Actor Michael Madsen got sober in the months preceding his death last week.

The 67-year-old star of Quentin Tarantino classics including “Kill Bill: Volume 2” and “Reservoir Dogs” had worked to pull himself together before dying from an apparent cardiac arrest in Malibu, California, Thursday, according to TMZ.

It’s not clear if Madsen was using drugs or alcohol when he died, though he’d reportedly made strides in his ongoing battle with substance abuse. TMZ said the Chicago native spent years in rehabilitation programs meant to help him win his battle with booze. Madsen also helped mentor addicts trying to conquer their demons in a Malibu recovery facility.

A friend of the performer, who appeared in more than 300 film and TV productions during a career spanning more than forty years, told TMZ that Madsen was in good health a week before his death.

Madsen effectively played troubled, hard-living characters at odds with the law on the big screen. He sometimes found himself in similar roles in real life.

That included an August arrest for domestic battery, according to Variety. He also pleaded no contest to a 2019 misdemeanor DUI charge in Los Angeles County after he crashed his SUV into a pole in Malibu, the county’s District Attorney said. It was his second such offense in less than a decade.

Madsen told RogerEbert.com in 2012 he once hoped to drive fast cars for a living.

“A long time ago, what I really wanted to do was drive in Nascar,” he said.

Madsen added that acting in a race car film was also on his bucket list, but as time passed, he realized the opportunity to do so was passing too. In 2019, he teamed up with John Travolta and singer Shania Twain in the racing flick “Trading Paint.”

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