Teetotal Daniel Radcliffe 'relapsed during West End stint in The Cripple of Inishmaan'

He’s been teetotal since 2010, but a new unofficial autobiography claims Daniel Radcliffe briefly relapsed into alcoholism while starring in the West End production of The Cripple of Inishmaan. 

Jernigan, who spoke with 19 of the actor’s close friends and work associates to write The Life and Career of Daniel Radcliffe (on bookshelves in July), exclusively tells RadarOnline.com all the juicy details. He claims the stress of the show forced the actor to seek solace at the end of a bottle. Speaking to RadarOnline, Jernigan said: ‘He had to learn a very deep Irish brogue and put so much time into rehearsals. He relapsed because he went back to his old ways of thinking. He felt like he wasn’t good enough.’

Daniel has admitted in the past that he has battled alcohol demons from a young age, and would sometimes arrive drunk onto the Harry Potter set. 'I can honestly say I never drank at work on Harry Potter,’ he told Heat magazine in 2012. ‘I went into work still drunk, but I never drank at work. I can point to many scenes where I'm just gone. Dead behind the eyes.’ Radcliffe also talked about how his alcoholism turned him into ‘a recluse at 20’. ‘The drinking was unhealthy and damaging to my body and my social life. That’s beyond question,’ he told Shortlist magazine. ‘I was living in constant fear of who I’d meet, what I might have said to them, what I might have done with them, so I’d stay in my apartment for days and drink alone. ‘I was a recluse at 20. It was pathetic - it wasn’t me. I’m a fun, polite person and it turned me into a rude bore.’He added: ‘For a long time people were saying to me “we think you have a problem” but in the end I had to come to the realization myself.’

Daniel’s spokeswoman said back in 2008: ‘Yes, Dan Radcliffe does have dyspraxia. This is something he has never hidden. Thankfully his condition is very mild and at worst manifests itself in an inability to ties his shoe laces and bad handwriting.’ 

Jernigan claims on the Harry Potter set, production had to be halted ‘more than few times’ as Radcliffe suffered ‘episodes where he couldn’t do anything, even tie his shoes’.