Michael J. Fox will be back on airwaves this fall with his upcoming NBC comedy, “The Michael J. Fox Show."
Fox plays a local newscaster with Parkinson’s disease who decides to return to work after years of staying home with his family.
At the Television Critics’ Association summer press tour on Saturday, Fox explained how he is making the disease "funny."
"The reality of Parkinson's is that sometimes it's frustrating and sometimes it's funny. I need to look at it that way," Fox stated during the NBC panel. "I think we all get our own bag of hammers. We all get our own Parkinson's. We all get our own thing."
“The humor was based on the kind of stuff I deal with on a daily basis," added the 52-year-old actor. "I feel that this is the reflection of my experience and certainly in the pilot it was more prevalent than it is in subsequent scripts."
With the show, Fox wants people to know “There’s nothing horrifying [about Parkinson's] to me ... It’s not horrible. I don’t think it’s gothic nastiness. There’s nothing on the surface horrible about someone with shaking hands.”
Clearly the disease isn't scaring away network execs, as "Fox’s return to toplining a sitcom created such a bidding frenzy among the nets that NBC gave the Sony Pictures TV project a 22-episode on-air commitment last fall,"notes Variety.
“The Michael J. Fox Show" premieres on NBC in September. Watch the trailer below:
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