Bullying that was so severe that it almost threatened her life.
Scary struggles with her mental health.
A lit cigarette that nearly led to an untimely demise.
Here are just a few tragic details of Winona Ryder's life.
Members of Winona Ryder's paternal family were killed in the Holocaust, and as a child,
she was afraid something similar would happen to her.
In an interview with the Mirror, Ryder shared that she would sleep on the floor outside
of her parents' bedroom due to fear that they would be taken away by Nazis.
It got to the point where the actor started obsessing over details about the atrocities.
She said,
"I used to go to the library and look at books about it.
I couldn't stop turning the pages and thought, 'This is horrible.
Why am I doing this?'
Then I realized maybe I was looking for my family, for someone I recognized."
In 2020, Ryder starred in HBO's "Plot Against America" — a series based on the Phillip
Roth novel in which Nazis take over the world.
While speaking to Variety, she expressed that the series was, quote, "so incredibly timely,"
which is why she chose to take on the role.
"Where?
Where will I go?"
Winona Ryder has opened up about experiencing antisemitism at several points throughout
her career in Hollywood.
The actor told The Sunday Times that people would often act surprised about her ethnic
background, claiming she was too pretty to be Jewish.
In the same interview, Ryder shared a story about actor Mel Gibson, who was recorded hurling
antisemitic remarks at one of the police officers when he was arrested for driving drunk in
2006.
Ryder told The Sunday Times that when she and her friend ran into Gibson at an event
in the '90s, the "Braveheart" actor lobbed bigoted comments in their direction.
Apparently, Gibson targeted Ryder’s friend, who was gay, with an insensitive joke about
aids.
Following that up, he then made another joke toward Ryder herself about Jews, which she
understandably took to heart.
She has talked about the incident in previous interviews, including a 2010 GQ feature where
she said,
"It was just this weird, weird moment.
I was like, 'He's anti-Semitic and he's homophobic.'
No one believed me!"
Though he apologized for the aforementioned DUI tirade, the same cannot be said about
his interaction with Ryder.
In a statement obtained by NBC News, a rep for Gibson alleged that Ryder's account is
100% untrue and claimed,
"She lied about him trying to apologize to her back then."
You'd think that stardom would give Winona Ryder some clout at school.
Come on, who wouldn't want to sit next to a movie star at lunch time?
Well apparently, Ryder's classmates were not fans.
So much so that, according to the actor, her fame only made her more of a target for bullying.
After starring in "Beetlejuice," her peers made fun of her for playing Lydia Deetz — a
spooky teen who befriends some ghosts and ends up at odds with the titular antagonist.
She revealed to Marie Claire UK,
"They called me a witch."
"Why are you doing this!
Leave me alone, all of you!"
According to Ryder, she was so heavily bullied in her formative years that she feared for
her own life.
She was picked apart for her style, as she refused to conform to the preppy school's
standards.
Instead, she'd show up to class in hand-me-downs while rocking an angsty crew cut.
As she shared in a 2000 interview with Harper's Bazaar her classmates weren't at all interested
in accepting her unique style or her newfound fame.
Instead, she was physically attacked by the girls at school.
"They slammed my head into a locker.
I fell to the ground and they started to kick the s— out of me.
I had to have stitches.
The school kicked me out, not the bullies."
She also shared with Harper’s Bazaar that, when one of the bullies asked her for an autograph
some years later, she told her off.
Per V Magazine, she switched to homeschooling after the incident.
Although the majority of the world has a big ol' crush on Winona Ryder, the actor says
she was told by Hollywood casting directors that she wasn't pretty enough to star in movies.
Despite developing amazing acting chops at a young age, she was rejected because of her
physical appearance.
While sitting down with Interview, Ryder said,
"I remember one time in particular.
I was in the middle of auditioning, and I was mid-sentence when the casting director
said, 'Listen, kid.
You should not be an actress.
You are not pretty enough.'"
Even so, she wasn't crushed by this remark.
Why?
Well, it was because of what her parents had taught her.
She explained,
"They had always instilled in me that it was way cooler to be an individual and to be unique
and that you don’t want to blend in."
Furthermore, despite being practically born for the part of Veronica Sawyer in "Heathers,"
the role almost went to Jennifer Connelly.
She said in another chat with Interview,
"I knew that they thought I wasn't pretty enough."
Little did they know that she would grow up to become the ultimate muse for a plethora
of famous actors and musicians.
As her "Reality Bites" co-star Ben Stiller said in Rolling Stone,
"Every guy I've ever talked to has a crush on her."
Take that, casting directors.
"Lick it up, baby.
Lick.
It.
up."
Winona Ryder struggled with depression early on in her career and even developed insomnia
due to her anxiety.
She said to The New York Times in 1999,
"I was overworked and overtired— too tired to sleep.
I was in a really bad state."
The depression she was experiencing led to some terrible anxiety attacks, and so she
checked into a psychiatric hospital when she was 20.
She told the New York Times,
"The worst part of it was not being able to describe it — the overwhelming horror of
the anxiety attacks — even to my own family, to the people closest to me."
And though it was difficult for Ryder to open up about her mental health issues in the past,
she stated in a 2016 interview with New York Magazine that she is glad she's been able
to speak about her own experiences publicly.
She said,
"I have had women come up to me and say, 'It meant so much to me.'
It means so much when you realize that someone was having a really hard time and feeling
shame and was trying to hide this whole thing."
Winona Ryder's headline-making relationship with Johnny Depp began in 1989, and it all
came crashing down in 1993.
Not only was Depp her first love, but he was also the man she had planned on marrying.
She said in an interview with Cinema.com,
"When I met Johnny, I was a pure virgin.
He changed that.
He was my first everything.
My first real kiss.
My first real boyfriend.
My first fiancé.
The first guy I had sex with.
So he'll always be in my heart.
Forever...
Kind of funny that word."
Speaking of "forever," after only a few years of dating, the "Pirates of the Caribbean"
actor famously got the words "Winona Forever" tattooed on his arm.
He told Rolling Stone back in 1991,
"It ain't goin' nowhere."
Perhaps "forever" in celebrity terms is less than half a decade because the two split just
a couple years later.
Depp has since changed up the Ryder tattoo to "Wino Forever."
The breakup hit Ryder hard.
She told Cinema.com,
"I was very depressed after breaking off my engagement with Johnny."
"I just lied to myself and said it didn't matter."
And while grieving the relationship, she almost accidentally burned down her hotel room.
She explained,
"[One night I] fell asleep with a lit cigarette, and woke up to the flames."
Ryder told the outlet that the moment was a wake up call for her, and she hasn't visited
the, quote "dark side" since.
Acting in a horror movie can be an emotionally challenging experience, and it sounds like
the Francis Ford Coppola-directed "Bram Stoker's Dracula" was no exception.
In a chat with The Sunday Times, Winona Ryder alleged that Coppola told other members of
the cast to yell things that might upset her.
In a statement to People, Coppola claimed,
"[I only asked Gary Oldman] to whisper improvised words to her and the other characters, [but
make it] horrific and evil."
Her rep told People that she and the director are in agreement about this and his recollection
is correct.
The statement continued,
"Although that technique didn't work for her, she loves and respects him and considers it
a great privilege to have worked with him."
While Coppola's attempt at drawing emotion out of his actors is a negative memory for
her, Ryder did find a life-long friendship in her "Dracula" co-star Keanu Reeves, who,
as she told The Sunday Times, refused to c to make her cry.
What's more, Ryder told Vanity Fair that the "John Wick" star saved her throughout the
production.
She explained,
"I have these journals, and I just pulled one out recently, and it was from around the
time of 'Dracula.'
[...] 'angst, angst, angst, angst, thank God for Keanu.
Thank God I'm going to see Keanu.'
I was always just so happy when [Reeves was] around because there was so much, sort of,
trauma."
"Yes, that helps tremendously."
In 2001, Winona Ryder was caught shoplifting over $5,000 worth of items from a Saks Fifth
Avenue store.
The actor, who was reportedly experiencing kleptomania, was convicted of grand theft
and vandalism, per Time.
Her sentence included probation, community service, and restitution.
Looking back at the incident with Porter magazine in 2016, Ryder tried to unpack her actions.
Ultimately, she suspected she'd reached a breaking point.
She said,
"Psychologically, I must have been at a place where I just wanted to stop."
Up to that point, the weight of fame was something she'd been carrying for well over a decade.
Ryder's acting career began when she was 14 years old, and it's no secret that being a
child in show business can be an intense way to grow up.
She once expressed how much pressure she endured from working in Hollywood at such a young
age, noting that she couldn't take breaks like most of her peers.
She said while speaking to The New York Times,
"I was going through adolescence on screen.
I mean, most kids can have a bad day and miss school, but I couldn't miss a day of work
because that would be a $300,000 insurance day, blah, blah, blah."
Winona Ryder decided to take on a physically demanding role in the 1997 sci-fi movie "Alien
Resurrection."
According to Lena Dunham and Alissa Bennett's "The C-Word" podcast, it was reported that
Ryder injured a disk in her back while making the flick and was prescribed pain medication.
She continued to take prescription drugs long after sustaining the injury, and her pain
med usage made front page news when she was arrested for shoplifting.
As CBS News reported in 2002, a probation report claimed,
"[She] filled 37 prescriptions from 20 doctors under a half-dozen aliases [for years and
was] apparently addicted to painkillers."
Ryder explained to Vogue,
"Two months prior to [the shoplifting arrest], I broke my arm in two places, and the doctor,
a sort of quack doctor, was giving me a lot of stuff and I was taking it at first to get
through the pain.
And then there was this weird point when you don't know if you are in pain but you're taking
it."
Ryder told the magazine that her family was not concerned about a drug problem or anything
like that following the arrest.
She continued,
"Because after that night I pretty much didn't ever.
... If you are ever arrested, you can't ever do that again."
If you or anyone you know is struggling with addiction issues, help is available.
Visit the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration website or contact
SAMHSA's National Helpline at 1-800-662-HELP (4357).