Richard E Grant has revealed he cut off his best friend of 29 years after being accidentally copied on an email containing a 'paragraph of such toxicity' about him. The 68-year-old actor, known for his role in The Thursday Murder Club, described the incident on the Mad, Sad, & Bad podcast.
Grant explained that the email was sent from Africa to a mutual friend in Australia, who had asked for his email address. Because his name was in the body of the message, he received it inadvertently. The email arrived on a day when he had learned for the third time that a film he had written and was about to direct had collapsed financially.
The offensive comments were about a script Grant had written, which was entirely autobiographical. He said the email contained such toxicity that he immediately decided to end the friendship. 'I thought, 'That's not a real friend anymore.' And I was absolutely devastated,' Grant said. He copied and pasted the paragraph and sent it back, asking, '29 years of friendship?'
Grant's daughter, then 16, questioned whether the friendship had ever been genuine. 'In your heart of hearts, haven't you always known this about that person?' she asked. Grant reflected that the friend knew him during his most formative years as an actor, making the betrayal particularly painful. 'When you're betrayed like that, there's no going back for me,' he said.
Grant is best known for his breakthrough role in Withnail and I and his Oscar-nominated performance in Can You Ever Forgive Me? His recent roles include The Thursday Murder Club and Nuremberg.
