Sam Neill has opened up about his 2022 cancer diagnosis, saying he “didn’t know how long he had to live” at the time.
In March last year, the actor revealed that he was receiving treatment for stage three blood cancer, and that he was now in remission.
He was diagnosed with angioimmunoblastic T-cell lymphoma and underwent chemotherapy, but when that began to fail, he started on a new chemotherapy drug and is now cancer-free. The actor will stay on the monthly drug for the rest of his life.
He received the diagnosis in March 2022 after noticing lumpy glands in his neck during the publicity tour for Jurassic World Dominion, and it prompted him to write his memoir, Did I Ever Tell You This?, which he credited with giving him a “reason to live”.
“I thought I need to do something, and I thought, ‘Shall I start writing?’” he said about the memoir. “I didn’t think I had a book in me, I just thought I’d write some stories. And I found it increasingly engrossing.”
Now, in a new interview with The Guardian, he has said that the writing of the memoir was a result of him being faced with his own mortality. “The truth was, I didn’t know how long I had to live,” he said. “What I had was aggressive. I thought I’d better scribble down some stuff before I shuffle.”
He describes being “stuck in Sydney, getting chemo” and having “nothing else to do”. “The idea of having nothing to do was unbearable,” he said.
Last October, he gave an update on his condition, saying it is likely his treatment would eventually stop working.
“I’m prepared for that,” he said, adding that he is not “remotely afraid” but finds the situation “annoying”. The 76-year-old also described the idea of retirement “completely out of the question”.
The actor is currently starring in the second season of Australian drama series The Twelve, and was the lead in the miniseries Apples Never Fall alongside Annette Bening earlier in the year.
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