Giancarlo Esposito Admits He Considered Possibly Orchestrating His Own Murder Before Booking 'Breaking Bad'

From Do the Right Thing to The Mandalorian, Giancarlo Esposito's acting work has transcended generations and touched audiences for years. At the turn of the last decade, Esposito had a multi-season arc on the hit series Breaking Bad as drug kingpin Gus Fring. At that time in his life, Esposito's job on Breaking Bad was a godsend.

The award-winning actor opened up about the years in his career before he started working on Breaking Bad in a recent interview on SiriusXM's The Jim and Sam Show. Before booking the show, he was in a bit of a career dry spell and dealing with depression and financial troubles. He confessed he was so desperate to provide for his family that he considered some extreme means to do so.

"My way out in my brain was... 'If you get life insurance, if someone commits suicide, do they get the bread?' And my wife said, 'Well, that's kind of tricky.' And I went, 'Well, yeah, okay,'" he recounted of a conversation he had with his wife whose father worked in insurance. "She had no idea why I was asking her this stuff. And then I thought, you know, I just started scheming. If I got somebody to knock me off, death [by] misadventure, they would get the insurance."

"I had four kids. I wanted them to have a life," he continued. "It was a hard moment in time. I literally thought of self-annihilation so that they could suvive. That's how low I was."

"That was the first inkling that there was a way out, but I wouldn't be here to be available to it or be a part of it or be there for my kids. Then, you know, I started to think, 'That's not viable, because the pain I would cause them would be lifelong and lifelong trauma that would just extend the generational trauma, which I'm trying to move away from,'" he thought.

When asked what project gave him hope during his depression, he admitted it was Breaking Bad.

"The light at the end of the tunnel was Breaking Bad," he stated plainly. "I had a few little things before that to start to recover, but Breaking Bad was the light."

Esposito would go on to reprise his role as Gus Fring in the smash Breaking Bad spinoff Better Call Saul, which wrapped up in 2022. He later starred as Moss Gideon in The Mandalorian.

If you or a loved one is contemplating suicide, call the National Suicide and Crisis Lifeline at 988 to connect with a trained counselor.