Johnny Knoxville Suffered Brain Damage Following Brutal 'Jackass Forever' Stunt

Next month will finally see the launch of Jackass Forever. The long-awaited fourth instalment in the hugely popular franchise arrives in cinemas February 4, which is something of a miracle given the frankly ludicrous amount of setbacks its hit on the road to release.

It's unclear what the future might hold for the Jackass crew going forward. But for Johnny Knoxville, Jackass Forever may well be his last dalliance with extreme stunts after a brutal encounter on the latest movie left him with brain damage.

Speaking on The Howard Stern Show, Knoxville revealed that a stunt with a bull in Jackass Forever left him seriously wounded. A broken wrist and several broken ribs were just the tip of the iceberg, as he also suffered a brain hemorrhage as the result of a nasty concussion.

“My cognitive abilities were in steep decline after that hit,” Knoxville explained. “The bull hit was the worst hit I’ve ever taken from a bull or maybe period. I remember taking some tests. The neurosurgeon said, ‘Do you have trouble paying attention right now?’ I said, ‘Yeah, why?’ He goes, ‘Because you scored a 17 on [your attention].’ That’s out of 100.

“I had to go under all these type of treatments. This transcranial magnetic stimulation, which they buzz your head with these magnets for about 30 minutes at a time for like, oh God, I would say 10 to 12 treatments over a series of two months, and it’s supposed to help with depression and help with my cognitive skills. It was a tough one to come back from. I was trying to edit the movie at the time, but I couldn’t sit still.”

Knoxville added that this particular injury had a serious impact on his emotional and mental wellbeing, which he explained is not something he was used to experiencing.

“I did slip into a little bit of a depression with this last concussion," he revealed. “That hasn’t happened before. My brain was just playing tricks on me. I got really depressed and over-focused on things. I did have to start medication for the first time in my life. It completely turned me around — that and doing therapy. It was a really hard recovery from this last injury, but I’m great now. I feel like I’m the healthiest I’ve ever been.”

Maybe surviving a head-on encounter with a raging bull is a good place to end your stunt career, to be fair.

Topics: TV And Film