LOS ANGELES – Owen Wilson dropped out of the upcoming ensemble comedy "Tropic Thunder" as a report swirled that he was hooked on heroin and cocaine before his apparent suicide attempt.
Wilson will not appear in the DreamWorks movie, already six weeks into production in Hawaii, Daily Variety and The Hollywood Reporter said Wednesday, citing sources they didn't identify.
The decision was characterized as a mutual agreement between director Ben Stiller and the 38-year-old actor, who was taken to the hospital Sunday after police responded to the report of a suicide attempt at his Santa Monica, Calif., home.
The Hollywood Reporter said Wilson had a minor part in the movie, which stars Jack Black and Robert Downey Jr. and revolves around a group of actors who find themselves in the middle of a war.
Wilson's part was to be filmed in just a week, the trade paper said.
In the months before his apparent suicide attempt, the actor was hooked on heroin and cocaine, struggling with depression and hanging out with the wrong crowd, according to a report in Us Weekly.
Click here for the Us Weekly report
While a rep for Wilson adamantly told the magazine that the actor has never used heroin or cocaine, his drug use was so frequent it was even the cause of his Memorial Day breakup with Kate Hudson, according to the report.
"The drugs and partying were a huge factor in the breakup," said a pal of Hudson, who has a 3-year-old son, Ryder, with ex-husband, Chris Robinson. "As much as she liked him, she didn’t want to be around that" — especially given that Robinson is a recovering drug addict.
Wilson's loved ones worried so much about his dependence on hard drugs, Us has learned, that friend Woody Harrelson staged an informal intervention at his Hawaii home in May.
But Owen continued to withdraw and succumb to depression following his June split from Hudson, who is now dating "Punk'd" star Dax Shepard — which might have pushed Wilson over the edge, the magazine says.
"Seeing her happy with someone else made him happy that she'd found that," one longtime Wilson family friend told the magazine, "but made him hate himself so much more that he could never do it.”
While Hudson was reveling in her new romance with Shepard over the weekend (the two were photographed making out in an L.A. grocery store), Wilson was hitting rock bottom.
A depressed Wilson visited St. Monica church in his neighborhood on Aug. 23, out of either devotion or desperation, Us Weekly reports. Three days later, actor Luke Wilson, 35, found his brother in his home, reportedly with his left wrist slashed and having ingested a quantity of pills.
Owen's Career
Wilson co-wrote a scene in his 2001 movie "The Royal Tenenbaums" in which a character played by Luke Wilson attempted suicide.
Usmagazine.com reports that in his upcoming movie, "The Darjeeling Limited," Owen Wilson plays a man who may have tried to commit suicide himself.
"The Darjeeling Limited" is a comic drama that follows three brothers played by Wilson, Jason Schwartzman and Adrien Brody, who, after the death of their father, decide to travel via train across India in an attempt to find their long-lost mother.
Wilson's character is very depressed by his father's death, and he wears bandages throughout the movie, implying recent wounds.
A source who has seen the film told Us, "The suicide attempt is alluded to, but never specifically said. Owen’s character has bandages on throughout the movie (on his face and right hand), but you don’t know why. Toward the end of the movie, his brothers ask him about them. He tells them he was in a car wreck. It’s then alluded to — but never said — that the accident was possibly done on purpose. His character may have tried to commit suicide because of their father’s death."
"The Darjeeling Limited" will be screened at next week's Venice Film Festival before opening the New York Film Festival on Sept. 28. It will open in limited release on Sept. 29.
Many Hollywood insiders believe Wilson's setback will be short-lived and that he will continue to enjoy big-screen success.
"He's loved," Bernie Brillstein, a veteran Hollywood manager who worked with John Belushi and Chris Farley, said Tuesday.
Brillstein said the apparent suicide attempt is "serious, but it's a singular case. Anyone can have a bad day, a very bad day."
Wilson's friend Tom Arnold also had kind words.
"Most people are confused by this, but as a recovering addict myself it gives me hope that this is his bottom and he can turn it around. He really is a good guy," Arnold told theinsideronline.com.
Wilson's box-office track record — "Wedding Crashers" topped $200 million and "Cars" brought in almost $250 million — plus his on-screen image as an affable everyman who can charm the ladies while boozing with the boys has made him a favorite with both filmmakers and filmgoers.
Wilson's public perception is "very positive," industry analyst Paul Dergarabedian of Media by Numbers said Tuesday. "Owen Wilson has a really good reputation and people in general really feel bad for him right now."
Longtime publicist Michael Levine, however, said the actor's emotional issues could have "a deep impact on his future employability and the ability to obtain insurance."
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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