Robert Downey Jr. is starting to get candid about his imprisonment decades ago.
This oppenheimer The 58-year-old actress appeared. Seat Specialist This week’s podcast co-hosted by friend Dax Shepard. At one point in the wide-ranging conversation, Downey Jr. He remembered his time in prison in the late 1990s.
After 48-year-old Shepard was asked about prison, Downey Jr. said, “I’ll try to give you the flashcards: I’m in court, I was over-sentenced by an angry judge, and at one point he said: Something in Latin. I thought you were casting a spell on me.”
“Two weeks later, I’m at a place called Delano, a reception center where they decide where to go. Probably the most dangerous place I’ve been to because no one’s been assigned. If you’re a level 1, 2, 3, or 4 criminal, [everyone’s there]”You could feel the evil in the air.”
“It was like being in a really bad neighborhood and there was no opportunity there; only threats,” Downey Jr. continued, “I mean, yeah, everybody. is is I’ll take your wallet, so watch out.”
Charley Gallay/Getty
Don’t miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE’s free daily newsletter to stay up to date with the best PEOPLE has to offer, from compelling celebrity news to compelling stories that engage people.
The actor recalled: “I remember at one point when I rushed out of my cell to go to the shower – by the way, that would be the best voice-over – and I didn’t know that, but I was a little surprised. ”
He explained what it was like to be out at the facility for the first time after being transferred.
“Walking through the garden for the first time in over a year, the closest thing I can relate to is being sent to a distant planet where there’s no way back home until the planets align. . . ,” he said.
In 1996, the actor was arrested and charged with drug and weapons charges. He was sentenced to three years in prison in 1999 after parole violations. A total of 15 months plus parole and parole period served.
In December 2015, then California governor Jerry Brown pardoned him of his convictions.
While Downey Jr. admitted that incarceration was one of the “worst” things to happen to him, he revealed that after two weeks in prison, he found a model and somehow adjusted to his situation.
“We’re programmed to adapt to what soon seemed impossible,” he said. “… it was like a ball on day 15. I’m playing on day 15, I’m literally involved in the game.”
He said of prison culture: “As long as you are willing to do harm, you are unlikely to be targeted. That’s really the difference between pretending to do harm and being willing to do harm.”