Dennis Quaid talks his 'daily' cocaine habit in the 80s

Dennis Quaid has revealed his ‘daily’ cocaine binges in the 80s, and that some movies would even have supplies of the drug budgeted in.

The star of movies like Innerspace, Footloose and The Day After Tomorrow, made the remarks during an interview with Megyn Kelly on US TV.

“I grew up in the 60s and 70s, and there was a completely different attitude about [cocaine] back then,” he said.

“It was even in some movie budgets. But I kept roaring on. I was basically doing cocaine pretty much on a daily basis during the 80s.

“I had spent many, many a night screaming at God to please take this away from me, I’ll never do it again because I’ve only got an hour before I have to be at work.

“Then about 4 o’clock in the afternoon, I would go, ‘That’s not so bad.’

“I had what I call a white-light experience, where I saw myself either dead or losing everything that meant anything to me.”

Quaid has discussed his struggles with drugs in the past, telling Andy Cohen on Watch What Happens Live in 2015 that he was high in ‘every frame’ of Jaws 3D.

After hitting rock bottom, he revealed his problem with cocaine to his then-wife Meg Ryan, and entered rehab, after which he quit the drug.

“That was the end of the love affair for me with cocaine. I didn’t play music for a while because it was so connected to music. I meditated for two years straight. I read the Bible. I read the Dhammapada. I read the Bhagavad Gita. I read the Quran. I just started really delving into the mystery because that’s what addiction is really about — it’s about trying to fill up a hole inside of yourself,” he said.

But he adds that as his career had flourished in the 80s and 90s, when it took a dip and Ryan’s in turn took off, he found it hard to cope with.

“When we met, I was the big deal,” he said. “Then my career [stalled] and [hers soared]. We’d go out on the streets of New York, and it would be like, ‘Meg! Meg!’ And I have to admit it: I actually did feel like I disappeared.”

Of his jealousy, he added: “I didn’t think I was that small, but I was.”

Quaid is next up playing US president Ronald Reagan in a biopic movie due out next summer.

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