Christina Applegate’s Surprising Take On MS Diagnosis: “I’m Pissed”
"Acceptance? No," says the acclaimed actress on her recent health diagnosis.
Christina Applegate isn’t letting her multiple sclerosis diagnosis stop her from finishing what she started. After delaying production twice — due to COVID-19 and once more so Applegate could undergo treatment — the third and final season of Dead to Me is upon us.
Applegate, who plays the show’s lead, Jen, knows fans are eager to settle in and watch the chaos between her character and Judy (Linda Cardellini) unfold. However, she also knows a lot of eyes will be taking note of the change in her appearance and mobility as well.
In a new interview with the New York Times, the actress shared this will be “the first time anyone’s going to see me the way I am,” and she’s well aware some fans may not be able to look at her character—or even her—the same way.
“I put on 40 pounds; I can’t walk without a cane. I want people to know that I am very aware of all of that,” Applegate said.
The star first announced her MS diagnosis in August 2021, just months after production was scheduled to resume for a second time.
“If people hate it, if people love it, if all they can concentrate on is, ‘Ooh, look at the cripple,’ that’s not up to me,” Applegate said. “I’m sure that people are going to be, like, ‘I can’t get past it.'”
“Fine, don’t get past it, then. But hopefully, people can get past it and just enjoy the ride and say goodbye to these two girls,” she quipped.
While Applegate is grateful she had time to “process my loss of my life” and “my loss of that part of me,” that doesn’t mean things are all kumbaya.
“It’s not like I came on the other side of it, like, ‘Woohoo, I’m totally fine,'” she told the outlet. “Acceptance? No. I’m never going to accept this. I’m pissed.”
But nothing, not even a chronic illness, is going to stop Applegate from getting back to set.
“Nothing is going to keep her down and she is going to battle and fight through anything and I admire her as a person,” James Marsden told Entertainment Tonight of his co-star.
“Just as a compassionate, wonderful human being who is fun to work with but is also, in addition to that, anything that life will throw at her, she will figure out a way to not let it keep her down. And she is doing exactly that,” he added.
Set a reminder! Dead to Me season three hits Netflix on Nov. 17.
