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The Jackass crew has spent decades subjecting themselves to bodily harm for the amusement of the masses, but it’s been impossible to ignore the physical and emotional toll those stunts have taken on its members. That includes Bam Margera, who has spent years grappling with the fallout of his involvement on the show and the movies it spawned.
The skateboarder-turned-stuntman has fought an incredibly public battle with the substance abuse issues that have resulted in multiple rehab stints, and his struggles ultimately spawned a massive rift with Johnny Knoxville and Co. that led to him being excluded from the filming of Jackass Forever (things got so contentious that director Jeff Tremaine successfully filed for a lengthy restraining order in 2021).
Margera’s co-stars have been left in an incredibly unenviable position, as they’ve spent years trying to get him the help he obviously needs before reaching a point where they needed to distance themselves from their longtime friend. Thankfully, it appears things have started to heal in multiple senses based on the most recent episode of Steve-O’s Wild Ride!
Margera recently appeared on the podcast for the third time around a month after he was placed on a ventilator in the ICU following a scary brush with COVID-19 and pneumonia. He wasted no time diving into the details of that incident, and it sounds like he was in incredibly dire straits based on what he had to say about what transpired during the hospital stay.
Here’s his recollection of what went down:
“I was basically pronounced dead on Elvis’ birthday; December 8th.
I did not know that I had gnarly COVID and my body was shutting down. I went into four seizures, and each one lasting 10 to 20 minutes. And on the fourth one, I bit my tongue so hard it was nearly fallen off. It got so swollen and puffy it wouldn’t fit in my mouth, and I was drinking the infected blood, which gave me pneumonia, as well.
So I woke up five days later thinking I was there for just a couple hours. They were like, ‘Dude, you’ve been here for nearly a week. We tried to take the tube out, but you weren’t breathing on your own.’ I spent eight days in there.”
Margera seemed to be in a pretty good place over the course of an incredibly candid conversation where he also shed some more led on his most recent trip to rehab, the fallout of his feud with other Jackass members, and the difficulties of navigating the conservatorship he revealed has officially been lifted.
He’s undoubtedly still got a long road ahead of him, but it’s great to see him doing much, mich better than he has been over the past few years.