A video with Michael J Fox

Older, but very good

A conversation with Michael J Fox
Published on Feb 16, 2016

Beloved actor and activist Michael J. Fox  drew a full house of eager students, faculty, staff and community members to Pomona College’s Bridges Auditorium on Friday, where he talked about politics, living with Parkinson’s disease, the importance of family, and maintaining optimism. 

Fox, who has sold out movie theaters and been a mainstay in millions of living rooms since his breakthrough in the 1980s, is known best for his roles on “Family Ties,” the “Back to the Future” trilogy, “Spin City” and “The Good Wife.” He is also a known philanthropist. His Michael J. Fox Foundation is the largest nonprofit funder for Parkinson’s research, having raised $450 million toward the search for the cure.

In this special event on Family Weekend, he spoke with Pomona College Professor of Neuroscience Nicole Weekes and answered student questions. Among Weekes’ questions was how working in acting has changed him and how he has changed the work.

“When I first started I was just a goofy kid, I was doing it for me,” Fox said, noting that most of his food money was spent on cigarettes, and that he was used to “chasing after [actor] Matthew Broderick’s scraps.” Prior to “Family Ties,” a phone booth outside of a Pioneer Chicken restaurant served as his office. 

His public disclosure that he had Parkinson’s disease did in fact change his acting career, but in a liberating way. “What I couldn’t do was more freeing than what I could do,” Fox says. Then he joked, "I realized I could play anyone as long as he had Parkinson’s.”

Fox talked about the struggle of daily tasks like getting ready in the morning and the victory of still working in acting 26 years after his diagnosis when he was told that he only had 10 years left to do so.

“It’s not projecting into a grim future that has made my present so wonderful,” he says.

Community member Gina Alessi attended the event and two of her sisters have Down Syndrome and Fox’s optimism was inspiring to her.

“When celebrities who are struggling with these real world problems talk about them, it’s not just inspiring to people because they’re famous but because they’re so visible and can bring lots of light to these situations,” says Alessi, who lives in Pasadena, Calif. “I have friends who have health issues, anxiety issues, and I’ve gone through hard stuff myself. If you imagine the worst-case scenario, it’s not going to do anyone any good.”

Samantha Borje ’19, who says “'Back to the Future' was everything to me,” found Fox to be “in equal parts, honest and inspiring.”

Throughout the hour-long event, Fox returned to themes of resilience and hope, saying in response to a question from Kyra Stone ’16 that he does think optimism is innate.

Fox that while he's not a reckless optimist, he does "believe that if we let [life] happen, it will happen in the right way most of the time.

Beloved actor and activist Michael J. Fox drew a full house of eager students, faculty, staff and community members to Pomona College’s Bridges Auditorium on Friday, where he talked about politics, living with Parkinson’s disease, the importance of family, and maintaining optimism. 

https://www.pomona.edu/news/2016/02/12-michael-j-fox-captivates-crowd-through-humor-and-positivity