Christina Applegate has revealed how she overlooked an early symptom of multiple sclerosis (MS) while filming her Netflix series Dead to Me.
Speaking on the latest episode of her MeSsy podcast, which she co-hosts with Jamie-Lynn Sigler, who also has MS, Applegate explained how she fell over while filming a running sequence in a field. She didn’t realize it at the time, but this was an early sign of her MS.
“Hi, first sign of MS!” Applegate said of the fall. “So, not to bring everybody down, but there it was.”
The Emmy-winning actress revealed her MS diagnosis in August of 2021 and has since retired from acting. She and The Sopranos alum Sigler share their health stories on their MeSsy podcast.
Dead to Me creator and executive producer Liz Feldman was a guest on the latest episode of the podcast and recalled times when Applegate would lose her balance on set. At the time, Feldman put this down to long working hours and exhaustion.
“I remember you losing your balance when we were shooting the pilot a couple of times,” Feldman shared. “It was very hard to figure it out because, you know, I remember one time, it was really late at night. We’d been shooting probably 14 or 15 hours… it seemed completely reasonable that anybody would be collapsing.”
“It was MS,” Applegate replied.
“I could just sense A) that she was scared, and B) that something was wrong,” Feldman added. “That something in her body was not working the way that she wanted it to. There’s no handbook for this. I can’t compare it to any experience I’ve ever gone through with a person before.”
The Anchorman star filmed three seasons of Dead to Me, including the final third season following her diagnosis. Feldman explained how she tried to make the process as comfortable as possible for Applegate.
RelatedChristina Applegate Opens Up About MS Battle: ‘I Lay in Bed Screaming’
“I just always tried to put her health first in my mind,” she noted, adding how she often reminded Applegate that Dead to Me was “just a TV show” and that her health and well-being were more important.
“At the end of the day, yeah, maybe it’ll reach people and help people and entertain people, but this is your life,” Feldman remembered telling the Married With… Children alum.
Applegate shared how Feldman and the entire crew of the Netflix series went out of their way to support her amid her MS struggles. This included shutting down filming for a week so that she could go home and recuperate.
“That would not happen anywhere else,” Applegate stated. “So my gratitude towards you guys being humans, because you should be humans and love other humans, is astounding. I can’t even tell you… that’s not the normal reaction.”
Dead to Me, Streaming, Netflix
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