Shia LaBeouf revealed in an interview that he once lived at Central Park in New York City
“You got to move every three or four hours and the guy comes around, but you can spend most of your time there,” the actor said of sleeping near where the horses are kept
LaBeouf said it was during a time when he was “not in a good way” while working on a Broadway play
Shia LaBeouf is reflecting on a time when he spent nights at Central Park while struggling.
The actor spoke with The Hollywood Reporter alongside his Henry Johnson director David Mamet, at one point recalling a time when he was “not in a good way” while working on the Broadway play Orphans, which he eventually dropped out of.
LaBeouf, 38, said he was on steroids and “sleeping in Central Park” at that time in is life, circa 2013, adding of his living situation, “They keep horses there at this little fire basin. And there’s a whole lot of room around there where you can just chill.”
“You got to move every three or four hours and the guy comes around, but you can spend most of your time there,” the actor said.
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LaBeouf also recalled the tensions between himself and Alec Baldwin on Orphans ahead of his departure from the project, but noted that they eventually “made it right.”
“He’s a good guy. He’s just like me. Fear will make you move different. I found it came from having absolutely no spiritual life,” he said.
LaBeouf said not having a spiritual life “made me a piece of s—” and “not a nice guy,” adding that finding Catholicism and having lived in a monastery “changes the way you work, for sure.”
“Me and Alec would never have these problems now. But I was in an island,” he continued. “Then I hear Timothée Chalamet get up [at the 2025 SAG Awards] and he says something like, ‘I want to be great.’ I so know the feeling. On him, it’s cute. On me, it wasn’t cute.”
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Max Cisotti/Dave Benett/Getty
Shia LaBeouf in Cannes, France, on May 16, 2024
LaBeouf has a history of controversy, having become embroiled in a sexual-battery lawsuit filed by his ex-girlfriend, singer FKA Twigs, who accused him of “relentless abuse.”
A source told PEOPLE in February 2021 that the Transformers star was taking a break from his screen career “so that he can get the help he needs.”
“I have been abusive to myself and everyone around me for years,” LaBeouf told The New York Times at the time. “I have a history of hurting the people closest to me. I’m ashamed of that history and am sorry to those I hurt.”
Later in May 2025, he is slated to attend the 2025 Cannes Film Festival premiere of a documentary that chronicled a controversial acting school he launched, Slauson Rec.
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