Bryan Greenberg’s directorial debut, “Junction,” draws on his personal struggle with OxyContin addiction, the actor said in a January interview.
Greenberg admitted most fans didn’t know about his short-term opioid battle. “It’s taking people off guard. But I had a brief encounter with addiction. I’m not an addict—I want to make that very clear. I’m an ally,” he told Vanity Fair in an interview Jan. 25. “But I was prescribed OxyContin for routine surgery, and then I became a little hooked, and I had trouble getting off of them,” he said.
Greenberg opened up about why this particular topic struck a chord with him, and how he managed being a writer, actor, and director on this project.
“It kind of stuck with me because I’m the type of person that doesn’t want to be controlled by things, and that really pissed me off,” he told Vanity Fair.
He went on to discuss the unique approach he took when filming.
“I think the impetus was that I wanted to, for this film, destigmatize addiction, put a face to it. I feel like it all starts with empathy,” Greenberg said.
“This is the opioid crisis, and we’re filming in Rhode Island. It’s very prevalent everywhere in America; you’re hard-pressed to find somebody who hasn’t been affected by it.”
He explained his process.
“Then I went into the streets of Rhode Island, found real people who were in the throes of addiction, and filmed them. I didn’t want to make this addict porn. I didn’t want to cheapen the message—and it’s not just about addicts, this story. It’s about everybody who’s affected,” Greenberg said.
EAST HAMPTON, NY – OCTOBER 13: Actor Bryan Greenberg attends the 21st Annual Hamptons International Film Festival on October 13, 2013 in East Hampton, New York. (Photo by Eugene Gologursky/Getty Images for The Hamptons International Film Festival)
“So then I went to social workers, and counselors who help people get off drugs, and family members. It’s a wide array of people that we captured. With my editor, we just found the right moments to put it in the film.”
Greenberg admitted the filming process was a real eye-opener for him.
“I just set out to understand what this crisis was, and it was almost my own personal journey of trying to understand it,” he told Vanity Fair, before saying the process was “so consuming and overwhelming” for him at times. (RELATED: Country Singer Jelly Roll Comes Clean About Depths Of His Addiction Issue)
The 97-minute feature is set to premiere in theaters and on Apple TV+ Friday. The story follows three interconnected characters—the CEO of a pharmaceutical company (Griffin Dunne), a doctor (Ashley Madekwe), and an addict (Greenberg), and each character is impacted by the opioid crisis in their own way.