Charlie Sheen Clarifies Comments About Sex With Men: “It Wasn’t Full Fledged”

Charlie Sheen has further addressed his candid revelations about his past sexual experiences with men, clarifying recent comments that sparked headlines following the release of his new Netflix documentary aka Charlie Sheen and memoir The Book of Sheen.

The 59 year old actor, who first rose to fame with roles in Platoon and Wall Street before becoming one of television’s highest paid stars in Two and a Half Men, has been remarkably open about his history of drug use, sexual experimentation and his HIV diagnosis.

Charlie Sheen Clarifies His Comments

Speaking to People last month ahead of his documentary’s release, Sheen admitted that during the height of his crack addiction, he had sexual encounters with men.

“That’s where it was born, or sparked,” he explained. “And in whatever chunks of time that I was off the pipe, trying to navigate that, trying to come to terms with it, ‘Where did that come from?… Why did that happen?’ — and then just finally being like, ‘So what?’ So what? Some of it was weird. A lot of it was fucking fun, and life goes on” he said.

At the time, Sheen said speaking so honestly felt “liberating,” describing how freeing it was to share details of his life without fear or shame.

“I’m not going to run from my past, or let it own me,” he said.

However, in a new interview on In Depth with Graham Bensinger, Sheen moved to clarify that parts of his previous comments had been misinterpreted.

“When people say ‘sex with men,’ you immediately think of, like, butt sex,” he said candidly. “Sorry to be graphic, but that’s kind of where the mind goes, right? But it wasn’t that.”

The actor went on to explain that while he had experimented sexually with men, it wasn’t what he called “full-fledged.”

“I don’t want to be like, ‘Okay, I did this thing, but this and that part of it didn’t happen.’ But it didn’t,” he said.

“I don’t know that that matters, but that’s the only part of it that I’m like, it wasn’t full-fledged, man. They say you experiment in college, you know? I never went to college, so maybe that explains it.”

Sheen added that his clarification wasn’t about shame or regret, but about precision.

“It’s not a shame thing,” he told Bensinger. “It’s just kind of like a, ‘Huh, [sex with men] is a bit of a broad category.’”

The actor’s latest remarks come as part of his effort to reclaim and reframe his story after years of public scrutiny.

Following his highly publicised 2011 departure from Two and a Half Men and his 2015 disclosure that he is HIV positive, Sheen has focused on sobriety and self-reflection.