Kiwi actor opens up about addiction and eating disorder during filming of hit show
Wednesday, 22 July 2026
New Zealand actor KJ Apa has spoken about how he battled addiction and an eating disorder while appearing on hit TV show Riverdale.
Apa played Archie Andrews on the teen drama between 2017 and 2023. He had previously appeared on Shortland Street between 2013 and 2015.
Speaking to Dylan Sprouse and Brendan Columbus on their Wild Men Podcast, Apa said at the time of filming Riverdale, he was “doing a lot of drugs”.
“A lot of my close friends were worried about me. And [they] had learnt that I was doing drugs again. It was a wake-up punch.”
Apa said that when he came off Riverdale, he knew he needed to “get sober”.
“Honestly, the first step was getting sober. I just had so much cloudiness. I had so many things that I was doing that [were] so unhealthy that had kind of bred throughout that show in me.”
Apa said he has been sober for about a year-and-a-half now, but for six years anything that made him “feel good” he “would abuse”.
“This is something that I have learned about myself. I mean, even eating, my relationship with eating, especially on that show, was bad,” he said. “I used to eat doughnuts all day long, go back to my trailer and throw up.”
Apa spoke in particular about one time during the show he was quarantining and ordered McDonald's at 2am, a decision he came to regret.
“I ordered like three Big Macs, a bunch of McNuggets and stuff, fries, milkshake. It's like 2am and I’m about to beast mode this thing.
“I slam like half of it and immediately it's like [sighs] - why did I do that?”
Apa said he has now identified what his “addictive qualities” are and “knows how to talk to it”.
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