Tragic Tony Slattery’s battle to beat booze & drug demons saw him living in warehouse and throwing furniture into Thames
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COMEDIAN Tony Slattery’s “dazzling talent” delighted fans for more than 40 years – but behind the humour he was deeply troubled by depression and addiction. At the height of his career, the stand-out star of Channel 4 improv show Whose Line Is It Anyway? — who died today after a heart attack aged 65 — disappeared from public life after suffering a breakdown at the age of 36.
![[Tony Slattery on the set of Good Morning Britain.]](https://www.thesun.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/c31a12a6-2138-49f3-96e5-de9213d7b28b.jpg?strip=all&w=478)
Tony later referred to the episode as a six-month period of torture in which he spent time living in a warehouse and “throwing (his) furniture into the Thames”. He added: “I had a very happy time until I went slightly barmy.”. Tony, who also appeared in films including How To Get Ahead In Advertising, The Crying Game and Peter’s Friends, was among a group of comics who emerged from the Footlights student comedy troupe at Cambridge University in the 1980s.
![[Headshot of actor Tony Slattery.]](https://www.thesun.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/df900338-89d0-41dc-893d-94f1603d3a9c.jpg?strip=all&w=643)
Close friend and fellow ex-Footlights star Sir Stephen Fry led tributes to Tony, calling him “the gentlest, sweetest soul”, adding: “Not to mention screamingly funny and a deeply talented wit and clown.”. And comic Al Murray wrote: “Really sad news about Tony Slattery. Such a dazzling talent.”.
![[Stephen Fry and Tony Slattery in Kingdom, Series 2.]](https://www.thesun.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/b1fbfb96-f4d0-4de4-b263-42df73908779.jpg?strip=all&w=960)
Tony was a familiar face and voice on TV and radio in the late ’80s and ’90s, in comedy shows such as Radio 4’s Just A Minute and Have I Got News For You on BBC One. Then in 2020 he appeared in a BBC documentary, What’s The Matter With Tony Slattery?, in which he revealed he had been sexually abused by a priest when he was eight years old.
![[Group photo of the Whose Line Is It Anyway? cast, including Tony Slattery.]](https://www.thesun.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/NINTCHDBPICT000963715901.jpg?strip=all&w=800)
