Phoenix-like, Actor/Producer Jeff Wincott Rises from the Ashes of Substance Use Disorder

Fall Fight Shine.

At 28, actor Jeff Wincott had landed a national and international series lead in the iconic Night Heat police series, which was followed by a prestigious Gemini Award nomination. Then at 35, he was starring in Hollywood films including high octane action flicks like Martial Law 2, Mission of Justice, and Street Law. Soon, the phone wouldn’t stop ringing and people wanted to hire him to do films that required someone to carry the film with martial arts abilities but also someone who could act. Wincott explains, “I didn’t have to audition anymore, and it was a really good time for me, life was great. I had starred in over a dozen movies and was commanding six-figure salaries.”

But then something not-so-funny happened on the way to personal and career nirvana. He had been running marathons, and was in the gym training twice a day at Gold’s Gym in Venice Beach, until he tried psychostimulants for the first time. At 42, with the world at his feet, Jeff Wincott began struggling with substance use disorder (SUD), and overdosed off of Sunset Boulevard, that famous thoroughfare of hopes and broken dreams.

As he notes in the thought-provoking, insightful and helpful documentary, Fall Fight Shine, having a substance use disorder (SUD) is “like fighting for your life, you throw punches, you spit blood, your knees buckle. And you wonder, who’s going to win—the disease or me?”

This movie, which intimately and dramatically tells Wincott’s story of recovery, has already earned a Best Documentary award, and has been an Official Selection at more than a half dozen Film Festivals, and will be streaming digitally in 65 countries on August 1.

Fall Fight Shine also explains the concept of recovery from a scientific standpoint, with its director Charlotte Wincott (PhD) and several other guest scientists and health experts explaining that a SUD “is a brain disease and not a result of a moral failing.” Charlotte, who is Jeff’s wife, adds, “We mainly focus on opioids, stimulants like cocaine, and alcohol, but there are many other types. The point is to help you see that this disease is real and so is RECOVERY.”

However, director Charlotte Wincott warns that the statistics on SUDs are horrific. In 2018, approximately 53 million Americans were estimated to have misused prescription drugs or engaged in the use of illicit substances like methamphetamine or heroin. That same year there were over 67,000 drug overdose deaths. Moreover, the National Survey on Drug Use and Health reports that over 20 million Americans over the age of 12 have had a SUD.

You. Cannot. Be serious.

Indeed, Jeff Wincott, his filmmaker wife Charlotte, and her fellow scientists are deadly serious. Actor Wincott, who has been clean and sober for going on almost twenty years now, describes the price he paid for his SUD (cocaine and alcohol):

“Everything took a back seat to my addiction including my personal life and career. Years later after I got sober, I made an amends to a director I worked with in the last years in the throes of my addiction. He said that in between takes on the set I would lay on the cold concrete floor and pass out, and he would have to wake me up when it was time to shoot. The director told me ‘Do you remember the producer and I saying goodbye to you after filming?’  I replied, ‘No, I don't recall.’ He then ominously said, ‘We said goodbye because we knew you were going to die and that was the last time we were going to see you.’ As a result, the phones, which had always been ringing on my nice run, well, they stopped ringing. No one wanted to hire me. The work dried up. It was over.”

Actors know from being vulnerable. From the very act of auditioning, with its inherent and always high possibility of being rejected, to breaking through barriers to express a character’s emotions with as much authenticity as possible, the craft is all about vulnerability. Yet, an actor’s vulnerability is precisely what draws audiences in and moves them.

Reflecting on telling his tale in Fall Fight Shine, Wincott confesses, “It’s hard to tell my story as it comes with a lot of pain, it’s also hard to be vulnerable. What I realize is that I’m not getting any younger, yet I do have a story to tell. Life hasn’t been perfect, sobriety has its ups and downs. But they’re not because I’m high. Life always comes at ya. But I now don’t have to drink or use over what comes at me. If there’s a problem and I drink, then the problem is just going to get worse. But if I don’t drink or use, I can walk through that problem to get to a solution.”

Additionally, Wincott’s son, Wolfgang, with whom he co-starred in the multi award-winning feature, The Issue with Elvis, makes an appearance in family clips. Wincott bares his soul about the blessings that sobriety has brought him:

“My son Wolfgang was born in 2009, seven years after I got sober. I remember hearing his first cries. What a beautiful sound. I got to hold this tiny little angel in my arms, and that same day I had to fly to Pittsburgh to do a film, Unstoppable, I was playing Chris Pine’s brother in it. And, after finishing shooting, I was back on dad duty. I must’ve changed thousands of diapers, on planes, on Fifth Avenue in New York, and on buses. I watched him take his first step with his great grandmother in North Carolina, which was amazing. He came with me in his stroller to auditions, and I’d get one of the actors to watch him while I did my audition, they were really good sports. They really didn’t have a choice, ha. I’ve been married for almost two decades now, which is remarkable. To be sober, these are the gifts.”

Moreover, director Charlotte says of their movie: “Recently released provisional data from the CDC showed that there were over 100,000 overdose deaths in 2021, up 15% from 2020. And, the enormous struggle that the journey to recovery entails can feel insurmountable, but if you have this epiphany and take on this fight, there is a light at the end—and, that light shines. It is bright and hopeful and it can open up the world for you. But the basic key message from the film is that recovery is attainable.”

Recovery. Is. Attainable.

 
While Charlotte suggests that “healing begins with a desire to recover, the courage to seek help, and the perseverance to keep trying,” Jeff offers from his own experience: “You can’t help someone until they say, I have a problem, I need help. Please help me. They have to find that on their own. They have to find their own bottom. I hope you get the gift of desperation. I did!”

Director Charlotte Wincott received the Activism Award, Filmmaker, from the Hollywood Women’s Film Institute for her work in the addiction space. Check out her bio on Hollow Metropolis Films website. Drop in on Jeff Wincott on his website, and on the Fall Fight Shine trailer on YouTube. The documentary feature will be available digitally on August 01 on Apple TV, YouTube, iTunes, and Google Play.