One habit did the trick — Josh Brolin credits it for 12 years sober

Here we go again with another Hollywood sobriety story, but this one from Josh Brolin has a detail you probably weren't expecting – it involves Zoom, an alarm clock that clearly hates him, and a fair bit of honest reflection he’s never really shied away from.

So, Brolin sat down with The Telegraph for a proper natter about his turbulent history with alcohol, and how he’s managed to stay completely sober for over a decade now. This is the man who introduced a big purple alien to the MCU, but even he admits that for years, booze and fighting felt more like his regular job than acting ever did.

Drinking got boring in the end. I woke up on the sidewalk outside my house, yet again, and it felt like a fork in the road.

Brolin’s gone into detail before about his hard-partying youth in Montecito, California, hanging out with a bunch of locals nicknamed the Cito Rats. They were heavy on surfing and even heavier on drugs and alcohol. The police knew him well – apparently he got nicked nine times through his twenties and thirties, mostly for public drunkenness and a spot of fisticuffs. Attempt one at sobriety? That started all the way back at age nineteen after yet another run-in with the law. His words: he was so smashed he thought he "was Bruce Lee" and took on six coppers at once. As you do.

I love being sober. I’m having way more fun now than I ever did drinking, and I never end up in jail, which is a real bonus.

The change wasn’t overnight. The real clincher was personal – and a bit of a punch in the gut, honestly. When he spoke to the "Where Everybody Knows Your Name" podcast, he linked his final push for sobriety to his grandmother. She raised her head to smile at him from her deathbed aged ninety-nine, and that, remarkably, was the trigger. Brolin realised if she could hold out nearly a century, he could at least have a crack at staying on the straight and narrow for a few years.

All that led to his rather surprising daily routine now: every single morning, 6 a.m. sharp, Brolin is in an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting. It’s on Zoom – time zone miracles, maybe, or just the price you pay for resetting your life. But it's twelve years and counting for him; he puts a lot of credit for that endurance down to both the regular meetings and his current family situation – wife number three, Kathryn, and their two small daughters, back in Montecito where it all began.

Josh Brolin attends an AA meeting at 6 a.m. by Zoom, every day, and that routine has helped him maintain sobriety for twelve years.