Winona Ryder has opened up about the years following her breakup with Johnny Depp more honestly than usual. The Stranger Things star is on the cover of the July 2022 issue of Harper’s Bazaar, and she takes time to look back on all her work and her time in the public eye. That includes her relationship with Depp from 1989 to 1993.
Ryder met Depp at the New York City premiere of the film Great Balls of Fire! in 1989 and began dating in two months later in August of that year. At the time, Ryder was 17 years old and Depp was 26 years old. They got engaged five months after their first date in early 1990, and that year they co-starred in Tim Burton’s Edward Scissorhands together. Ryder referred to the sensational breakup as “My Girl, Interrupted real life,” – referencing her 1999 movie about a girl struggling with mental health.
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Ryder said that she did not do a good job of caring for herself after the breakup. She said that an “incredible” therapist advised her to visualize her younger self as an external person and try to be kinder to her than she was being in her own mind. Ryder employed this advice while filming the 1994 drama The House of Spirits and said that it worked wonders for her.
“I remember, I was playing this character who ends up getting tortured in a Chilean prison. I would look at these fake bruises and cuts on my face, and I would struggle to see myself as this little girl,” she recalled. “‘Would you be treating this girl like you’re treating yourself?’ I remember looking at myself and saying, ‘This is what I’m doing to myself inside.’ Because I just wasn’t taking care of myself.”
“I’ve never talked about it. There’s this part of me that’s very private. I have such, like, a place in my heart for those days. But for someone younger who grew up with social media, it’s hard to describe,” Ryder went on. Ryder did not give any new insights about Depp’s recent sensational court case against his ex-wife Amber Heard. The actress has generally referred to her own mental health struggles at that time without pinning any blame on Depp.
Ryder previously told Time Magazine that Depp was “never abusive at all towards me” and that he was “a really good, loving, caring guy who is very, very protective of the people that he loves.” However, she was careful not to cast aspersions on Heard either.
“I wasn’t there. I don’t know what happened. I’m not calling anyone a liar,” she added at the time. “I’m just saying, it’s difficult and upsetting for me to wrap my head around it. Look, it was a long time ago, but we were together for four years, and it was a big relationship for me. Imagine if someone you dated when you were – I was 17 when I met him – was accused of that. It’s just shocking. I have never seen him be violent toward a person before.”
