Bruce Campbells Cancer Update: Live With It, Not Die From It

Bruce Campbell has put a number on it.

The 68-year-old star of the Evil Dead films, who disclosed in March that he had been diagnosed with a cancer that is “treatable” but not “curable,” told Adam Carolla in a September 4 appearance on The Adam Carolla Show that his doctors are working from a five-year window.

“With the type of cancer that I have, which I don’t want to get into, the current thing is a five-year deal,” Campbell said. Asked if that meant he has five years to live, he answered: “Give or take.”

He has not named the cancer, and he has been direct about not intending to. When he went public in March, he wrote that he was “not trying to enlist sympathy – or advice.” The September conversation held to the same line.

“I’ve decided pretty specifically though to live with it, not die from it,” Campbell said. “You don’t die from cancer, you die from what cancer does to you. It’s a whack-a-mole life, literally.” At the time of the taping he added that he was “between whacks” and felt “perfect.”

Then he said what he intends to do with the window: “I got a movie to promote.”

The Movie He Is Promoting Right Now

That movie is Ernie & Emma, and Campbell wrote it, directed it, produced it and stars in it. He plays Ernie Tyler, a small-town Oregon pear salesman who loses his wife and then drives her ashes around the state, scattering them at the places she chose for him in advance. Campbell’s wife, Ida Gearon, produced. It premiered in February at the Holly Theatre in Medford, Oregon.

It is not a horror film. It is a comedy about grief, and Campbell is taking it around the country himself, on an 18-city Alamo Drafthouse tour of live Q&A screenings. It opened in Los Angeles on September 4, with Brooklyn and Staten Island on September 11 and 12. The next stop is the Washington, D.C. metro area on September 18, and the last is the Denver area on November 14.

“How many people here have lost a loved one? Raise your hand,” Campbell says in material promoting the tour. “Every hand is going to go up. That’s why I believe this movie connects with everyone.”

The Evil Dead Regulars Came With Him

The names around him will look familiar to anyone who has been through the Evil Dead saga more than once. Joseph LoDuca wrote the score, as he did across the Sam Raimi era of the franchise — the 1981 original, Evil Dead II, Army of Darkness and all three seasons of Ash vs Evil Dead — along with Campbell’s own directorial outings My Name Is Bruce and Man with the Screaming Brain. Ted Raimi turns up as a dance instructor. Cerina Vincent, of Cabin Fever, plays Judy, and Robin McAlpine is Emma.

Still on the Call Sheet

Campbell has not stepped away from the franchise that made him. He voiced a role in Evil Dead Rise, and he is an executive producer on this year’s Evil Dead Burn and on Evil Dead Wrath, set for 2028.

Remaining dates and tickets for the Ernie & Emma tour are listed at the film’s official site.