Eric Dane opened up about his life with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) before his death on Thursday, February 19.
In his last public appearance, the Euphoria star called living with ALS, also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease, “so horrible.”
Dane’s last appearance was on a virtual panel with Brian Wallach and Sandra Abrevaya, the co-founders of I AM ALS and Synapticure, for Giving Tuesday in December 2025.
Reflecting on his first role as an ALS patient, Matthew, a firefighter and 9/11 hero who struggles to inform his wife of his diagnosis with a progressive, fatal neurodegenerative disease in Brilliant minds.
The Burlesque alum confessed that breaking away from the character of Matthew proved to be a difficult role because he was playing something “so real.” However, he was “grateful” for the “redemptive” experience.
Dane said: “I have no reason to be in a good mood on any given day. I don’t think anyone would blame me if I went upstairs to my bedroom, crawled under the sheets and cried for the next two weeks. And I was kind of pleasantly surprised when I realized I wasn’t built that way, because I definitely thought I would be.”
It was “very encouraging” to “have a cheerful spirit in the face of something so terrible” and he made sure “people are aware of what ALS is and what it is about.
More importantly, “what we can do to combat it and improve the landscape because it’s so rocky and littered with obstacles and bureaucracy and all this other nonsense that we’re trying to sort through so we can get to a place where we can go and work on a solution,” he said.
It is pertinent to mention that Dane passed away after revealing his ALS diagnosis in April 2025.
