Christina Applegate says she missed an early symptom of multiple sclerosis (MS) when she fell on the set of her Netflix series Dead to Me.
‘I remember falling that day,’ Applegate, 53, told co-host Jamie-Lynn Sigler, 43 and guest Liz Feldman, 47, the creator of Dead to Me, on the latest edition of her MeSsy podcast Wednesday.
The Hollywood, California native said she fell while filming a running sequence in a field on the latest edition of the podcast, titled Putting Life on Paper.
Applegate said of her fall: ‘Hi, first sign of MS! So, not to bring everybody down, but there it was.’
The Emmy-winning actress – who publicly announced she has been battling MS in August of 2021 – and The Sopranos alum Sigler, who publicly revealed her MS battle in January of 2016, have spoken about their respective health battles on the podcast.
Feldman noted that she had observed Applegate, who starred on the series during its three-season run from 2019-2022, experiencing physical symptoms, but chalked it up to long hours on set.
Christina Applegate, 53, says she missed an early symptom of multiple sclerosis when she fell on the set of her Netflix series Dead to Me. Pictured in April in LA
Applegate played the role of Jen Harding on the series during its three-season run from 2019-2022
‘I remember you losing your balance when we were shooting the pilot a couple of times,’ Feldman said. ‘It was very hard to figure it out because, you know, I remember one time, it was really late at night.
‘We’d been shooting probably 14 or 15 hours … it seemed completely reasonable that anybody would be collapsing.’
Applegate – who continued work on the third season of the show after she was diagnosed – said that ‘it was MS.’
Feldman said she was empathetic in watching Applegate – also known for Married… with Children and Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitter’s Dead – soldier on in production amid her health crisis.
‘I could just sense A, that she was scared, and B, that something was wrong … that something in her body was not working the way that she wanted it to,’ Feldman said. ‘There’s no handbook for this.
‘I can’t compare it to any experience I’ve ever gone through with a person before.’
Feldman said she ‘just always tried to put [Applegate’s] health first in my mind’ as cameras rolled on the third season of the show, telling the actress at times that her well-being was priority over ‘just a TV show.’
Feldman said she told Applegate, ‘At the end of the day, yeah, maybe it’ll reach people and help people and entertain people, but this is your life.’
James Marsden, Liz Feldman and Applegate were pictured at a promotional party for Dead To Me in May of 2019 in Santa Monica, California
Applegate and her co-host Jamie-Lynn Sigler, 43, speak about their respective MS battles on their MeSsy podcast
Applegate said that Feldman and the Netflix show’s crew went out of their way to accommodate her amid her MS battle, stopping filming for a week to let her recuperate.
‘That would not happen anywhere else, so my gratitude towards you guys being humans – because you should be humans and love other humans – is astounding,’ Applegate said. ‘I can’t even tell you … that’s not the normal reaction.’
The series also starred Linda Cardellini, James Marsden, Sam McCarthy, Luke Roessler, Max Jenkins, Diana Maria Riva and Brandon Scott.
Applegate and Cardellini played the respective roles of Jen Harding and Judy Hale on the dark comedy, as a pair of women in grief who grow closer amid therapy.
The show was nominated six times for Primetime Emmys, with Applegate receiving two nods for her work in the lead role.
Applegate told Kelly Clarkson in a December 2022 interview that the show provided her with ‘this weird platform of dealing’ with the life-changing diagnosis.
‘The beauty of Dead to Me is that … I didn’t have to be on all the time and I didn’t have to make all the jokes and I could fall apart in a scene,’ Applegate said. ‘And it was, like, me. It was my soul actually falling apart, unfortunately, in front of the world, but it was cathartic in a beautiful way.’
