'Yellowstone' star Wes Bentley on 'incredibly dark' drug addiction: 'I lost everything'

“Yellowstone” star Wes Bentley is opening up about the destructive impact that drug addiction had on his life.

Bentley, 44, who stars as Jamie Dutton on Paramount Network’s Western drama, detailed his relationship with drugs in an interview with Men’s Health published March 28. The actor, whose breakout role came in 1999’s “American Beauty,” began exploring recreational drug use with psychedelics in the Hollywood party scene and then moved on to “hard drugs.”

“I ended up going down the cocaine and heroin route,” Bentley told the outlet. “Hard partying. You’re in clubs and you’re at afterparties, and there’s cocaine, and eventually it became heroin.”

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Bentley said his competitive spirit, coupled with addiction, made him want to be “the most impressive drug addict ever.”

“That period was incredibly dark,” Bentley said. “I did really dangerous stuff. I went downtown. I went and hung with really shady people. I wasn’t trying to kill myself or anything. That was just me: Go far. Be the guy who went the furthest.”

Looking back on that period in his life, Bentley – who’s been sober for more than a decade – refers to the chaos of his past addiction as “the fire.” “I lost everything in the fire,” he said. “I had no car, I had no clothes, I had no money – I was $400,000 in debt.”

Bentley’s path to sobriety began to take shape when he met his wife Jacqui Swedberg while filming a movie in Saskatchewan, Canada. Bentley had previously completed a court-mandated rehab stint following a 2008 arrest, although he later relapsed.

“I met a girl, and this girl was awesome and funny and just had the weirdest sense of humor and made me laugh and made me want to live again – like, live live, not go deal drugs,” Bentley said.

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Wes Bentley says friend Heath Ledger ‘begged’ him to get sober

Bentley said his friend, actor Heath Ledger, took a strong interest in his sobriety. The two co-starred in the 2002 action drama “The Four Feathers.”

“He even begged me to get sober in an email,” Bentley recalled. “Last email, he was beggin’ me. I didn’t, at first, but later, getting sober, I’d think of that email all the time."

Ledger died of an accidental drug overdose in 2008. Bentley said he skipped Ledger’s memorial service. “I tried to go, but I was really messed up, and I felt like that wasn’t right,” he said. “So I got out of the cab on the way to it. And that sits with me forever.”

“I’d never felt love from someone like him," Bentley added. "And he didn’t care what I was, or what I was like, the stupid things I was doing. He just wanted me to be better. I always thought of him as a brother, and I wish I could’ve given that back.”

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Wes Bentley talks past drug addiction, friendship with Heath Ledger