‘I tried to kill myself’

Wentworth Miller has revealed that he has tried to kill himself a number of times.

The former Prison Break star – who recently came out – revealed that he struggled with keeping his sexuality hidden, and first tried to commit suicide when he was 15.

Speaking at a Human Rights Campaign gala in Seattle on Saturday, he said: "Every day was a test and there were a thousand ways to fail, a thousand ways to betray yourself, to not live up to someone else’s standard of what was acceptable or what was normal.

"The first time I tried to kill myself I was 15. I waited till my family went away for the weekend and I was alone in the house and I swallowed a bottle of pills. I don’t remember what happened over the next couple of days but I’m pretty sure come Monday morning I was on the bus back to school pretending everything was fine.

"And when someone asked me if that was a cry for help, I say no, because I told no one."

The actor described doing press tours while on the hit Fox drama, and recalled numerous interviews where he had an opportunity to speak out, but did not.

"I had multiple opportunities to speak my truth, which was that I was gay," he said.

"But I chose not to. I was out in private, to family and friends … but professionally, publicly, I was not."

Miller – who publicly opened up about his sexuality for the first time last month after writing an open letter to organisers of the St Petersburg International Festival protesting Russia’s recent anti-gay legislation – told guests at the gala that he decided to come out because he wants to be a role model for others: "To be the someone else, that no one was to me."