Danny Dyer plunged into a "spiral of madness" following the death of his mentor Harold Pinter

Danny has now confessed he hit rock bottom after the loss after reading about it in a newspaper. During an appearance on BBC Radio 4's 'Desert Island Discs', he explained: "I hadn't spoke to him in a while. I did go off the rails for many years and I found out by looking on the front of a newspaper.

"Again, I'd been on a bender and I was coming home and I was going, I think I was going to buy cigarettes at the petrol garage, and I see it in the paper: 'Pinter dead'.

"This really sent me on a spiral of madness, really. The guilt of not being around him any more and just being lost, I was a bit of a lost soul, and again, angry at the world."

It comes after Danny revealed he's working on a play based on his friendship with Pinter with the working title 'When Harry Met Danny' .

Danny told Deadline.com: "I really like it [the play idea] and am excited about it. I'd love to explore it more. I'm grateful for the years I spent with Harold and he was a real mentor to me."

The actor previously hosted a 2020 documentary about his friendship with the late writer called 'Danny Dyer on Pinter'.

Speaking to the Guardian in 2013, Danny said his late pal taught him a lot about being an actor and set him up for a successful career in showbusiness.

He said: "I miss him, you know, he was a good influence on me. He was the only person who I feared but loved.

"He had faith in me, he suffered all my s*** because he knew I was a talented actor. He was a f****** tyrant, too, you know, but he could get away with it because he was so enchanting. He was a poet ...

"If he didn't like [something] he'd tell me straight; there were no airs and graces about him. I learned so much from him that set me up for the rest of my career."