“Why couldn’t it have been me?”: Alec Baldwin shares mental health update post-“Rust” shooting

Alec Baldwin is reflecting on his mental health in the aftermath of the “Rust” shooting that led to the death of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins in 2021.

The actor, a central figure in the new TLC reality show, “The Baldwins,” speaks candidly in the first episode of the show, set to premiere Sunday, Feb. 23, about the ways in which his life has changed since the on-set fatality.

“This has been just surreal,” Baldwin says to his wife, Hilaria Baldwin, in the episode. “I mean, I can’t even believe that we’re going through this. And I always feel more pain for you than for me, because I think to myself, well, you know, I’m going to try my best to just get through it. And I think about what it’s done to you, how much it’s hurt you, and everything.”

“This past year was just terrible. There were times I’d lay in bed. I’d go, ‘Wow, my kids. I can’t get up.’ That’s not like me. I’m not like that at all, not in any way am I like that. Never,” he explains in a confessional, detailing the hit his mental health has taken.

Hilaria, explaining that Alec’s overall mood shifted when he was charged with involuntary manslaughter, adds her own insight to his “darkest moments,” saying, “Everyone who is close to Alec has seen his mental health decline.” Adding that her husband was diagnosed with PTSD and has been heard saying, “If an accident had to have happened this day, why am I still here? Why couldn’t it have been me?”

“You wake up in the morning and you’re like, ‘Oh god, why did I wake up?’” she says to Alec, who remembers an instance where he didn’t know how to answer a friend who asked how he was doing.

“I said, ‘I’m happier when I’m asleep than when I’m awake,’” he said.

The shooting incident occurred four years ago on Oct. 27, 2021, in New Mexico when a prop gun Baldwin held went off on the set of “Rust” and killed Hutchins. Baldwin has maintained he did not fire the prop gun and did not know it was loaded with a live bullet. The film premiered in Poland in November 2024 with a dedication to Hutchins.