Michael J. Fox is alive and “doing great”, despite an unsettling news report that suggested otherwise.
Fans feared the Back to the Future star had died at age 64 after CNN published an online article and tribute video titled “Remembering the life of actor Michael J. Fox”.
The headline caused mass confusion among fans, forcing Fox’s team to shut down the death rumours.
“Michael is doing great,” the actor’s representative told TMZ in a statement, after Fox was spotted at TV and entertainment convention PaleyFest in LA this week.
“He was on stage and was giving interviews.”
There have been no reports of Fox’s death, and the post and video has been since taken down from CNN’s website.
A spokesperson for CNN told Entertainment Weekly, “The package was published in error; we have removed it from our platforms and send our apologies to Michael J. Fox and his family.”
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The beloved actor and ’80s teen hearthrob returned to screens last year, five years after announcing his retirement from acting.
Fox retired in 2020 due to health complications and speech issues associated with his Parkinson’s disease diagnosis.
In 2025, he joined another Hollywood legend, Harrison Ford, in the TV show Shrinking in a guest role.
Ford’s character in Shrinking has had Parkinson’s since Season 1, though he initially tries to conceal it and the severity of his symptoms.
But over time he is forced to tackle the disease head-on and come to terms with it.
Fox made his real-life diagnosis with Parkinson’s disease public in 1998 after receiving the news in 1991.
He has since founded the Michael J. Fox Foundation in 2000 to help fund research, which it continues to do today.
The star’s last major role was as the lead in the sitcom The Michael J. Fox Show, which ran from 2013 to 2014.
Before that, he voiced lead roles in the Stuart Little films and Atlantis: The Lost Empire, along with many guest appearances in films across the 2000s.
But the actor is no doubt most famous for his role of Marty McFly in the Back to the Future trilogy (1985–1990), and was also well known for Teen Wolf (1985).
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