Michael J. Fox

 

 

Michael Andrew Fox was born in 1961 to parents William and Phyllis in Edmonton, the capital of the Canadian province of Alberta. (He later adopted the "J" as an homage to legendary character actor Michael J. Pollard.) Like most Canadian kids, Fox loved hockey and dreamed of a career in the National Hockey League. In his teens, his interests expanded. He began experimenting with creative writing and art and played guitar in a succession of rock-and-roll garage bands before ultimately realizing his affinity for acting.

When he was 18, he moved to Los Angeles. He had a series of bit parts before winning the role of lovable conservative Alex P. Keaton on NBC's enormously popular Family Ties (1982-89). During Fox's seven years on Ties, he earned three Emmy Awards and a Golden Globe, making him one of the country's most prominent young actors.

Fox returned to series television in 1996 with ABC's Spin City, portraying Michael Flaherty, New York's deputy mayor. He won critical praise, garnering three Golden Globe Awards, one Emmy Award, three Emmy nominations, a GQ Man-of-the-Year Award (in the TV comedy category), a People's Choice Award, and two SAG Awards. A multi-talented actor Fox has appeared in over a dozen features showcasing his keen ability to shift between comedy and drama. These include the Back to the Future trilogy, The Hard Way, Doc Hollywood, The Secret of My Success, Bright Lights, Big City, Light of Day, Teen Wolf, Casualties of War, Life With Mikey, For Love or Money, The American President, Greedy, The Frighteners, and Mars Attacks!

Fox married his Family Ties co-star, actress Tracy Pollan, in 1988. Together they have four children. Inspired to find projects that his kids would enjoy, Fox has lent his voice to a variety of hit children's films since the early 1990s. He began as Chance the dog in Disney's Homeward Bound movies. In December 1999, he provided the voice of Stuart Little for the Sony feature of the same name, and in the summer of 2001 Fox's voice was heard as that of the lead in Atlantis The Lost Empire, his first animated feature for The Walt Disney Co.

Though he would not share the news with the public for another seven years, Fox was diagnosed with young-onset Parkinson's disease in 1991. Upon disclosing his condition in 1998, he committed himself to the campaign for increased Parkinson's research. Fox announced his retirement from Spin City in January 2000, effective upon the completion of his fourth season and 100th episode. Expressing pride in the show, its talented cast, writers, and creative team, he explained that new priorities made this the right time to step away from the demands of a weekly series. Though he maintains a strong commitment to his acting career and running Lottery Hill Entertainment, Fox has shifted a good deal of his focus and energies toward The Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson's Research, which he launched in May 2000, and its efforts to raise much-needed research funding for and awareness about Parkinson's disease. Fox wholeheartedly believes that if there is a concentrated effort from the Parkinson's community, elected representatives in Washington, DC, and (most importantly) the general public, researchers can pinpoint the cause of Parkinson's and uncover a cure by 2010.

 

 

Pageonelit.com: What was the impetus for writing a book—was there one event that made you want to? Had you been thinking of doing a book for some time?

Michael J. Fox: I never had much of a desire to write a memoir or an autobiography. When I’ve been asked about it before, that is, before people knew about my PD diagnosis, I assumed what they had in mind was a “how I made it in show business and you can too” sort of thing. A lot of kiss-and-tell and name-dropping, which I find incredibly boring. I don’t read a lot of those kind of books myself. But when I disclosed that I’d been dealing with this disease for seven years and, at one point, mentioned that I viewed it as “a gift,” the surprised reactions told me that a further explanation was in order. My outlook could only be explained by an accounting of those seven years -- and certain aspects of the thirty before them. That could only be accomplished in a book. And, frankly, I was curious to find out if I had the discipline to sit down and write it all out. Add to that the opportunity to raise money for PD research, and I’m now an author.

 

Pageonelit.com: Did you find writing more difficult than acting, or the reverse, and why?

Michael J. Fox: I was surprised to learn how similar writing was in some ways to acting. Just as with a performance, the goal is to capture and hold the audience’s (readers’) attention, while you tell your character’s -- in this case, my -- story. Honesty is crucial. I also tried to avoid being too linear, just as I would with acting, and too conventional in the narrative. As a practical matter though, it’s much more difficult and demands greater discipline than working on a film or a television show. As an actor, I show up on the set and there’s this huge mass of people, this production company, all collaborating toward the final product. Everybody does their bit to keep the thing rolling along. Writing requires self-motivation, it’s just me and whatever mood I happen to be in that day. It’s the difference between stepping into a flowing river and letting it carry you downstream or swimming twenty miles across a flat, still lake. Writing, like the latter, is a lot more exhausting, but surviving the journey is something I’m proud of.

 

Pageonelit.com: This is your first published book, but it’s incredibly well written. Had you written things before?

Michael J. Fox: As I kid I was a prolific writer. My maternal grandmother, my Nana, who I talk about in the book, was convinced that I’d be a writer. But I drifted away from it and focused more on music and then acting. And then when I got into show business and had a chance to work with so many talented writers, I just never thought of myself as being in that category. Working all these years in television, though, I’ve enjoyed the time I’ve spent with writers, brainstorming with them as they developed characters, built stories and pitched jokes. Words are powerful, and images can have a great deal of impact, but the thrill for me has been creating those images in the mind of another person using only words.

 

Pageonelit.com: You made a conscious choice not to use a ghostwriter. How did you come to that decision?

Michael J. Fox: I knew, for a number of reasons, that I’d have to write this myself. It’s such a personal story, so much of it happens inside my head -- in more ways than one. Even I wasn’t aware of the import of certain people, place, actions, emotions and events until I sat alone for hours sorting them out. Also, presumably, anyone who reads this book is already familiar with my sense of humor and my outlook. If somebody tried to approximate my voice and missed, it would be obvious. Plus I’m a control freak and am always excited by the idea of a new challenge. I am a realist though. I’ve never done this before. I’m not a professional writer. So, I did make sure that I had a mentor in this process. I wanted a talented writer and editor, someone I was close to, to show me the ropes, be honest with me about what was good and what sucked -- not just correct my mistakes, but help me learn from them. Luckily for me, my brother-in-law Michael “keep going” Pollan agreed to serve in this role.

 

Pageonelit.com: Your proceeds from the book are going to your Parkinson’s Foundation. When did you start the foundation and what are its goals?

Michael J. Fox: We launched in May of 2000, right after my final season on Spin City. Our goal is obsolescence; that is, to help identify and fund research to find what most scientists say is possible: a cure for PD within this decade.

 

Pageonelit.com: You’ve done a very brave thing in deciding to fight Parkinson’s publicly. How did you come to that decision?

Michael J. Fox: It was actually two decisions, neither of them particularly brave. The first, after seven years of secrecy, was to publicly disclose that I was dealing with this disorder. The amount of stress involved in continuing to hide finally outweighed whatever stress could come from people knowing. Then there was this amazing reaction from the public, the press and from the Parkinson’s community. The second came almost a year later, after learning a lot about the other people who shared my disease, the science behind it, how there was tremendous potential for a breakthrough but that potential was being stifled by a dearth of federal funding. It was then that I took my first steps into advocacy. All of this was part of a progression that I talk about in the book.

 

 

Pageonelit.com: Tell us how the Foundation has speeded up the research process.

Michael J. Fox: We have a phenomenal executive director, Debi Brooks, who has a background in business, and an extraordinary board made up of people from both the entertainment industry and the NY financial community. These are competitive and entrepreneurial people. We knew this foundation had to break away from old-style foundational bureaucracy and speed up the process of finding a cure. Our scientific advisory board devised a much faster way to review grant applications and ultimately get money into the hands of researchers. We were especially pleased when the NIH asked if they could funnel some of their dollars through our fast-track granting system; we’d only hoped to be able to work this closely with Washington. We’ve also been able to respond to political currents. For example, when President Bush approved federal funding for stem cell research but limited the number of cell lines available, we offered a grant for what is now up to $4.5 million to any researchers who could come to us with a dopaminergic cell line -- that is, a line of cells that would produce dopamine, the chemical in such short supply within the brains of Parkinson's patients.

 

Pageonelit.com: What are some of your favorite books and authors?

Michael J. Fox: I’m not very good at keeping lists. My favorite book is usually the last one I’ve read and enjoyed. But, just off the top of my head, I’d say Cormac McCarthy, for sure -- All The Pretty Horses was an amazing and powerful book. Another personal favorite is The Bird Artist by Howard Norman. My favorite author at the moment is Michael Chabon. The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay is, I think, a modern masterpiece. Reaching back into my youth, the Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings really got me involved in reading for pleasure. Being a high school drop-out, I’ve filled in the gaps by reading a lot of non-fiction, especially political history: David McCullough, Stephen Ambrose. I’ve read most of Ambrose’s WWII books, but my personal favorite of his was Undaunted Courage about Lewis and Clark. And although I have a bias, I have to mention my brother-in-law Michael Pollan’s Botany of Desire as one of the better natural history books I’ve ever read.

 

Pageonelit.com: What books do you like to read to your children?

Michael J. Fox: Whatever they want to hear. My favorites to read aloud are Dr. Seuss. These are the first books I learned to read from and I love the way the nonsense words roll off the tongue. I don’t think my daughters like them as much as I do, but they humor me.

 

Pageonelit.com: In the book, you talk about the protective bubble of celebrity. But it seems that you’ve really burst that bubble in your public work with Parkinson’s. Can you talk about that?

Michael J. Fox: Well, the bubble of celebrity I describe wasn’t really about protection from the public, or even the press, but really from myself. I was buying into a kind of magical thinking that my celebrity, this artificial state of grace, was somehow normal. Long before I went public with my PD diagnosis, the disease itself burst that bubble. None of us are every really safe, whatever that means. It caused me to wake up and face real world issues. Earth to Mike.

 

Pageonelit.com: What was the hardest thing about announcing that you had Parkinson’s?

Michael J. Fox: If you keep a secret, any secret, for seven years, it’s painful to finally let people in on it. It’s like letting a genie out of a bottle, you can’t stuff him back inside. By that time, though, I’d already accepted the disease as a fact of my life, and even, in many ways, appreciated what it had taught me. But I had absolutely no idea, however, of how other people might react, or how that reaction was going to effect me and my family.

 

Pageonelit.com: In the book, you discuss your brain surgery. Is this an option for most people with Parkinson’s?

Michael J. Fox: Parkinson’s is an ideopathic disorder. Everybody’s disease, that is their symptomology and how they react to therapies -- pharmaceutical or surgical -- is wholly unique to them. There are a variety of options out there, and if anyone is considering a thalamotomy or a pallidotomy, or having a deep brain stimulator implanted, they need to explore this at length with their neurologist. It’s fantastically improved many lives, but it’s a fact too that for others it is not as successful.

 

 

Pageonelit.com: What are the most promising research avenues in Parkinson’s today?

Michael J. Fox: There’s so much exciting science out there right now, a lot of it just waiting to be funded. Like one leading researcher in the book says, “the science is way ahead of the money.” Stem cells are especially promising, but there’s a lot happening too with gene therapy, new medications, and a variety of other research areas. Our foundation, for one, doesn’t play favorites. We’re interested in traveling down any avenues that might lead toward a breakthrough.

 

Pageonelit.com: In the book, you discuss in depth your relationship with your father. What do you think he’d say about the work you’re doing now?

Michael J. Fox: Above all else, my dad was a kind man with a generous heart. I’m sure he’d be very gratified by, and in support of, the efforts I’m involved in now, and tremendously moved by the support and love that so many people around the world have shown me.

 

Pageonelit.com: Is there a book that had a seminal influence on you when you were younger?

Michael J. Fox: There was a book called My Side of the Mountain. I was 10 or 11 when I read it. I can’t recall the author’s name.

 

Pageonelit.com: What is your favorite play and/or playwright?

Michael J. Fox: Death of a Salesman by Arthur Miller. And also, anything by David Mamet.

 

Pageonelit.com: You testified in the Senate about raising money for research for PD. Was that eye-opening in any way, in terms of how government works?

Michael J. Fox: I’ve always been a political junky -- paid attention to the American political process even before I was a US citizen. I’d have to say that participating in that process in a meaningful way was a humbling and energizing experience.

 

Pageonelit.com: In Lucky Man, you talk about Parkinson’s being a gift. Can you elaborate on that?

Michael J. Fox: This question is exactly why I wrote the book. It’s impossible to answer briefly. Let me just say that you don’t know what you have until it’s gone, and you know even less about what may appear to take it’s place if you allow for it.

 

 

Pageonelit.com: Your foundation seems to have hit the ground running. How did you make that happen?

Michael J. Fox: In 1998, after I made my disclosure about Parkinson's, I went down and spoke to a Senate subcommittee, and I started to meet people in the scientific community. Naturally, my question was, Well, we're asking for money, what would we spend it on?

And they said, Oh, there's no end. This is the quintessential case of the science being way ahead of the money. And so in talking to Joan Samuelson [director of the Parkinson's Action Network], we just kind of came of this idea of this guerrilla organization that was bound by no convention. It was bound by no existing alliances. It only had one goal — which was to take this declaration that I heard from a few scientists: that a cure was possible within a decade — and make that our mantra. Let's say our deal is to be out of business within 10 years.

We recognize the sense of urgency in this community. The clock is ticking for these folks. This is not theoretical. We're trying not to do this for posterity. What we're trying to do is affect the lives of the people that we see every day.

 

Pageonelit.com: Your foundation has spent $4.4 million on stem cell research, and you've advocated the research before a Senate subcommittee. Why is it so important?

Michael J. Fox: It is the gateway. And it's pretty established that it's the gateway to curing and treating a lot of diseases, but especially Parkinson's because it's so specific a problem. If you fix that one thing — if you get the brain to produce dopamine and have the neuroreceptors accept it in the appropriate measure — you've cured the problem. It holds out the promise of perhaps being able to do an end run around the question of causation. The accepted rule is, if you don't know the cause you can't find a cure. Well, we might be able to get around that.

 

Pageonelit.com: What other areas of Parkinson's research are you particularly interested in?

Michael J. Fox: Well, to put it in context, I have the conversations with my kids on summer vacations about why does the lizard's tail grow back. I mean, I don't profess to be much beyond that, scientifically, other than to have an innate curiosity.

Certainly, I love the idea of cell replacement. I'm also fascinated by the idea of biomarkers, genes that might predispose to P.D. There's also a lot of work that's being done surgically. A pet project I would love to do is get an accurate census, which I don't think exists. Especially with young-onset Parkinson's, you're looking at a disease that's been misdiagnosed for years. And I'm sure we're underrepresented now in terms of numbers. The official figure is between one and a half and two million people, but we think it's much, much bigger than that.

 

Pageonelit.com: In your book, you acknowledge that it is your celebrity that gets people to listen when you talk about Parkinson's disease, and you question whether that's fair. Why would that bother you?

Michael J. Fox: I had this for seven years before I told anybody. So that kind of relieves a little bit of any feeling I might have of, oh, I get this problem and immediately I take it to people. I didn't do that. I spent seven years kind of going crazy with it, and figuring it out, and looking at it, and running away from it, and finally coming back to it and embracing it, and trying to understand it, before anybody ever heard about it.But I certainly didn't want to be in a position of going out to people and saying, Help me. I didn't want any of that. And in fact a lot of times in this work and in the things that we do, I forget that I have this. I really do. It's not personal. It means a great deal to me personally, and I'm passionate about it. But it's not personal.There is a kind of a ubiquity to being on television; you're in all these homes. When people say I grew up with you, they really did, and there is a connection that's very strong. What I'm trying to get people to recognize is the scope of this, and the reach of it. What I'm trying to say to people is, this is really important. It's also an inevitability, so let's take a moon-shot approach to it.

 

Pageonelit.com: Your public familiarity also means people look to your illness as the typical case of Parkinson's.

Michael J. Fox: But I'm not a test case. This dyskinesia you're seeing, it comes from too much L-dopa. It's tough to get the exact amount you need. So it's kind of a trade-off between being able to sit and talk to you in a fluid way or being kind of halted and rigid.In my day-to-day life, my kids are used to me saying things twice, or kind of haltingly, so I don't feel the same impetus. But people with P.D. will see me on television and then come up to me on the street and say, You're taking too much medication. And I'll say, Well, if you had to sit in front of Larry King for 45 minutes, you'd take too much medication too. The disease is idiosyncratic, idiopathic, and my life is so idiopathic and idiosyncratic, and the combination of the two means I'm not a test case for anybody.

 

Pageonelit.com: You've said you believe Parkinson's can be cured within 10 years. What makes you so optimistic?

Michael J. Fox: It's the certainty and the unanimity of the scientists' assertion that a cure is possible in 10 years. There's very little qualifying. A cure is you don't feel this way anymore. You don't have the problem. So whether you really don't have that problem or you've just created an amazing illusion that you don't have that problem — an illusion you can sustain for 100 years. Good. You know, fine. Take it.