This month, television gives us health information with a spoonful of sugar: the convergence of celebrity and disease.
Michael J. Fox and Farrah Fawcett have stories to tell. So does Maria Shriver.
Normally this is where cynicism would kick in. Do we really want TV stars airing their illnesses on TV? Can we feel good watching this stuff?
Of course, we should want to know more about the Parkinson’s disease that ails Fox and the cancer that is bringing down Fawcett without the titillating hook of celebs as patients. And television should be able to inform on serious subjects without marquee names and flashbacks to red-carpet moments.
Besides, stories touching on widespread illnesses should be compelling anytime, not just during the May sweeps. It’s a strange manipulation.
Yet these celebrities are putting their pop-cultural cachet to good use.
We’ve known Michael J. Fox since he was a kid on “Family Ties” in the 1980s, through “Spin City,” “Back to the Future” and beyond. Farrah Fawcett’s been in our lives since she was a poster girl in college dorms during the late-’70s “Charlie’s Angels” years. (Trivia buffs’ note: she played a judge on four episodes of “Spin City” in 2001).
Recently, Fox has been on “Rescue Me,” playing a paraplegic (ironic for a guy who can’t sit still, he says). Fawcett was unwillingly in the news when complications ensued following an experimental surgery in Germany.
Fox’s hour-long exploration of his own essential optimism in spite of his degenerative illness aired Thursday on ABC. It was an endearing, uplifting meditation on the nature of happiness, philosophy-lite from a guy who could be forgiven for seeing the glass as half-full. Instead, he chooses joy.
“Michael J. Fox: Adventures of an Incurable Optimist” followed the actor’s search for answers from the streets of New York to the Obama inauguration in Washington, D.C., to a Cubs game in Chicago and ultimately to the remarkably happy kingdom of Bhutan in the Himalayas.
Now, 20 years after his diagnosis, he finds “optimism is contagious.”
In Fawcett’s case, the intersection of celebrity and personal tragedy is more problematic. She uses her status to justify a prime-time special, but at the same time claims to “battle” her celebrity along with the cancer — “standing up to the paparazzi and tabloids” to protect her privacy.
“Farrah’s Story,” Friday on NBC, (locally at 8 p.m. on KUSA-Channel 9), chronicles the actress’ two-and-a-half year battle with cancer. Home videos document her struggle, in a two-hour program under the auspices of NBC News.
“I’ve never understood why people are interested in anything that I do,” she said, perhaps disingenuously. “Until now,” she added.
“As much as I would have liked to have kept my cancer private, I now realize that I have a certain responsibility to those who are fighting their own fights and may be able to benefit from learning about mine.”
Viewers likewise may be ambivalent: wishing she could have her privacy, feeling sheepish about being celeb-curious. Wondering if she’s the role model we’d pick.
There’s one more celebrity disease rep. On Monday, Maria Shriver lends her name to HBO’s “Alzheimer’s Project.” Her key contribution is the half-hour documentary, “Grandpa, Do You Know Who I Am?” based on the book she wrote about the illness of her father, Sargent Shriver. Ultimately, she teaches, Alzheimer’s demands compassion. The first lady of California and former NBC newswoman has campaigned for Alzheimer’s awareness for years.
It’s never easy drawing attention to chronic diseases, even when there’s not a potential pandemic stealing headlines. That’s where the power of TV stardom comes in — for worse and, they hope, for better.
As the subjects open up, cynicism melts away. What’s left is an odd sensation of rubbernecking.
Joanne Ostrow: 303-954-1830 or jostrow@denverpost.com
