Sad News About Michael J. Fox

Don’t make me the story,” Michael J. Fox insists, both gentle and firm. “The story is the power of optimism. It’s a choice. Acceptance doesn’t mean giving up; it means looking at the truth and asking: ‘What does this truth require of me?’” After more than three decades of living with Parkinson’s disease, the 62-year-old actor still frames his life around that philosophy: facing pain without letting it define him.

From Teen Heartthrob to Cultural Icon

Born in Canada, Fox quit school early and moved to Los Angeles, eventually landing the role of Alex P. Keaton on the hit sitcom

Family Ties. His career exploded with Back to the Future, making him an international sensation. By the summer of 1985, Fox had the No. 1 movie (

Back to the Future

Fox fell into drinking until Pollan confronted him about raising children with an alcoholic. He sobered up, built a career around

Spin City, and in 1998 went public with his diagnosis. Two years later, he founded the Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research, which has since poured billions into medical science.

No Glossing Over: Honesty and Humor

In the documentary Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie, Fox allowed cameras to capture his tremors, falls, and even flashes of humor in the middle of hardship. There was no sugarcoating, but no self-pity either. “Do I feel sad seeing myself young and athletic? No. Do I sometimes change the channel? Yes,” he says.

He admired Muhammad Ali, who shared the same illness, for carrying public attention lightly. Ali could rewatch old fights with pride, and Fox does the same with his acting. “People sometimes come up and say: ‘Thanks for my childhood.’ I can’t take credit for their childhood, but I understand the connection.”

Fox also laughs at himself. On Curb Your Enthusiasm, he played a fictionalized version of himself—sometimes exaggerating symptoms to irritate Larry David. For Fox, self-deprecation is a way to resist being boxed into pity.