RJ Mitte, 'Breaking Bad' Star and Disability Advocate, Dies at 34

**Updated 04:40 UTC.** Bryan Cranston led the tributes on Monday night. In a long Facebook post he said he was in deep despair as he wrote, and he called Mitte his sweet son on Breaking Bad. He wrote that Mitte, who was born with cerebral palsy, never allowed that challenge to be an excuse for anything, and that he loved him and would miss him. Cranston wrote that Mitte took his own life. He closed the post by urging anyone who is contemplating suicide to call the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, and wrote: There is hope.

Aaron Paul, who played Jesse Pinkman, told The Hollywood Reporter that he was at a loss and heartbroken, and he told readers that they are loved and not alone. Dean Norris, who played Mitte's uncle Hank Schrader, posted on X on Monday evening that he was heartbroken. Norris wrote that he always looked out for Mitte as a young kid on set, called him a sweetheart of a young man and said he would be greatly missed. Mitte's representative Sean Reilly confirmed the death to USA TODAY and described him as a beloved actor, philanthropist and passionate disability rights advocate.

RJ Mitte, the actor who played Walter White Jr. on Breaking Bad, died on Monday in Brownsville, Texas. He was 34.

Cameron County Justice of the Peace Cyndi Hinojosa told USA Today that Mitte was declared dead at 1:32 p.m. local time at his residence in Brownsville. The Associated Press reported that Hinojosa gave no cause of death and that an autopsy will be performed. Brownsville police confirmed the death to local media and said the cause and manner remain under investigation.

His representative, Sean Reilly, confirmed the death in a statement. He called Mitte a beloved actor and a passionate disability rights advocate, and he asked the public to respect the privacy of Mitte's family and close friends.

The role that made him known

Mitte played Walter "Flynn" White Jr., the teenage son of Bryan Cranston's Walter White and Anna Gunn's Skyler White, across all five seasons of Breaking Bad on AMC from 2008 to 2013. The character had cerebral palsy. So did Mitte, who was diagnosed at age three.

That match was the point. Mitte drew on his own life for the role, and the performance put an actor with a disability at the center of one of the most watched dramas on television. The show recently ranked as the best series of the 21st century in a New York Times poll, the AP noted. Mitte shared the Screen Actors Guild ensemble award with the cast in 2014, and in 2013 he received the SAG-AFTRA Harold Russell Award.

A second career in advocacy

Mitte was born on August 21, 1992, in Jackson, Mississippi. He moved to Los Angeles in 2006 and took small roles before Breaking Bad changed his career.

After the series ended, he kept acting. His credits include the ABC Family drama Switched at Birth, the films The Oak Room and The Recall, and Triumph, a coming-of-age drama he also executive produced. He later appeared in the Netflix series The Guardians of Justice.

The advocacy ran alongside the acting, not after it. Mitte served as an ambassador for United Cerebral Palsy and Shriners Children's, worked as a Screen Actors Guild spokesman for actors with disabilities, and served as president of The Mitte Foundation, which supports community projects. The Mitte Cultural District in Brownsville also confirmed his death on Monday and called him a champion of the arts in the city he called home.

Why it matters

Mitte's casting was rare when it happened and it is still rare now. Disabled actors seldom get lead roles, and they seldom play characters whose lives are written with any depth. Mitte spent years making that argument in public, in interviews and on panels, and he used the fame from a hit show to push studios to hire more performers with disabilities.

No cause of death has been released. Officials said the investigation is ongoing, and the autopsy results will decide what can be said next. For now, the confirmed facts are simple and sad: a 34-year-old actor who changed what television audiences expected is gone, and his family has asked for privacy.