Marlee Matlin Reveals a Darker Side

April 14, 2009 — -- It hasn't been an easy road to success, but Oscar-winning actress Marlee Matlin said she hopes sharing the bumps she had along the way -- including drug use and an abusive relationship -- will help others realize happiness is possible.

At just 18 months old, Matlin lost her hearing due to a bout with the roseola virus. Without hearing aids, she says she is absolutely deaf.

But that didn't stop her from netting a role at age 19 in "Children of a Lesser God" that earned her a Golden Globe and Academy Award for best actress.

While filming the movie, Matlin and her co-star, William Hurt, fell in love. In her just released, and very candid, autobiography, "I'll Scream Later," Matlin writes about her passionate and tumultuous two-year relationship with Hurt as well as her romances with other Hollywood stars.

But beneath the dazzling facade there were dark clouds. Her long relationship with Hurt was tempestuous and she says sometimes violent.

In a statement released by his publicist Tuesday, Hurt responded to Matlin's allegations that their relationship was abusive, saying "My own recollection is that we both apologized and both did a great deal to heal our lives. Of course, I did and do apologize for any pain I caused. And I know we have both grown. I wish Marlee and her family nothing but good."

Even as she was winning accolades for "Children of a Lesser God," Matlin said she was preparing to check herself into rehab to battle her drug addiction that began when she was 13.

In fact, the name of her book "I'll Scream Later" was inspired by her inability to react to her Oscar nod because she was in rehab.

Now happily married with four children, her demons seem long gone. But it was a certain dancing show that inspired her to write about her troubled past.