Celebrities Who Are Proud to Be Sober

Celebrities battling drug and alcohol addiction have been a part of Hollywood since the earliest days of the entertainment industry. The list of famous names who lost their lives from substance abuse-related causes is long, from classic stars like Judy Garland and Marilyn Monroe to more recent overdose deaths like Prince, Tom Petty, Mac Miller, and Juice Wrld.

As the list of stars who lost their battles with addiction continues, many other celebrities have opted for sobriety. Some have struggled with overdoses and jail time on their way to healthier lifestyles, while others saw the warning signs and stopped substance abuse before their addictions progressed. While the fight against drugs and alcohol is often considered a social taboo, many famous names have openly spoken to fans about their journeys into sobriety, inspiring others who may be fighting similar demons. Read on for a list of celebrities who are loud and proud of their sober lifestyles.

Ben Affleck’s journey into sobriety has involved at least three visits to rehab, first in 2001 and then again in 2017 and 2018, with his ex-wife Jennifer Garner organizing an intervention before taking him to a rehab center. Affleck thanked his fans and loved ones in an Instagram statement in October 2018, in which he announced that he had completed his 40-day rehab stay, calling his addiction a “difficult and enduring fight” and that he was “fighting for [himself] and [his] family.”

Affleck discussed his several relapses with The New York Times in a February 2024 profile, saying that he “would beat [himself] up” when he fell back into alcoholism. “I certainly made mistakes,” he said, adding: “I certainly did things that I regret. But you have to get up, learn from it, learn a little more, [and] try to move forward.”

After his turn as Batman in the 2016 movie Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, Affleck explained why he walked away from the next movie Batman he was supposed to direct, alluding to his alcohol problems. “I showed someone the Batman script,” Affleck headed for the exit. “They said, ‘I think the script is good. I also think you will drink to death if you go through what you just went through.”

After her hospitalization in July 2018 for an apparent overdose, Demi Lovato has been open about her drug and alcohol problems. After six years of sobriety, she released the song “Sober” in June 2018, which included lyrics “I’m so sorry, I’m not sober anymore” in which she hinted had relapsed. Weeks later, the singer was rushed to the hospital and entered rehab in August 2018.

Years after her hospitalization and rehab drama, Lovato has spoken out about her sobriety journey, hoping to inspire fans who may also be struggling with similar issues. Sitting down with Ellen DeGeneres for an interview in March 2024, Lovato addressed the viewers directly and said, “I think it’s important that I sit here on this stage and tell them at home, or in the audience, or right here, that If they do this, you can overcome it yourself. You can get to the other side, and it can be bumpy, but you get a 10 out of 10.

Before his second act as Iron Man in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Robert Downey Jr. was a talented Hollywood heartbreaker whose addictions and arrests overshadowed his acting career. “You would have to go far, far behind” to trace Downey Jr.’s drug story, The Guardian said in a 2003 interview.

The actor began using drugs at a young age and rose in Hollywood with roles including a drug addict in the 1987 movie Less Than Zero, which earned him acclaim as he made his substance abuse problems worse. “I was playing this [junkie] boy and, for me, the role was like the ghost of the Christmas future.”

Over the next 15 years, the Sherlock Holmes star would land in rehab multiple times and face numerous drug-related arrests, several of which led to jail, including a famous incident in 1996 where he was found passed out in the bed of his neighbors’ 11-year-old son. Downey Jr. made a commitment to sobriety in 2002, as he told Oprah Winfrey two years later, and has since avoided any problems with the law.

Speaking to Vanity Fair In 2014 about his rehab experiences and return to the outside world, Downey Jr. explained, “The first job is to get out of that cave. Many people go out but do not change. So the thing is to get out and come through the crucible forged in stronger metal. ”

Jamie Lee Curtis had a secret addiction to Vicodin for more than a decade, and said she had become sober “[her] greatest individual achievement” in an interview with People in 2018. “Bigger than my husband, bigger than my two children and bigger than any job, success, failure. Anything”.

As a result, several members of the actress’s family suffered from substance abuse problems, including her father, beloved actor Tony Curtis, who abused alcohol, cocaine, and heroin. “I am breaking the cycle that has basically destroyed the lives of generations in my family,” Halloween starlet revealed.

During an interview with Variety in 2019, Curtis recalled a humiliating experience in 1998, when she stole Vicodin from his sister, Kelly Curtis. Explaining what happened after she confessed, Jamie Lee said, “[Kelly] just looked at me and reached out and hugged me and said, ‘You’re an addict and I love you, but I’m not going to watch you die.'” Soon after, Curtis began attending recovery meetings, which she continued to frequent in subsequent decades.

“At recovery meetings, anyone raising opiates, the whole room will turn and look at me, because I’m going to say, ‘Oh, talk to me. I’m the opiate girl,” she explained to People.

Jada Pinkett Smith has openly addressed her demons on her Red Table Talk show on Facebook, including her porn addiction. The Smith family matriarch also revealed that she struggled with her past alcohol use and eventually stopped drinking “cold turkey.”

Smith described how he stopped drinking after “[hitting] rock bottom” in the July 2018 Red Table Talk episode. “I was alone in the house, I had those two bottles of wine and I was looking for the third bottle and I was like ‘Are you alone in this house looking for the third bottle of wine? You might have a problem.'”

Pinkett Smith even dedicated a full April 2024 Red Table Talk episode of addiction problems, in which he spoke to her mother, Adrienne Banfield Norris, a former heroin addict, about strategies for staying sober under the COVID-19 quarantine. “Quarantine put me back in touch with going to [recovery] meetings because I started going online,” Banfield Norris told Pinkett Smith.

The informal cocktail may have been a central activity for the characters in Sex and the City, but in real life, Kristen Davis considers herself a recovering alcoholic. The actress, famous for her portrayal of Charlotte York in the HBO sitcom, revealed during a 2018 interview with Origins with James Andrew Miller podcast that “[she] doesn’t think [she] would be alive” if she hadn’t turned sober.

Davis called herself “an addict [and] a recovering alcoholic” during the episode, proclaiming that acting was “the only thing [her] ever did sober.” Then she added: “I had nothing that was so important to me other than trying to hinder my senses.” However, Sex and the City alum had a saving grace: “Because my love for acting was so great … when I was young, I had something that was more important to me than just drinking”.

Davis, born in South Carolina, attributed her alcohol problems to her upbringing in the South in a 2002 interview with the Guardian, stating that “in the South, almost everyone drinks.” And although she admitted that “sometimes it would be good to have a little red wine with dinner,” she opposes against it. “I have a great life, a great situation,” she said. Why would I want to risk self-destructive behavior?