Actor Michael J Fox has raised more than £1.5 billion to fund pioneering research into Parkinson’s disease.
The 62-year-old, who shot to fame in his youth in the Back to the Future trilogy of movies, was diagnosed with the condition in 1991.
© Ron Adar / Shutterstock.com
He founded the Michael J Fox Foundation in 2000 to raise funds to seek a cure for Parkinson’s, which affects an estimated 153,000 people in the UK. Subsequently, his foundation has led groundbreaking research to recognise the onset of Parkinson’s long before the first symptoms occur.
Fox aims to continue seeking potential cures for the disease, while staying positive himself, even in his darkest moments.
What’s Parkinson’s disease?
A progressive neurodegenerative disorder that causes parts of the brain to become damaged over time, Parkinson’s disease affects ten million people globally. It primarily affects the neurons that produce dopamine, a neurotransmitter used by the nervous system to send messages to the body’s nerve cells.
Physical symptoms include the most common: involuntary shaking of the body, known as a tremor. People with Parkinson’s will also have inflexible and stiff muscles, slow movement, poor balance and a lack of coordination.
There can also be other effects of Parkinson’s as the disease progresses including losing your sense of smell, sleeping problems, loss of balance, poor memory and psychological symptoms such as anxiety and depression.
Parkinson’s diagnosis
For Michael J Fox, Parkinson’s disease has led to a complete change of lifestyle since he was diagnosed more than three decades ago.
Born in June 1961, he was a young actor at the peak of his success when he was diagnosed with the condition at the age of 29.
The Canadian-born star had earned fame in a series of hit TV shows and movies, making his TV debut in Canadian sitcom Leo and Me at 16.
Moving to Los Angeles at 18 to develop his fledgling acting career, he met his future wife Tracy Pollan in 1985, when they played a married couple in the sitcom Family Ties, from 1982 to 1989. They married on 16th July 1988 and had their first child, Sam, in May 1989, when Fox’s career had reached an all-time high.
His life changed forever when shooting the US romantic comedy movie, Doc Hollywood, in early 1991. He first noticed his little finger was twitching in 1989. This continued over time, and he also realised he had a continually sore shoulder.
While the initial symptoms were minor, he sought medical advice and was diagnosed with Parkinson’s in 1991. He was devastated to be told he would no longer be able to work within a few years.
Living with Parkinson’s
Doctors don’t fully understand why Parkinson’s occurs, although studies suggest it may be a combination of environmental and genetic factors.
Fox is one of four cast and crew members of Leo and Me, filmed in Vancouver, to have been diagnosed with Parkinson’s. However, he says this hasn’t been well-researched, as there aren’t enough cases to be considered a “cluster”.
In an interview in 2020, he admitted “you can drive yourself crazy” trying to work out why you have the disease. He has thought of every possibility, such as going fishing in his youth in a river near industrial premises and eating the fish he caught. He also said he had spent time on a lot of farms. He believed he was exposed to an unknown chemical when he was younger, explaining, “Genetics loads the gun and environment pulls the trigger.”
Deciding not to go public with his diagnosis, Fox carried on acting, starring in movies The American President, For Love or Money and Frighteners. He was working as hard as ever on film sets overseas and was reportedly drinking too much to mask his anguish.
An interview with Fox earlier this year reported that Tracy told him things would have to change, because she wouldn’t raise children with a heavy drinker.
He was starring in the US sitcom Spin City from 1996 to 2001. However, outward signs of his condition were already appearing, according to the 2023 Emmy Award-winning documentary, Still: A Michael J Fox Movie, directed by Davis Guggenheim.
At one point during filming, his left hand twisted behind his back as he tried to hide the fact he couldn’t control the contortion, reportedly because he was scared people would no longer find him funny if they knew he had Parkinson’s.
Guggenheim said Fox’s initial response was to “do all the wrong things” such as “running away”. However, the actor finally told the public about his condition in November 1998.
He decided to do something positive to help other people with Parkinson’s, launching his foundation in 2000. Boxing icon Muhammad Ali, the three-times world heavyweight champion who was also diagnosed with Parkinson’s, reached out to Fox in the same year.
The actor later told ABC News that when he learned Ali had called, it took a long time to muster up the courage to ring him back. Eventually, he had to do so from the privacy of the bathroom to focus properly.
Ali wanted to team up to raise awareness of Parkinson’s to help others. Ali told the actor, “With you in this fight, we can win,” which reduced Fox to tears. A few months down the line, they met in person and campaigned to raise awareness, cementing a lifelong friendship until Ali’s death in 2016.
Michael J Fox Foundation
Today, Fox remains philosophical and positive about the way his life has turned out. In an interview earlier this year, he told reporters “Excess reflection” on why he had developed Parkinson’s was “pointless”, adding, “It is what it is.”
It hasn’t defeated him, but he doesn’t see this as a “heroic thing”. He says it can be “tough to get up in the morning” but he’s thankful for his beautiful family and for what he has achieved so far. He feels proud when fans tell him how much they love his acting work, especially when they say, “Thank you for my childhood.”
In 2023, scientists funded by the foundation made a groundbreaking discovery when they found a protein in spinal fluid that can assist in detecting Parkinson’s earlier. Fox says although it’s “not a cure”, he feels the research is “on the right path”, putting the spotlight on the factors scientists must focus on in the future.
As soon as he made his diagnosis public, it became his lifelong mission to find a cure to help others and according to the acting legend, being able to fund the groundbreaking research into Parkinson’s support is “by far the most exciting thing” he has ever done.
