Jared Leto has opened up about finding out about the pandemic weeks after the rest of the world due to being on a silent retreat as cases soared, admitting that it was like “coming out to the zombie apocalypse.”
Chatting on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon on Monday evening, the Suicide Squad actor explained: “It's a two-week silent meditation. The idea is that you go away, you get rid of your phone and distractions and you just meditate.”
“When I went away there were about 150 cases and in that short amount of time, when I came out, there was a shutdown and a state of emergency and the whole world had changed. But when we were in there, they didn’t tell us.”
Leto said he and other guests remained blissfully unaware of the developments in the outside world because cellphones, televisions and talking were all prohibited at the retreat.
“I didn’t turn on my phone until I went back to LA, so I drove the whole way, you know, trying to be like peaceful and zen, keep the feeling going,” Leto explained. “I got back and I was kind of shocked. It was like Rip Van Winkle.”
Jimmy Fallon suggested it was “like a Twilight Zone episode, but in real life.”
“I had this great tool to deal with ‘stress' and things in life, but I don’t think anything can quite prepare any of us for what we all went through at the beginning,” Leto said.
The coronavirus has now killed more than 420,000 people nationwide.
Watch Jared Leto explain what happened to Jimmy Fallon
