I mentioned this in yesterday’s post about Channing Tatum covering the new issue of Vanity Fair. Thankfully, VF released their exclusive interview with John Galliano shortly after they released the Tatum stuff. While I love Channing, this Galliano interview is actually NEWS, you know? We haven’t heard from Galliano since 2011, when he went off on some drunken tirade in Paris, saying that he hates Jews, he loves Hitler and even more shenanigans. Something about Asians too. He was charged with two hate crimes and he was found guilty. He’s currently on probation. Shortly after Galliano was revealed to be something of a bigoted d-bag, he was fired from Christian Dior. He was also abandoned by many of his high-profile friends. But not Kate Moss, who asked him to personally design her wedding gown, which he did and it was actually a really beautiful gown. But other than that, Galliano has been keeping his head down. His hate speech incident was more than two years ago – so what does he have to say for himself these days? Some highlights from VF:

Fashion designer John Galliano, in his first-ever sober interview, tells Vanity Fair contributing editor Ingrid Sischy that, in spite of his words, he is not an anti-Semite or a racist. “It’s the worst thing I have said in my life, but I didn’t mean it. . . . I have been trying to find out why that anger was directed at this race. I now realize I was so f–king angry and so discontent with myself that I just said the most spiteful thing I could.”

Galliano tells Sischy that he has been sober for over two years now and that theirs is the first interview he has ever given sober. Of his drinking and drug use in the years leading up to the outburst, Galliano says, “I was going to end up in a mental asylum or six feet under.”

Sischy reports that Galliano has spent the last couple of years learning about what he has to do to keep his illness at bay, facing up to what went wrong in his life, and taking certain steps to atone, including reading books on the Holocaust and Jewish history, meeting with Jewish leaders, and reaching out to members of the larger fashion community, including retailers, as part of the process of making amends and possibly returning to work.

Reflecting on his last two years of sobriety and struggles to come to terms with his words and actions, Galliano says that he knows “it sounds a bit bizarre, but I am so grateful for what did happen. I have learned so much about myself. I have re-discovered that little boy who had the hunger to create, which I think I had lost. I am alive.”

Galliano describes how he slipped into addiction slowly over the course of time, while continuing to work at a high level. “I never drank in order to be creative, or to do the research,” he tells Sischy. “I didn’t need alcohol for any of that. At first alcohol was like a crutch outside of Dior. Then I would use it to crash after the collections. I’d take a couple of days to get over it, like everyone. But with more collections, the crash happened more often, and then I was a slave to it. Then the pills kicked in because I couldn’t sleep. Then the other pills kicked in because I couldn’t stop shaking. I would also have these huge bottles of liquor that people got for me. Towards the end, it was whatever I could get my hands on. Vodka, or vodka-and-tonic. Wine, in the belief it would help me sleep. Wrong. I did manage to stop the voices. I had all these voices in my head, asking so many questions, but I never for one second would admit I was an alcoholic. I thought I could control it.”

“What had started as self-expression turned into a mask,” Galliano says. “I lived in a bubble. I would be backstage and there would be a queue of five people to help me. One person would have a cigarette for me. The next person would have the lighter. I did not know how to use the A.T.M.”

Galliano tells Sischy he was aware on some level that he had a problem, especially as he began to lose days to bouts of drinking. “Not having washed, I’d be covered in sores and humiliated,” he says. “I had the tremors. I wouldn’t sleep for five days. I would go to bookstores and get some self-help books, but I was in denial. I’d throw myself back into the gym. I’d be careful about what I ate. And, of course, the whole cycle would start again.”

All told there were three separate accusations of Galliano’s having made anti-Semitic tirades. Galliano reiterates that he does not remember the events of the night in 2010 when his remarks were videotaped, explaining, “When everyone came over to tell me that I had done these terrible things, I was walking round and round and round not really knowing what had gone down. My assistant told me about the video. When I saw it, I threw up. The feeling was like I was about to take a step out onto the street and a bus or truck whooshed past me and the blood was drained from my legs. I was paralyzed from the fear.”

Galliano tells Sischy about his admission to an Arizona rehab facility on March 1, 2011. Here staff confiscated pretty much everything he brought, including the Keith Richards memoir, Life. Linda Evangelista was the sole friend to make the trek for Galliano’s first visitors weekend. “I just didn’t want that weekend to go by without anyone reaching out to him,” she tells Sischy.

A few weeks into Galliano’s recovery, Kate Moss contacted him and asked him to design her wedding dress, something they had discussed when he was still at Dior. Galliano tells Sischy he felt it was a gift: “Creating Kate’s wedding dress saved me personally because it was my creative rehab. She dared me to be me again.” Moss describes the gown as “absolutely gorgeous, a diaphanous 1920s-type dress, romantic, with gold sequins in the shape of the phoenix—as if he was saying he would rise from this.” She tells Sischy that “when my dad gave his speech he thanked everyone and then he referred to the genius of Galliano, who made his daughter’s dress. Everyone stood up and gave John a standing ovation. It was the most moving thing, because suddenly John realized he wasn’t on his own.”

[From Vanity Fair]

VF also reports that Galliano’s then-bosses at LVMH confronted him a few times before the “I love Hitler” incident and that Galliano was a total dick to them then, and he was obviously in denial about his problems. It makes me think that there was some sort of latent “payback” involved – everyone loved the creative genius of Galliano, but Galliano’s handlers had already grown weary of his shenanigans months before the “I love Hitler” tirade. Which explains why Galliano was fired so quickly – they had already reached a point where his handlers realized he had become unmanageable.

As for Galliano’s apology/explanation and the work that he’s done to make it right… I don’t know. I like the fact that he went away, they he took time away from the spotlight, that he hasn’t given any interviews in two years. That makes me think he IS taking his sobriety and his public apology seriously. But I do think he’s very consciously trying to make all of the “right” and “appropriate” moves to get his career back. And God knows, he probably will have a comeback.

Photos courtesy of WENN.