Paul Johansson reveals ‘awful’ impact ‘One Tree Hill’ role had on him

One Tree Hill actor, Paul Johansson, got candid about the impact his character Dan Scott had on his well-being.

The actor, 59, appeared on the Trying to Figure It Out With Ally Petitti podcast in which he revealed struggling with depression and alcoholism, when the show was running from 2003 to 2012.

“It was awful,” he said. “I was, I’ve never spoken about this before, I was deeply depressed and I was drinking.”

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He added that he was “drinking a couple bottles of wine a night” by himself for “about six or seven years.”

Johansson played the role of a controlling father of basketball prodigy Nathan Scott (played by James Lafferty) and Lucas Scott (Chad Michael Murray). He was also known as the master manipulator of their small town, Tree Hill, in North Carolina.

The actor went on to say that people would move seats on airplanes “to get away” from him.

“It was just a time when I think I was absorbing the energy of the people that were looking at me and seeing me and seeing me as something that’s bad,” he recalled, adding that he’s “sensitive” and “vulnerable to criticism.”

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He added that he was “grateful” once the show ended because he “needed to get out and get other characters and feel other things.”

However, due to his performance, he was offered more “bad guy roles” which “put him in a box.”

When asked if he was ever offered any support from the show, to which he responded, “It’s a really, really simple question. Never, nothing, zero.”