In an interview recorded just days before his death, Breaking Bad actor RJ Mitte made a painful confession: he found it difficult to watch the series that had made him a household name.
Mitte, who was diagnosed with cerebral palsy at age three, said watching himself portray Walter White Jr. alongside Bryan Cranston could trigger a damaging mental “spiral” whenever he noticed a mistake. “I dwell in it,” he admitted.
Even while avoiding the show, however, Mitte acknowledged that he was still measured against one of television’s most acclaimed dramas. “I want to top Breaking Bad,” he said during the final interview, conducted on October 5.
“That’s the hardest… I set a bar for myself as a young man that is kind of unobtainable. And I tell people, it’s a long way down from the top of the mountain.”
Five days later, Mitte died by suicide at the age of 34 in Brownsville, Texas.
Friends and people close to the actor are now describing the extent of the emotional and financial strain they say he had been facing.
A Daily Mail source claimed Mitte’s financial difficulties had complicated his wedding plans with fiancée Kennedy Suarez; Mitte and Suarez are pictured together in June 2025.
Sources said Mitte feared he would never match the success he achieved as a teenager and had become increasingly anxious about his future, including how he would support himself.
“RJ couldn’t continue his struggle any longer,” said one insider described as being close to the actor.
“It took its toll on him mentally. There was almost always a dark cloud hanging over him.”
The source added that members of Mitte’s inner circle had long been concerned about his wellbeing. “It was hanging over him 24/7,” they said.
Another source said Mitte’s financial problems had also affected plans to marry his fiancée, Kennedy Suarez.
“RJ was nearly broke, he had severe financial problems and was struggling to afford a nice wedding to his fiancée, and that broke his heart,” the source claimed.
His financial difficulties reportedly began during his teenage years. At about 17 or 18, after spending three years working on Breaking Bad, Mitte hired a business manager to oversee his income and tax affairs.
Mitte joined the series at 14, when it premiered in 2007, and initially earned the Screen Actors Guild minimum for the pilot. As the show became a global hit, cast salaries rose. Mitte later estimated that he earned between $3 million and $5 million from the series.
According to the account, however, his manager allegedly failed to pay the Internal Revenue Service and instead provided Mitte with forged tax documents.
The actor was later presented with a substantial IRS bill, which reportedly consumed his earnings and left him with debt that took almost 10 years to repay.
“It really ruined him,” the insider said.
Working on Breaking Bad had once provided Mitte with an escape from those pressures, sources said, particularly when he was filming alongside Cranston.
“When he was working with Cranston in particular, it gave him a big lift. You could see it in his face. His spirit was strong,” the insider said. Mitte is pictured with Bryan Cranston and Anna Gunn in Breaking Bad.
‘He became more and more bitter about the industry. He’s been in a very dark place for a long time,’ said our first source (pictured with Cranston in 2012)
‘When he was working with Cranston in particular, it gave him a big lift. You could see it in his face. His spirit was strong,’ said our insider.
But when the series ended in 2013, he had nowhere to escape to and for Mitte, the industry quickly became a source of frustration and angst.
‘As soon as he finished his final episode, his downward spiral started,’ the insider said. ‘He kept saying he’d never get another role anywhere near as good.’
Indeed, in a text dated April 7, 2017, obtained by the Daily Mail, Mitte described uncomfortable encounters with casting directors.
‘When I go for a part, they sometimes tell me that it’s not a character with a disability, and I’m like why can’t the character be disabled?’ he wrote. ‘They get real uncomfortable when I say that.’
Mitte believed casting an actor with a disability could add depth to a character without requiring the entire storyline to revolve around his disability.
‘He hated auditioning and being judged,’ said the insider close to Mitte. ‘Although he was a big talent, he always felt his disability got in the way. He often thought he was getting auditions out of sympathy.’
After Breaking Bad, Mitte found himself fighting for roles in smaller productions.
Parts such as his appearance on Switched at Birth or his voice and live-action work in The Guardians of Justice gave him steady, respected acting jobs – but they aired on niche or smaller platforms compared to AMC’s prime-time juggernaut.
Much of his highest-profile work after the show was outside traditional acting entirely – serving as an ambassador for United Cerebral Palsy and pushing for better representation of disabled actors in Hollywood.
‘I can do any role, but some of [the casting agents and directors] are a******* who won’t even look at me,’ he wrote in another message in April 2017. ‘I want to put them on blast, but I won’t now.’
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As recently as July 2025, Mitte was considering a return to the spotlight via reality television, telling a friend he had softened to the idea of appearing on a show like Dancing with the Stars to challenge assumptions about what performers with cerebral palsy could do.
‘RJ was angry he could not make enough money in acting,’ said another insider, adding: ‘This kid had so many struggles. He got a bad break in life’
‘RJ was nearly broke, he had severe financial problems and was struggling to afford to pay for a nice wedding to his fiancée, and that broke his heart,’ said the Daily Mail source
‘Although he and his fiancée Kennedy were in the middle of planning their wedding, he thought she deserved someone better. He didn’t think he was good enough,’ the source said (pictured with Kennedy Suarez in October 2025)
Our source said: ‘He became more and more bitter about the industry. He’s been in a very dark place for a long time.’
Friends say part of that bitterness stemmed from money – and his belief that acting had never paid him what he believed a lifelong career should have.
‘RJ was angry he could not make enough money in acting,’ said our second insider.
‘He had started at a young age and acted his whole life, so he didn’t understand why the roles were not better. RJ wanted to be a big star. He wanted a nice house, but he never got it. He had to live modestly.’
The source believes Mitte may have earned far more had he pursued modeling.
‘He probably would have had way more money if he had just modeled,’ they said. ‘He made good money modeling for Gap and Vivienne Westwood, and he had the handsome face for it, but he wanted to act.’
Even a bright spot in his life, his relationship with fiancée Suarez, whom he proposed to in 2025, could not fully lift the cloud.
Suarez works in human resources remotely and would frequently travel with Mitte to work with him on different endeavors in his career.
He proposed in October 2025, not long after her 30th birthday.
‘Happy birthday to my everything, you are so amazing,’ he said. ‘I can’t believe all the things we do together, you make me better and want to be better!!!’
Yet according to our first insider, the mental struggle and feelings of inadequacy soon began to take over.
‘Although he and his fiancée Kennedy were in the middle of planning their wedding, he thought she deserved someone better. He didn’t think he was good enough.
‘He’d been in and out of therapy for years. Sadly, all the treatment didn’t help in the end.’
Our other source added: ‘This kid had so many struggles. He got a bad break in life.’
Despite his private turmoil, Mitte managed to put on a brave face in his final days.
Mitt was seemingly high spirits at his final red carpet appearance – the premiere of his movie Talking to Strangers on September 30
At his final red-carpet appearance – the premiere of his movie Talking to Strangers at Beverly Hills’ Fine Arts Theatre on September 30 – he flashed a Hollywood smile for the cameras.
Eight days before his death, he made his final public appearance alongside Breaking Bad co-star Luis Moncada, 49, at a hot air balloon festival in New Mexico.
To those watching, he seemed to be coping. But those closest to him say the struggle had never truly gone away.
In an emotional interview with TMZ on Tuesday, Moncada described his final moments with Mitte and acknowledged that he had been ‘struggling’ and ‘pulled in all kinds of directions’, though he declined to elaborate out of respect for his friend.
News of his death has left his inner circle reeling – none more so than his former on-screen father.
Cranston, 70, said he is ‘in deep despair’ after Mitte’s passing, sharing a heartbreaking Instagram tribute: ‘I’ll miss you, son.’
The actor said it was ‘especially devastating’ that Mitte ‘took his own life’, revealing that the pair had recently been texting and making plans to meet for lunch.
‘I don’t know if that lunch would have changed his future,’ Cranston lamented.
For those who loved him, the question lingers: Was there more that could have been done – or was the battle simply one he could no longer fight?
‘He’s at peace now, if that’s any consolation for Kennedy and all those who loved him,’ said the insider.
The Daily Mail has contacted representatives for Mitte for comment.