Jake Lloyd, who starred as Anakin Skywalker in “Episode I — The Phantom Menace,” was admitted to a mental health facility after suffering a psychotic break in March 2023.
In a new interview, Lloyd’s mother, Lisa, revealed that she and her son were driving home from McDonald’s when the former child actor, now 35, wanted to turn the car off.
“And he turned the car off in the middle of the three lanes, and we were in the middle lane,” Lisa told Scripps News on Monday, adding that her son was already having a bad day before the incident.
“There was a lot of yelling and screaming.”
According to Lisa, several drivers who were stuck behind the pair called 911.
“The police got there, and they asked Jake some questions,” she said. “He was talking to them, but none of it made sense. It was all word salad.”
Lloyd, who was diagnosed with schizophrenia in 2008, was admitted to a hospital that day.
Months later, the “Madison” star was transferred to an inpatient program at a mental health facility where he is expected to stay for an additional 18 months.
According to Lisa, her son has taken well to the program.
“He’s doing much better than I expected,” she gushed. “He is relating to people better and becoming a little bit more social, which is really nice. It’s kind of like having more of the old Jake back, because he has always been incredibly social until he became schizophrenic.”
“We’re in a lot better place. And we do have a lot of things to look forward to,” she went on.
Lisa first noticed something was off when Lloyd “started having some trouble in high school.”
“He started talking about ‘realities.’ He didn’t know if he was in this reality, or a different reality. I didn’t really know exactly what to say to that,” she told the outlet.
Lisa recalled one instance when she asked her son if he finished his homework.
“And he was like, ‘Well, I don’t even know if I need to do it. I don’t know which reality I’m in,’” she said. “And I’m like, ‘Well, you’re in my reality today, so you have to do your homework.’”
Worried for her son, Lisa took the “Star Wars” actor to the doctor, who initially diagnosed him as bipolar. However, none of the medications prescribed to him seemed to work.
Things got even worse for Lloyd when he went to Columbia College in Chicago and began claiming people with “black eyes” were staring at him.
“It was really hard,” Lisa said. “[It] threw him off into an even worse depression.”
Lloyd’s condition hit a breaking point in 2015 when he was thrown in jail after leading police on a multi-county chase before he eventually crashed his car.
Lloyd spent nearly 10 months behind bars before finally agreeing to seek help.
Lisa was also quick to debunk the rumors that Lloyd’s mental health issues stem from the abuse his film has gotten in recent years.
“It would have happened anyway,” Lisa insisted. “I believe that it was genetic. And his psychiatrist also agrees that Jake was going to become schizophrenic.”
Lloyd’s mother also tried her best to shield him from toxic critics.
“I protected him from the backlash. He was just riding his bike outside, playing with his friends. He didn’t know. He didn’t care,” Lisa said. “Everybody makes such a big deal about that. And it’s rather annoying to me because Jake was a little kid when that came out, and he didn’t really feel all that stuff because I didn’t let him online.”
Despite everything, Lisa maintains that her son is still a die-hard fan of the franchise.
“People think Jake hates ‘Star Wars.’ He loves it,” Lisa said. “He loves all the new ‘Star Wars’ stuff.”
“Jake loved filming ‘Star Wars.’ He had so much fun,” she added. “I would love for him to get well enough to be able to do a little bit of something, and I’m sure he would maybe like to do that. He couldn’t at this point, but you never know how much he’s going to improve. So we’ll see.”