Scott Eastwood reflected on his girlfriend’s tragic death in a 2014 freak car accident and why he wasn’t able to grieve at the time.
“We were together for three or four years,” the actor said on the “Armchair Expert” podcast Monday, explaining that his late girlfriend, Jewel Brangman, was killed by a defective airbag.
“They had a recall on the airbag and what would have been a fender bender that probably most people would survive… she was essentially shot by the airbag.”
“Being on a film set when someone passes or something happens, it’s really tough because you don’t have time to grieve. The show must go on,” he explained.
“You can’t fly home, you’re stuck, you’ve got to work.”
Looking back, the “Fury” actor wishes he was able to begin the grieving process more immediately.
“I did a classic defense mechanism — just compartmentalize that until later. Brutal having to deal with that and not being able to go through it. I grieved later.”
“That’s not a great thing. You do want to grieve with the people that are around that you know and were part of their lives as well. That’s an important part of the grieving process.”
Eastwood admitted he “completely blacked out” the incident, and missed her funeral because of work or because he was not ready to face the loss.
“I had to deal with that grief later,” the 40-year-old concluded.
Brangman, who was a model and gymanst, was just 26 years old at the time of her death.
The actor rarely talks about her death. The first time be publicly shared the story of her passing was two years after the tragic incident.
“I dated a girl a couple of years ago who died in a car accident,” he told GQ Australia in 2016 when asked about the last time he cried.
“The f–ked up thing is, it was a fender bender, and there was a recall on airbags. Her airbag exploded. It shot a projectile through her body. It split her spleen and … I’ve never told anybody that.”
The “Longest Ride” star told the outlet it’s the loss that has affected him the most.
“I’ve lost friends before; I’ve lost some great friends. But, I’ve never lost someone I had been really intimate with. Maybe it’s made it harder for me to date,” he confessed.
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