MOVIE NEWS – Giancarlo Esposito talks about his struggles before ‘Breaking Bad’, even considering staging his own death to secure life insurance for his children.

Giancarlo Esposito recently appeared on SiriusXM’s “Jim & Sam” show where he was promoting AMC’s new drama series “Parish” and shared insights into the depths of his struggles before landing the iconic role of Gus Fring in “Breaking Bad”. Esposito revealed that at one point, he seriously contemplated staging his own death to ensure financial security for his children through life insurance. This thought occurred around 2008, a year before “Breaking Bad” permanently changed his career, opening up opportunities for him in “The Mandalorian”, “The Boys”, and other films.

When asked how he emerged from the brink of bankruptcy around 2008, Esposito responded, “One of my first thoughts was, ‘Is there life insurance if someone commits suicide? Do they get the money?’ My wife had no idea why I was asking these questions. I started to ponder. If someone accidentally killed me, and it looked like an accident, [my children] would get the insurance. I have four children, and all I wanted was to secure their future. It was a very tough time. I was literally thinking about self-destruction to ensure their survival. That’s how deep I was.”

“This was the first notion that there was a way out, but I wouldn’t be there to be with my children,” Esposito added. “Then I started to think that this wasn’t sustainable because the pain it would cause them would be lifelong, and it would only extend the generational trauma I was trying to escape from. The light at the end of the tunnel was ‘Breaking Bad’.”

Esposito appeared in a total of 26 episodes of “Breaking Bad” as Gus Fring, and later reprised the role for another 34 episodes in the prequel series “Better Call Saul”. Earlier this year, he told British GQ that he would love to play Gus a third time in a potential prequel series about the villain.

“Yes, I would really love to,” he said. “My backstory is that he was a real soldier who worked his way up the ladder and could have been a president or even a dictator, and could have taken power. But he wanted to do something that others couldn’t control, and he wanted to control his own destiny. So he started a new life in America as a methamphetamine dealer and businessman.”

“I think he could have been more like Tony Montana in his younger days,” Esposito continued. “But he worked hard to get to a level where he could listen, understand, and see through his emotional state. Hopefully, this will be ‘Gus’s Rise’.”

Watch Esposito’s full interview on the “Jim & Sam” show in the video below.