The 'Euphoria' star's friends and family open up about his addiction struggles in a new interview.
Angus Cloud's friends and family are remembering the late actor and sharing details from the Euphoria star's final days.
Cloud's mother, Lisa, pays heartbreaking tribute to her son in a new interview with People, sharing how she found him dead from an overdose on July 31.
Lisa says that she entered Angus' room in their Oakland, California, home to find him slumped over at his desk. This wasn't unusual, she said. He would often fall asleep there while creating art late at night. However, that day was different.
"I started shaking him and screaming," Lisa recalls. "I pushed him hard, and he fell on the floor. I tried to resuscitate him — mouth to mouth — and I was compressing him. I was screaming for my neighbor because I didn't want to leave him and call 911, and I just kept at it until they took him away."
Last week, a spokesperson for the Alameda County Coroner confirmed Angus' cause of death to ET: "Angus Cloud died from a lethal combination of fentanyl, cocaine, methamphetamine and more, in what is ruled as an accidental overdose. Angus suffered from acute intoxication from the combination of drugs, which also included benzodiazepine."
"It was predominantly the central nervous system depressants. It started to slow his heart and slow his breathing," Lisa tells People. "He got tired from lack of oxygen. Everything just slowed down, and eventually his heart stopped and he went to sleep. But he didn't kill himself.”
"He went out at his total power, his total beauty, his total influence, and the reaction that everyone has had is very moving to me," she continues. "You know, he's not just an actor who overdosed. He was a beautiful soul, and that's why people miss him so much... I miss him so much. He was the love of my life."
Euphoria creator Sam Levinson also opens up about his show's breakout star, noting that he changed the storyline several times to keep Angus' character, drug dealer Fezco, around longer.
"Angus was supposed to die at the end of the first season, but I loved him so f**king much," he shares. "He was perfect. I think part of the problem is I would sometimes put actors ahead of the show at times. So I was like, 'OK, I can't kill him because then what is he to look forward to?'"
In season 2, the plan again was for Fezco to die, this time in a hail of bullets during a police raid. But Levinson says he didn't want Angus to leave the show, in part because he knew he was using drugs and felt he would be safer on set.
"I think the hardest thing is when you have addiction issues — it's about finding your purpose and finding your meaning in life," he says. "The one thing that I knew is he loved making this show. He loved the crew. He loved the actors. He loved everything about it. And I just thought, if this goes away, I don't know what's going to happen in his life."
Of killing off Fezco, Levinson remembers thinking, "I can't do it. I can't kill him. We got to keep him around. He's too special. It doesn't matter what the f**king story is."
But Angus struggled on set during season 2 as his addiction issues continued to grow.
"I looked him in the eye and I knew that he wasn't doing well," Levinson recalls. "At the same time I've been in these situations before where you're trying to get someone clean. And I just said to him, 'I love working with you and we've got this amazing season planned and stuff, but I need you to be sober because I got to be able to rely on you.'"
One week prior to his death, Angus, his mother, and his twin sisters had traveled to Ireland for the funeral of his father. People reports that Angus missed the actual service because he was too high, and his mother shares that while she doesn't believe her husband's death was responsible for her son's, she knew he was grieving and struggling to cope.
"He went into these moods that were really awful, and he wasn't himself, and I now realize that's because he was on drugs," Lisa says. "I think he had very deep feelings, and sometimes this world was... he just couldn't handle it and didn't want to handle it. Was that the demands of being a celebrity and everybody trying to make money off him? Or was that pills that he took for pain? I don't think you can really separate it."
Angus' co-star, Zendaya, also shares a tribute to her friend in the article via email, writing, "He felt like a little brother instantly; ironic because we played characters with the exact opposite dynamic. I'm lucky because I got to experience the most beautiful parts of him. I got to watch him create and I got to watch him discover the fact that he was an actor. A damn good one at that, and as many times as I would tell him or compliment his performance, I don't think he ever truly believed it."
RELATED CONTENT:
