Šerbedžija has admitted to drinking before driving.
The TMZ website has reported that Rade Šerbedžija (71) was arrested in Santa Monica, California. The police stopped him and it turned out that the world-famous Croatian actor was drunk behind the wheel, reports 24sata.hr on July 1, 2018.
The police decided to stop Šerbedžija after he almost hit several other cars, and they allegedly found an open bottle of whiskey in the car. “I did not commit any traffic offense while driving. They stopped me with no reason. I had 0.08 % of alcohol in my blood. They checked my blood alcohol level three times,” admitted the actor.
The police in Santa Monica confirmed on their website that Šerbedžija was arrested. “The police officers recognized me, and they allowed me to pay the bail and get out of jail,” said Šerbedžija, adding that he did not drink the whiskey in the car, but did drink three glasses of wine before driving.
The actor spent last five months in Los Angeles where he was shooting the series “Strange Angel.” He returned to Croatia several days ago and started working on the 18th season of his Ulysses Theatre. On Friday, he was seen on the Sveta Katarina island near Pula in Istria, where he attended the ballet performance of “Gospoda Glembajevi”.
Rade Šerbedžija was born in Bunić near Korenica in 1946. He graduated in 1969 at the Academy of Theatre, Film and Television in Zagreb, after which he started working for the “Gavella” Theatre in Zagreb. He then worked as a freelance actor, and later for the Croatian National Theatre. He starred in both classical (Shakespeare’s Hamlet and Richard III) and modern roles (Ibsen’s Peer Gynt).
His first major film role was in the movie Gravitation directed by Branko Ivanda in 1968. Later he became one of the most popular and respected actors in the former Yugoslavia.
In 1991, he decided to leave Croatia, spending the next years in Serbia, Slovenia, Great Britain and the United States, working with some of the most famous film directors, actors, and actresses.
After 2000, Šerbedžija started returning to Croatia more often, and he launched the Ulysses Theatre in Pula, whose first play was a performance of King Lear at the Brijuni Islands.
Since 2010, he has lived in Rijeka, where he has launched a new postgraduate acting programme, established by the Senate of the University of Rijeka.
