Stranger Things star Charlie Heaton has opened up about an incident last year at Los Angeles’ LAX airport that left him unable to attend the premiere party for the Netflix show’s second season.
The British actor was detained at LAX Airport last October after allegedly being found to be in possession of cocaine. He was not arrested and immediately returned to London, U.K. More than a week later, Heaton said in a statement this his planned travel to the U.S. was “affected by an issue at U.S. immigration” and he was “working to rectify it as soon as possible.”
Heaton — who plays Jonathan Byers in Stranger Things — also said he wanted to clarify that he “was not arrested or charged with a crime,” and he was “sorry to all the fans and my Stranger Things family for missing the premiere. We are all so proud of this season and I would never want this story to negatively impact the show.”
READ MORE: ‘Stranger Things’ star Charlie Heaton releases statement after denied entry into U.S.
“It’s all sorted now,” he said in a recent interview with Flaunt magazine in his first public comments about the airport incident since October. “We go back in April.”
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“It was f**king awful. It was just awful,” he said of the embarrassing moment.
He spoke about how the news coverage following the incident made him feel “vulnerable.”
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“It was hard. Everything happened so fast, and I hadn’t come to terms with the fact that I was famous,” he said. “When something steps in from the work you are doing and breaks into your personal life … you feel kind of vulnerable.”
He continued: “All of a sudden it becomes a very big story and it gets really blown out of proportion.”
He said that after the news broke, reporters arrived at his house as well as his parent’s house, which he said was very “hard” and “upsetting” for them to deal with.
“At the end of the day I just wanted to go back,” he said. “I want to work and continue to work – that’s all I’ve ever done.”
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