‘I put on 40 pounds. I can’t walk without a cane’: Christina Applegate on filming Dead to Me final season after MS diagnosis

‘This is the first time anyone’s going to see me the way I am,’ said actor

Christina Applegate has opened up about returning to finish the third and final season of her Netflix black comedy Dead to Me after being diagnosed with multiple sclerosis.

The condition, also known as MS, can affect the brain and spinal cord, causing a wide range of potential symptoms, including problems with vision, arm or leg movement, sensation or balance.

Dead to Me stars Applegate and Linda Cardellini as two grieving women who bond during therapy.

In a new interview, the actor, 50, talked about how production on the new season paused for five months hiatus following her diagnosis, which she announced in August 2021.

“This is the first time anyone’s going to see me the way I am,” she told The New York Times. “I put on 40 pounds. I can’t walk without a cane. I want people to know that I am very aware of all of that.”

Applegate said she wished she had “paid attention” more to the signs she might have the condition in the years leading up to her official diagnosis.

Speaking about her determination to continue filming, she said: “I had an obligation to Liz [Feldman, series creator] and to Linda, to our story. The powers that be were like, ‘Let’s just stop. We don’t need to finish it. Let’s put a few episodes together.’ I said, ‘No. We’re going to do it, but we’re going to do it on my terms.’”

Applegate was then able to discuss with her colleagues how long and hard she could work, in what heat conditions, and how the set’s infrastructure could be adapted to her needs.

‘Dead to Me’ (Saeed Adyani)

The actor started using a wheelchair to get to set, and for some scenes her friend Mitch B Cohn – the show’s sound technician – held up her legs. In other scenes, she entered rooms with the door onscreen before her, so she could use it to lean on.

She said her co-star Cardellini was “my champion, my warrior, my voice”.

Applegate added that the filming hiatus was a useful time for her to come to terms her diagnosis. “I needed to process my loss of my life, my loss of that part of me,” she said. “So I needed that time.”

The actor also said she expects some fans to not be able to “get past” how different she will appear on screen. “Fine, don’t get past it, then,” she said. “But hopefully, people can get past it and just enjoy the ride and say goodbye to these two girls.”

The second season of Dead to Me, which aired in 2020, received acclaim for its poignant depiction of grief.

Season three will pick up after the car crash involving Applegate’s Jen, Cardellini’s Judy and James Marsden’s Ben, who was drove into the pair of friends after breaking his sobriety.

Dead to Me returns to Netflix on 17 November.