Stanley Tucci Credits Wife Felicity Blunt for Getting Him Through His Cancer Battle

Stanley Tucci is grateful to be alive after his 2017 cancer diagnosis.

Tucci was diagnosed with a tumor at the base of his tongue, which was treated with 35 days of radiation and seven sessions of chemotherapy. The experience left him unable to eat and dependent on a feeding tube.

In a new interview with People, the now cancer-free actor shared more about that time in his life.

"I had a scan, but the scan missed it. And of course, when you think that there might be something wrong, you're also afraid that there is something wrong," he said, recalling that he had extreme jaw pain for two years before he was diagnosed. Once doctors were able to identify the issue, Tucci said, "They couldn't do surgery because the tumor was so big. It's a miracle that it didn't metastasize. It had been in me so long."

Once his radiation and chemotherapy treatments ended in 2018, the Devil Wears Prada actor began to slowly rebuild his strength and ability to eat, which he recounted as "just the most exciting thing in the world."

He added that the support of his wife, literary agent Felicity Blunt, was invaluable. "Felicity's undying attention, affection and encouragement got me through it," he told People.

Felicity Blunt and Stanley Tucci.

Tucci, whose first wife, Kate Tucci, died after a battle with breast cancer in 2009, first made his cancer diagnosis public in a 2021 interview with Vera, Virgin Atlantic's inflight magazine.

"It was too big to operate, so they had to do high-dose radiation and chemo," he shared. "I'd vowed I'd never do anything like that, because my first wife died of cancer, and to watch her go through those treatments for years was horrible."

Tucci also reflected on how the diagnosis affected his family. (He shares two children with Blunt: three-year-old daughter Emilia and seven-year-old son Matteo; and three children with his late wife: 22-year-old twins Nicolo and Isabel, and 20-year-old daughter Camilla.)

"The kids were great, but it was hard for them," he recalled. "I had a feeding tube for six months. I could barely make it to the twins' high school graduation."

Now free of cancer, Tucci noted the ways the experience changed him. "[Cancer] makes you more afraid and less afraid at the same time," he said. "I feel much older than I did before I was sick. But you still want to get ahead and get things done."

Chelsey Sanchez

Digital Associate Editor

As an associate editor at HarpersBAZAAR.com, Chelsey keeps a finger on the pulse on all things celeb news. She also writes on social movements, connecting with activists leading the fight on workers' rights, climate justice, and more. Offline, she’s probably spending too much time on TikTok, rewatching Emma (the 2020 version, of course), or buying yet another corset.