Jane Lynch is reflecting on the life and death of her former Glee costar Mark Salling following his apparent suicide on Tuesday, January 30.
“It’s been tough. He was a troubled, troubled guy, and he always was,” Lynch, 57, told Us Weekly exclusively at Adopt the Arts’ Annual Rock Gala on Wednesday, January 31. “This is a very sad end to it, but I know that he’s at peace now. He’s in the arms of a beneficent force.”
Lynch and Salling costarred in Fox’s Glee from 2009 to 2015. Shortly after the show ended, Salling was arrested for felony possession of child pornography. He pled guilty just one month before his death and was set to appear in court on March 7.
“I know life was very, very hard for Mark. I think we all do the best we can at the end of the day. I know Mark that did the best he could,” Lynch continued. The Emmy Award winner admitted she didn’t know Salling’s family and really didn’t know him, regardless of working together for six years.
“He was a hard guy to get to know,” she said.
However, she does have a personal memory with Salling she holds close to her heart.
“He took videos of the stages and everything. He was so happy to be coming to work, to be on the show. He wrote a song and videotaped his day being on Glee,” Lynch explained. “Driving into the Paramount lot … at that time he was living on a cot in a little room. It was a big jump for him in his career, and also, he had a job and was in with this group of really great kids. I think he knew that he was breathing rarefied air. There was so much joy and happiness in his musical video that he shot for himself. Fox made him take it down. But it was a sweet, beautiful expression of his joy and being in Glee.”
As Us previously reported, Salling’s estate may not have to pay his victims $50,000 each following the death. “Restitution would be a part of his sentence. The amount of the restitution is determined by the sentencing judge … He will not be sentenced. Therefore there will be no restitution order,” a source explained.
Salling, who was 35 at his time of death, “knew he would have nothing to come back to after he went to prison,” an insider close to the actor told Us.
With reporting by Nicholas White.
If you or someone you know is in emotional distress or suicidal crisis, please call the Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255).
