Wentworth Miller Reveals He Tried Commit Suicide As A Teenager Before Coming Out

Wentworth Miller revealed that he tried to commit suicide multiple times before coming out while speaking at the Human Rights Campaign gala on Saturday night.

“The first time I tried to kill myself, I was 15. I waited until my family went away for the weekend and I was alone in the house and I swallowed a bottle of pills. I don’t remember what happened over the next couple days, but I’m pretty sure come Monday morning I was on a bus back to school pretending everything was fine. And when someone asked me if that was a cry for help, I say no, because I told no one. You only cry for help if you believe that help is there to cry for. And, I didn’t,” Miller said in his speech.

On Aug. 21, Miller published an open letter to the director of the St. Petersburg International Film Festival, in which he came out as gay while declining their invitation to attend the festival due to Russia’s treatment of their gay citizens.

“As a gay man, I must decline,” Miller wrote.

At the gala, not only did Miller speak about his private struggle with his sexuality growing up, he also spoke about being a closeted gay actor in Hollywood. Miller started in the hit television series Prison Break for four years, and has recently made the transition to screenwriter, penning the screenplay for Stoker.

“I was out in private to family and friends, but professionally, publicly, I was not… I chose to lie,” Miller said at the gala.

Miller said that the idea of coming out publicly scared him because of the effect it could have on his public persona and career. Despite this fear, however, Miller decided to publicly declare his sexuality hoping that he might serve as the role model he never had growing up.

“I thought that even if one person notices this letter, in which I speak my truth… I thought let me be to someone else what no one was to me,” Miller said.

– Olivia Truffaut-Wong

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_{Wentworth Miller, ‘Prison Break’ Actor, Comes Out As Gay While Declining Russian Film Fest Invitation}