incredibly successful career in acting.

At the time, the 21-year-old actor played the character of Ricky Fitts in the classic 1999 movie American Beauty. The acclaimed film starred Kevin Spacey and Bentley played Spacey’s neighbor, a part-time drug dealer.

Ironically, this was around the time Bentley himself became a drug addict and struggled to adapt in the professional world of entertainment.

“It was all vampires and underdeveloped young people,” he told the Times of the people he was surrounded by.

In 2008, Bentley was causing problems on sets of P2 and Weirdsville. Eventually, that year, he was arrested for heroin possession and attempting to pass off a counterfeit $100 bill. Bentley had been abusing drugs such as heroin, cocaine, and alcohol around the time of his arrest, which was his “rock bottom” moment.

He stated that he “continued using heroin until he was broke.”

In the interview, Bentley said: “The regrets are always going to be there.”

Bentley brought up that around the time he landed a role on “Dolan’s Cadillac,” he was beginning to doubt his career trajectory.

Wes Bentley Has Been Sober Since July 2009

“This is probably my last acting job… I’m going to be a drug dealer and a DJ,” he told the newspaper.

Bentley says that his addiction breakthrough finally came in 2009, when he reached out to a friend for help. “I’m a drug addict, and an alcoholic, and I need help,” he reportedly said. “I need help or I’m going to die”

His friend took him to 12-step meetings, and he’s been sober since July 2009.

In the interview, Wes Bentley also talked about what it’s like playing a universally-loathed character in the biggest role of his career.

Jamie Dutton is the son of Kevin Costner’s protagonist character John Dutton. Bentley explained that to play the character properly, he has to tap into sad emotions, and says this can sometimes “weigh” on him personally.

“He’s incredibly sad,” Bentley said. “I’ve always dealt with my sadness with things like comedy, or humor, or drugs at one point, or trying to just ignore it and finding another way out of it. But you can’t do that when you’re trying to portray someone’s sadness. You have to let it be there. That’s been the hardest part of it all, and it’s weighed on my life a little bit.”

Bentley says normally, he can leave work at work, but Jamie’s character makes that more difficult.

“Jamie’s sadness permeates my life, even though I’m not sad. I’m very lucky to have a great family and be where I’m at in life, but he’s always there behind me, clawing at that, especially when I’m shooting.”