Billy Idol recalls how he missed out "big part" in 'The Door'
May 02, 2024
Washington [US], May 2 : American singer-songwriter and musician Billy Idol recalled how because of his 1990 motorcycle accident he missed out on filming a larger part for 'The Doors', the 1991 biopic about the 1960s rock band of the same name, reported People.
"There were things about getting high that started getting in the way of what I wanted to do," said Idol. "I was going to have a big part in The Doors movie in 1991, but because of the motorcycle accident, I couldn't do it," he added.
"Once I had the accident, I started to think, 'Should I try and go forward and not be a drug addict anymore?' Gradually, I did achieve some sort of discipline," he added.
'The Doors' film starred Val Kilmer as the band's lead singer Jim Morrison, Kevin Dillon as drummer John Densmore, Kyle MacLachlan as keyboardist Ray Manzarek and Meg Ryan as Morrison's girlfriend Pamela Courson.
Idol appeared in the movie as Cat in what amounted to his first onscreen credit; later he was seen in the 1995 movie 'Mad Dog Time' and also made a cameo as himself in Adam Sandler's 1998 classic 'The Wedding Singer'.
'The Doors' made 34.4 million dollars at the box office upon its release in March 1991.
Idol looked back on his career more than four decades after his sophomore solo album, 1983's Rebel Yell, was released, which propelled him to major rockstar status.
"Initially when I was in Generation X, we were just thinking it would be like, what, six months, a year, maybe two years. We were just doing it for the love," Idol says of his career-long success, referencing his '70s-era punk band. "We'd never expected punk rock to go big. So it was quite by surprise that it went mega in England and then gave us a really big kickoff to where I'm still here today," reported People.
