Paul Mescal shares insight into fear he won’t ‘live a long life’

Paul Mescal has always had a “gut feeling” that he won’t live a long life, and so he’s thought about starting a family young.

In a new interview with GQ, Paul said: “I’ve always been convinced that I’m not going to live a long life…in my head it’s never been drastic. It’s just like a gut feeling. And maybe it’s to do with the fact that I can’t visualize myself as an 80-year-old man.”

He continued: “But I’m also afraid of death. So I think if death was to come for me at 55, I’d be equally afraid of it as I would be at 90.”

“It’s always in my head. I was like, Going to have a family young. I’m going to not survive a long time. Hopefully, I’m wrong. I think I will be wrong. But that’s just the truth around my brain,” he added.

On a lighter note, the Normal People actor was asked if rumors about him taking his dates to the park and ditching them there were true. He revealed that he first encountered the rumors when he was with his family.

He said: “We were looking at the videos and we were pissing ourselves at it. Categorically untrue. And we were laughing, laughing, laughing, laughing. And the one thing that upset me was that I was in the kitchen, I remember my mum looking at the videos and she was getting upset. Isn’t that devastating? I was like, Oh, it’s funny to us—my brother, me, my sister—because we know that this is the way the internet works. It’s hilarious. If it was true, it’d be f-cking bad, but as a rumor, it’s funny. Then I was like, Oh, if you’re a mother, her impulse is to come out and be like, ‘He wouldn’t do this.’”

The Gladiator II actor was also asked about his personal life, and he explained that he prefers to keep it private “for the benefit of my own sanity” as well as benefit of his work, as it helps people imagine him in his roles if they don’t know too much about his personal life. 

Paul Mescal’s Gladiator II will hit theaters on November 22.