Hollywood actor Michael J. Fox is “doing great” after US broadcaster CNN accidentally published his obituary prompting the broadcaster to issue an apology to the screen star and his family.
Michael J. Fox is “doing great” after US broadcaster CNN accidentally published his obituary.
The Back To The Future star was memorialised in an article and video titled Remembering the life of actor Michael J. Fox which the broadcaster published online this week – prompting a surge of rumours suggesting the actor had passed away – but a representative for CNN has now issued an apology and revealed the package was uploaded “in error”.
A spokesperson for Michael has also insisted the actor is alive and well, telling TMZ.com: “Michael is doing great. He was at PaleyFest yesterday. He was on stage and was giving interviews.”
A CNN spokesperson explained: “The package was published in error; we have removed it from our platforms and send our apologies to Michael J. Fox and his family.”
Michael, 64, appeared in public on Tuesday (07.04.26) to attend an event at PaleyFest LA at the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles to celebrate the third season of hit comedy Shrinking in which the actor appears alongside Harrison Ford.
During the event, Harrison, 83, opened up about playing a character with Parkinson’s disease and admitted he didn’t want to downplay the issues facing sufferers, saying: “Even though [the show] is a comedy sometimes, I don’t want to minimise the difficulty of the disease.”
However, his performance won praise from Michael – who was diagnosed with the condition in 1991 when he was just 29 years old.
He said: “I didn’t have to prove to him that I had Parkinson’s. He had to prove to me that he had Parkinson’s – he nailed it.”
It comes after Michael recently opened up about the end of his life revealing he doesn’t “think about his legacy” because it’s “other people’s business”.
He told the Los Angeles Times newspaper: “I’ll be dead. My late father-in-law wrote a book once called Die Broke. The theory being spend all your money now.
“I don’t mean just money. Your gift, your nectar. Spend it all now, and spend it on your kids, on people you love. I don’t think about legacy.”
After being diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, the actor went on to establish his Michael J. Fox Foundation – which is dedicated to finding a cure for the illness and has gone on to fund $2 billion worth of research – and he said he knows that work will “continue” once he’s passed.
He added: “Certainly, the foundation will be around and our work will continue. It’d be nice to have it done before I die, but I don’t know if that will happen. We’re certainly getting closer.
“Legacy is other people’s business; my business is to live my best life, do the best I can, the best work I can, seize opportunities like working with Billy [Bill Lawrence] and Harrison [Ford] and continue to write my story until the pin drops.”
Michael J. Fox ‘doing great’ after obituary blunder
