The success made him do it – and it wasn’t really “him.”
“Kony 2012” filmmaker Jason Russell appeared on “Oprah’s Next Chapter” Sunday to discuss his instant movie fame, public meltdown and recovery Sunday. The sit-down was Russell’s first interview since his viral rollercoaster early this year.
Russell’s film about a fugitive Ugandan rebel leader, released in March, has been viewed hundreds of millions of times online.
But the sudden success was too much for Russell to handle. So soon after the movie’s release he took to the streets of San Diego – naked – slapping his hands on the ground and screaming at motorists and onlookers, bizarre behavior that he attributes to an out-of-body experience. His family blamed the episode on “reactive psychosis,” and Russell was hospitalized.
“It really wasn’t me,” a shirt and tie-clad Russell told Oprah Winfrey. “That person on the street corner, ranting and raving and naked is not me. That’s not who I am.
“I look at the video and I think, how sad for him?”
Russell likened his movie’s success to a tsunami, with all the attention and stress piling onto the grind of film production.
The interview reached an awkward tone when Oprah asked Russell if he was gay.
“Yeah, I’ve heard those rumors,” Russell said, laughing. “In the video I was snapping my finger up and down. I grew up in theater. My parents started a large children’s theater organization, so I am animated. I am …”
“Theatrical,” Oprah said.
After his hospitalization, Russell says it took him two weeks to start feeling like himself again – and that he initially believed everyone was out to get him, including his wife and family.
But those days are seemingly past him, as the filmmaker who experienced good and bad viral is keeping his clothes on and maintaining a low profile.