The Treat: Will Poulter

0:00KCRW sponsors include Prime Video presenting Fallout. The second season is now nominated for 10 Emmy Awards. Collider says it's a wholly unique series that has no equal. Fallout is available for Television Academy members at ConsiderAmazon.com. Welcome to The Treat. I'm Elvis Mitchell. We've seen actor Will Poulter in many harrowing environments. The 1967 riots in the film Detroit. The Canadian wiles in the film The Revenant. but no place quite as demanding as the small Ohio community in the film Union County, where he plays an addict trying to recover. Poulter recently toured the film through Ohio, where it's set.

0:41And The Treat is a diary of his travels.

0:45Will Poulter:Hi there, I am Will Poulter, and this is The Treat.

0:55Will Poulter:recently i got a chance to be on the press tour with annette dio who is one of the leads of the film and also the leader of the adult recovery program in ohio and writer director of union county adam meeks and we got the opportunity to go to a number of different movie theaters around the state, many of which independent with fantastic programming with lots of wonderful independent films. I'm Cody and I'm an addict. Hi, Cody. I've been addicted to opiates since I was 17. And I'm part of the adult recovery court program. And so I'm here. Pass. Roger. At some of those theatres, we got the chance to do Q &As and getting the opportunity to do those Q &As and, you know, interact with folks from the community, feel the Ohio pride, see the extent to which the film resonated with people.

1:59Will Poulter:And to hear from also several people who work in the service sector as it relates to substance use disorder and recovery was really, really special. most special and most inspiring perhaps was watching Annette talk to those audiences. Well, first I want to talk about you. Your sister is really concerned about you. Where's Jack? The sober living house found Jack passed out this morning in the hallway. This is not his first violation. So we're going to send him to an intensive treatment center in Greene County. They have better tools to work with Jack. She had this analogy about challenging the stigma around addiction and supporting recovery efforts that I really love.

2:50Will Poulter:She said that if you were a resident in a small town and your child was ill or your child had experienced an injury of some kind, maybe they were upstairs in the bedroom, sick from something, you might expect to receive a casserole from your neighbor, a sign of solidarity, an extension of empathy. And she challenged the audience to think about the possibility that you might be a person from a small town and your child might be upstairs, sick, having just come out of a detox facility. or maybe they've just returned from rehab. And she asked the audience whether they would still expect to receive a casserole from a neighbor.

3:39You know, one of the things I've learned over the years doing this is that it's never really anyone's fault.

3:49It's not Jack's fault. It's not my fault. It's not your fault.

4:03I know that's hard to believe, but it's true.

4:09Will Poulter:I think what that did is put in my mind, you know, the challenge that lies before us all, which is to think differently about the subject of addiction and recovery and extend empathy beyond the boundaries that certain stigma puts up between us and other human beings. Yeah. So much for making mountains out of hills Each time I use these words They grow so weak they broke on me So much for uncomfortable Actor Will Poulter on the power of taking his new project, Union County, back where it was filmed. The Treat is produced by Rebecca Moni and mixed by Katie Gilchrist. You can go home again. I'm Elvis Mitchell.

4:58It's The Treat.

5:35So if you jump from where we're standing, don't look down Each time I dream, I see you crash into a cloud And you lost your ballast, but you make the fall your own And still you only come so close So don't be so brave Don't act so cool You're only afraid KCRW sponsors include Prime Video Presenting John Candy, I Like Me Now nominated for five Emmys Including Outstanding Documentary or Nonfiction Special Collider calls it A Triumph The Best Documentary of the Year Available at ConsiderAmazon.com