Michael J. Fox Honored With Bob Hope Humanitarian Award — SkimNews
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- Michael J. Fox received the Bob Hope Humanitarian Award at the 78th Emmy Awards on Monday night for raising Parkinson's awareness through the Michael J. Fox Foundation.
- Julianna Margulies presented the award, having starred alongside Fox on The Good Wife.
- Fox invoked Bob Hope's decades of troop visits to Berlin, Saigon, and the Middle East, saying Hope 'was showing up for the troops' with 'a turkey leg and a golf club.'
- Fox revealed he initially hid his Parkinson's diagnosis because he worried audiences wouldn't laugh, then found their support 'uplifting' and chose advocacy over silence.
- Fox left the stage in his wheelchair to a standing ovation, telling the crowd he was 'proud of the progress we've made' in fighting the disease.
- Fox has won five career Emmys, the first in 1986 for playing Alex P. Keaton on Family Ties and the most recent in 2009 for Rescue Me.
Why it matters: Fox's standing ovation as he left in his wheelchair gave the Michael J. Fox Foundation a primetime platform to drive Parkinson's awareness and fundraising, after decades of work that began when he chose to go public with his diagnosis rather than hide it.
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