Kirsten Dunst has revealed her young son James had a ‘frightening’ health scare while she was filming in Budapest earlier this year.
The actress, 43, who shares James, four, and Ennis, seven, with husband Jesse Plemons, 37, moved abroad for six months with her family to film The Entertainment System is Down – but ‘very quickly’ her youngest child became seriously ill.
Dunst told Town & Country the terrifying time was like ‘Final Destination, where you’re imagining all the things that could go wrong, worst case scenarios happening to your child.
‘I have never seen that movie. But I know the concept. That’s how it feels to be a mother at times.’
Plemons and their sons had joined her in Budapest in January, with the plan for them to stay with Dunst for the entire filming duration and Ennis enrolled in school before James fell ill.
Plemons later took their sons back to their ‘extended support system’ in Los Angeles while Dunst remained abroad – bar an April visit – to finish the film.
Kirsten Dunst has revealed her young son James had a ‘frightening’ health scare while she was filming in Budapest earlier this year
The actress, 43, who shares James, four, and Ennis, seven, with husband Jesse Plemons, 37, moved abroad for six months with her family to film The Entertainment System is Down – but ‘very quickly’ her youngest child became seriously ill – the family are pictured in 2022
While Dunst wouldn’t be drawn on James’ specific health condition, she stressed that he is doing fine now.
She said the health scare ‘brought us together as a family in such a deeper way’ and revealed they will soon holiday in the Bahamas as they promised to take James ‘anywhere he wanted to go.’
The star previously opened up about James on Jimmy Kimmel Live in April 2024, saying: ‘He’s almost three and when he’s bad we call him Jimmy. He’s out of control.
‘We actually call him baby Chris Farley because of the way he walks around and he’s just hilarious. He’s a crazy little dude.’
Dunst and Plemons got together after starring in Fargo Season 2 in 2016, getting engaged in 2017.
They married in 2022 in a secret ceremony in Jamaica.
‘We fell in love creatively first,’ Dunst gushed to the LA Times in 2021.
‘He was like a creative soul mate to me and the way we both work. On Fargo, I knew after two weeks.
Dunst told Town & Country the terrifying time was like ‘Final Destination, where you’re imagining all the things that could go wrong, worst case scenarios happening to your child’
Plemons and their sons had joined her in Budapest in January, with the plan for them to stay with Dunst for the entire filming duration and Ennis enrolled in school before James fell ill
While Dunst wouldn’t be drawn on James’ specific health condition, she stressed that he is doing fine now. She said the health scare ‘brought us together as a family in such a deeper way’ – pictured with Plemons in July 2025
‘ I didn’t remember saying this, but one of my best friends told me that I said to her that “I will know this man for the rest of my life. I just know it.”
‘Just because I felt such an immediate connection.’
