Alex Winter: Abuse as a child actor gave me PTSD
Alex Winter’s experiences of child abuse when starting out as a 12-year-old have left him with post-traumatic stress disorder.
Alex won legions of fans on screen as Bill S. Preston, Esq. in Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure in 1989, but says at the time he was coping with abuse he’d suffered as a child actor on Broadway.
“I was dealing with really intense and prolonged abuse,” he tells The Guardian. “There was The King and I – eight shows a week, happy face – feeling genuinely happy in that role. Great relationship with my mom and dad; great relationship with the co-workers around me; doing interviews, signing autographs, living this amazing … and then this nightmarish other existence.”
Alex refuses to name his abuser, who he says has died.
Explaining how it has scarred him for life, he adds: “I had extreme PTSD for many, many years, and that will wreak havoc on you. It’s a way in which you relate to the world around you and to yourself, and it’s very nuanced, but you can become very fractured. So you slowly compartmentalize. You keep this thing over here, you keep that thing over there, and you don’t have any natural equilibrium. That fracturing just gets worse and worse and worse.”
| by Anonymous | reply 16 | September 21, 2020 8:07 PM
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Gosh, that certainly sounds like C-PTSD. How awful for him.
| by Anonymous | reply 1 | September 21, 2020 6:19 PM
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Dear Gay God,
Please don’t let it be Yul Brynner. Or Angela Lansbury.
Amen. And 227.
| by Anonymous | reply 3 | September 21, 2020 6:35 PM
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Sorry to hear this and I wish him the best.
I liked FACE THE MUSIC, it was "sweet."
| by Anonymous | reply 4 | September 21, 2020 6:37 PM
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Wow, he aged really well. One of those lucky dudes who is hotter in middle age than in his 20s.
| by Anonymous | reply 5 | September 21, 2020 6:38 PM
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Here's the opening night cast for The King and I production that Alex Winter was in.
He wasn't even an opening night cast member. Alex was actually a replacement for Alan Amick in the role of Louis Leonowens.
| by Anonymous | reply 6 | September 21, 2020 6:43 PM
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"Wow, he aged really well. One of those lucky dudes who is hotter in middle age than in his 20s."
Okay, let's not get carried away.
I made this terribly wonderful movie back in the 80s (90s?) with his Bill and Ted money. I will always appreciate him for that.
But him talking about this makes me really appreciate him.
| by Anonymous | reply 7 | September 21, 2020 6:44 PM
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R2 Yes - the consensus is that it was likely George Rose.
| by Anonymous | reply 8 | September 21, 2020 6:44 PM
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I thought he was adorable as Bill, and cuter than Ted. He wore a cut-off that bared his torso and he had a nice body.
Sorry to hear he went through this.
| by Anonymous | reply 10 | September 21, 2020 6:49 PM
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George Rose sounds like a psychopath. I remember his murder being in the news when I was in high school, and how it seemed like the authorities believed he deserved what he got.
| by Anonymous | reply 11 | September 21, 2020 6:50 PM
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George Rose seems to fit the description best.
I always thought Bill and Ted were a cut-rate Cheech and Chong.
| by Anonymous | reply 12 | September 21, 2020 7:31 PM
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"Alex refuses to name his abuser, who he says has died."
Phew! For a minute there...
| by Anonymous | reply 13 | September 21, 2020 7:43 PM
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Well, why do you think I cast him?
| by Anonymous | reply 14 | September 21, 2020 7:57 PM
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George Rose was really a monster. No one deserves to be murdered, but it was really something he brought upon himself.
I am surprised Winter does not name Rose.
| by Anonymous | reply 15 | September 21, 2020 7:59 PM
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Someone linked a remembrance of Rose from a friend who made a one man show around their relationship (and Rose's fate). He said that Rose kept a wild animal as a pet. Some might laugh that off as an indication of eccentricity but it was also a cruel choice of Rose's.
| by Anonymous | reply 16 | September 21, 2020 8:07 PM
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