John Goodman on nearly 400 pounds and sobriety: 'I was eating alcoholically after I stopped drinking'

John Goodman got sober in 2007. Then, by his own account, he started eating the same way he used to drink.

In a new interview with The New Yorker, the 74-year-old Roseanne star offered some of his most candid comments yet on the journey that took him from nearly 400 pounds to a roughly 200-pound weight loss — a transformation he has rarely discussed in detail. The throughline, he said, was always the same impulse.

I would overeat, because that was comfort. Trying to fill up whatever hole that was. Same thing for drinking. It's been better said before by other people, but just trying to fill up that vacuum with kicks.— John Goodman, actor

Goodman told the magazine that his drinking began in earnest after he moved to New York City in 1975 as a young, aspiring actor with no prior experience, surviving on odd jobs before a run of commercial work gave him financial stability — and, he said, the means to start drinking. He found a community at Broadway bars, particularly a place called Café Central, where he went looking for friends and people to laugh with. The habit took hold.

I started gaining weight at an alarming rate.— John Goodman, actor

His big break — the role of Dan Conner on the megahit sitcom Roseanne — brought steady income but also sudden fame that he described as 'scary,' according to the New York Post. By the show's final original season, he said the period had become a 'misery tour with alcohol.' He remembered himself as a '38-year-old depressive alcoholic,' paralyzed by guilt, anxiety, and the fear of being judged while hiding how dependent on drinking he had become.

During the years between filming seasons, Goodman said he tried repeatedly to lose weight — and repeatedly failed.

I'd lose sixty pounds in a summer, gain it all back. Seventy pounds, eighty pounds. And that got tiring. I took steps so I wouldn't have to do that anymore. I was almost four hundred pounds. I was eating alcoholically after I stopped drinking.— John Goodman, actor

The drinking itself ended in crisis. Goodman described a vicious cycle of hangovers, shakes, and drinking again just to stop the shakes — until there was no way out that didn't involve a hospital.

I was in a position, when I quit, where I had to be hospitalized one way or the other. I just was tired of it, and I wanted to stop.— John Goodman, actor

He achieved sobriety in 2007, at age 55, according to the New York Post. But the emotional pattern that had driven his drinking simply shifted to food. His weight climbed to nearly 400 pounds.

What finally broke the cycle, he said, was recognizing what both compulsions had cost him.

I was delaying my maturation by drinking, and I had a lot of catching up to do, just realizing how selfish it made me. I was overlooking real life. And it was great to see there was a life where I didn't have to use anything to enjoy it.— John Goodman, actor

Goodman told The New Yorker he had an operation on his stomach, though he did not specify the procedure. He said the surgery left him anemic and caused him to lose a layer of fat under his skin, leaving him cold all the time. In a 2023 interview with Rolling Stone, he said he had also incorporated boxing and daily walks into his routine — up to an hour or an hour and a half of hitting mitts and bags and working on footwork, according to Bollywood Shaadis. He said he never trusted himself to spar, because he wasn't sure what he'd do if he got hit in the face.

In a 2017 ABC interview, Goodman said he had learned from the yo-yo years. 'This time, I wanted to do it slowly,' he said at the time, according to The Independent. 'Move, exercise. I'm getting to the age where I can't afford to sit still anymore.' By 2023, he said he had lost 200 pounds.

I got sick and tired of being sick and tired.— John Goodman, actor

Why it matters — Goodman's account is one of the more detailed public explanations of how addiction can shift form rather than simply disappear after sobriety — and of the medical and psychological steps required to break that pattern.

Reported by co.uk, independent.co.uk, nypost.com, bollywoodshaadis.com