he drank because becoming famous overwhelmed him. His difficulties with alcohol were part of a deeper and longer personal pattern. Success may have provided an environment in which drinking was readily available, but McCarthy does not describe celebrity as the single cause. In later interviews, he looked back on the experience as something he eventually became unable to manage. By the early 1990s, he could no longer convincingly deny that he needed help.
His career continued developing while these private difficulties were intensifying. In 1987, McCarthy starred opposite Kim Cattrall
