More than five years later, Christina Applegate is recalling how her struggle with multiple sclerosis (MS) began.
The 4x Golden Globe nominee unknowingly experienced one of her first symptoms of MS while filming the pilot for her Netflix dark comedy-drama Dead to Me, which ran for three seasons on the streamer from 2019 to 2022.
“I remember falling that day. Hi, first sign of MS!” she said to the show’s creator Liz Feldman on Applegate and Jamie-Lynn Sigler’s MeSsy podcast, recounting a scene that featured her character Jen running across a field.
Feldman noted, “I remember you losing your balance a couple of times but it was very hard to figure out. I remember one time it was like really late at night, we’d been shooting probably 14 or 15 hours, it seemed completely reasonable that anybody would be collapsing.”
Applegate announced her MS diagnosis in 2021 after she was diagnosed while filming the third and final season of the 6x Emmy-nominated series.
Linda Cardellini and Christina Applegate in Dead to Me (2021). (Saeed Adyani/Netflix)
“There’s no handbook for this,” said Feldman of Applegate’s condition. “I could just sense that A, she was scared and B, that something was wrong, something in her body was not working the way that she wanted it to. I told her so many times that it’s just a TV show; we’re making a TV show and it’s so silly, you know, at the end of the day!
“I knew Christina well enough to know that something major had to be going on because she’s an extreme professional,” she added.
Applegate praised Feldman and the show’s crew for adapting the production for her comfort as her mobility declined in the final season.
“That would not happen anywhere else,” said the actress. “So my gratitude toward you guys being humans – because you should be humans and love other humans – I can’t even tell you, that’s not the normal reaction!”
Liz Feldman, Christina Applegate and Linda Cardellini attend the unveiling of Applegate’s Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame on Nov. 4, 2022. (Priscilla Grant/Everett Collection)
In 2022, Applegate said she felt she “had an obligation” to finish making the show for Feldman and co-star Linda Cardellini, after taking about five months to adapt to her diagnosis.
“The powers that be were like, ‘Let’s just stop. We don’t need to finish it. Let’s put a few episodes together,’” recalled Applegate to The New York Times. “I said, ‘No. We’re going to do it, but we’re going to do it on my terms.’”
Although Applegate has since stated that she is “probably not going to work on-camera again,” she told Vanity Fair she remains open to voiceover work.