Larry Hagman blames boredom for his heavy drinking while filming Dallas, admitting alcohol helped cure the "tedium" of long shoots.
The actor guzzled champagne on set while playing scheming oil baron J.R. Ewing in the long-running drama series, but he was forced to give up booze after developing liver disease.
Hagman is now preparing to begin work on the upcoming Dallas revamp, and admits it'll be a completely "different" experience playing his character without a buzz.
He says, "It'll probably feel different being sober on the set of Dallas but I've had 15 years' experience of sobriety. Maybe the booze made me a better actor but I'll be fine without it.
"It was boredom that drove me to drink, the tedium during those long waits between takes while the next shot was being set up. Now I've learned to fill those breaks with friends, with charity work, with phone calls, so it's not so bad.
"I did miss drinking for a while but sobriety isn't hard when you consider the alternative. Doctors had given me two months to live when they cut me open. When they looked inside they found I had only two weeks left."