Jaime Bennington & Austin Gold | Director & Lead Actor in The New Film “A Chant”, Which Shines A Light On Mental Health, Anxiety and Depression Knockin‘ Doorz Down

Jaime Bennington is the son of Chester Bennington, the lead singer from Linkin Park that lost his life in 2017. His parents were actually never married, they were high school sweethearts. Jaime didn’t even meet his dad until 8 years old. His dad was on the road with Linkin Park, and there was a major disconnection there in his early upbringing.
Many members of Jaime’s family were addicted in many ways. He dealt with family members that abused meth, alcohol, and other hard drugs. He saw how it was affecting his family, and wanted to make sure he never went down that path. Jaime wasn’t upset at his father for committing suicide specifically, but rather he was more upset at how his father treated their family while he was here. This led to his own further understanding of his traumas. In combination with this, he was experiencing backlash from Linkin Park fans that were pulling him in different directions.
As he got older, he learned that he was non-diagnosed with personality disorder, and this was a result of childhood traumas. He realized that addiction was genetic in his family, and he tried to purposely avoid them. When he would smoke marijuana, his anxiety would increase tenfold. It would get to the point of actual seizures, which he initially thought was from the marijuana, but it turns out in his case, the seizures were psychologically induced. This led to more panic attacks, as he became aware of them.
This is when Jaime started to explore his mental issues as well as his anxiety problems. When he turned 24, he learned he had depression & anxiety, as a result of repressed childhood traumas that were never properly dealt with. Even now in his adult life, he has problems controlling the volume of his voice when talking with others, his intensity is through the roof. In his own words, he’s self-described as “An 11 and then a 0, there’s no in-between”.
With his new movie “A Chant” he didn’t want to exploit or fetishize mental illness. His goal was to portray it as it really is, with all of its ugliness and truth. Jaime met his lead actor Austin Gold in 2018 and immediately had a great connection. Austin appreciated Jaime’s candor and way of not holding anything back, with no filter. This led to a mutual understanding and shared enthusiasm for the subject of mental health with this film.
Jaime wants to carve out his own path in life & not live in the shadow of his father’s legacy. He wants to help other kids that are going through the same things he was, and this film was a way of communicating that goal. He wants people to know that what he’s going through is not unique, whether he had a famous father or not. He hopes his newfound vulnerability and openness will lead to more conversations to remove the stigmas of mental health.
This is Jamie Bennington with Austin Gold in their own words on Knockin’ Doorz Down.
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https://www.instagram.com/augoldy/

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