@Dolph Lundgren in Arrow.
In a recent interview with Graham Bensinger, Swedish actor Dolph Lundgren said he’s been battling lung cancer since 2015.
Though it went into remission soon afterwards, the cancer returned in 2020 and the 65-year-old actor recently underwent surgery for the removal of several tumors.
Speaking to Bensinger, he described how he discovered the cancer had returned. “In 2020, I was back in Sweden and I had some kind of acid reflux, I didn’t know what it was so I did an MRI…The surgeon called me and said [the tumor] had grown, it was too big, it had grown to the size of a small lemon. I asked them how long do I have left, I think he said two to three years but I could tell in his voice he thought it was less. I thought that was it for sure.
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As his fiancée Emma Krokdal added: “His mouth got really sore, his hands got sore and he couldn’t eat anything…That was a struggle, he was losing weight. We realized it was a lot worse than we thought, they started talking about tumors in the lung, stomach, spine, outside the kidneys.
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Lundgren speculates that perhaps his use of bodybuilding steroids in his 20s and 30s contributed to his illness. He used the steroids while he was appearing in several action-packed movies, including the role of Ivan Drago in Rocky IV. He reprised that role in the 2018 for the film Creed II. He also appeared alongside Rocky co-star Sylvester Stallone in the 2010 film The Expendables, reprising his role as Gunner Jensen in the second and third episode in the series. A fourth release is expected later this year.
Lundgren has also appeared in such films as Aquaman, Blackjack, and Masters of the Universe. He got his start in acting while working at the legendary Limelight night club in New York, where he’d moved at the urging of Grace Jones. He’d begun a relationship with the Jamaican singer while serving as her bodyguard.