Dolph Lundgren has proven himself to be a fighter on screen many times, but it seems that he is also one in real life. In a new interview, the Rocky IV star has revealed that he has been battling cancer for eight years since first discovering a tumor back in 2015.
Lundgren has become a household name through his action roles in movies such as Masters of the Universe, The Expendables and even delved into the world of DC with a role in Aquaman. However his biggest battle has not been seen on the big screen, and did not involve taking down bad guys with the largest available firearm. Instead, it has been the private on/off cancer fight that he has only just revealed to his loyal fans. While speaking on In Depth With Graham Bensinger, Lundgren explained that following the removal of the cancerous tumor on his kidney, he was clear of further tumors for several years. He said:
“Then I did scans every six months, then you do it every year and it was fine, you know, for five years. In 2020, I was back in Sweden and had some kind of acid reflux or… I didn’t know what it was. So I did an MRI and they found there were a few more tumors around the area.We realized it was a lot worse than we thought. [The doctor] kind of started talking about all these different tumors, like, in the lung and the stomach and the spine, outside the kidneys. He started saying these things like, ‘You should probably take take a break and spend more time with your family,’ and so forth. I asked him, ‘How long do you think I’ve got left?’ I think he said two or three years, but I could tell in his voice that he probably thought it was less.”
A Second Opinion on His Cancer Saved Dolph Lundgren’s Life.
The actor was filming on both The Expendables franchise and Aquaman’s sequel around the time that his latest tumors were discovered. After going for a second opinion on the growths, Lundgren was told that the cancer was acting like lung cancer, and his treatment was altered accordingly.
“If I had gone on the other treatment, I’d have had about three to four months left. 2022 was basically watching these medications do their thing. Finally things had shrunk to about 90%. Now I’m in the process of taking out the remaining scar tissue in those tumors… The prognosis is that, hopefully, when they take these out, there’s no cancer activity and the medication that I’m taking is gonna suppress everything else.”
This is all clearly good news for Lundgren, but another reminder that there are many celebrities who do not always share what they are going through when it comes to medical conditions. Chadwick Boseman’s cancer battle only became public following the actor’s death, and others such as Sam Neill and Jane Fonda only revealed their fight with the disease when they were ready. Hopefully for Lundgren, he will be the latest person to be joining the growing list of long-term cancer survivors.
Dolph Lundgren will be seen returning as Gunner Jensen in The Expendables 4 in September, and then as King Nereus in Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom in December.
This story originally appeared on Movieweb
