Bruce Campbell, best know for playing Ash in the original Evil Dead trilogy, has revealed he is stepping back from future fan events for a few months while he treats a cancer that is “treatable” but not “curable.”
The 67-year-old actor and total human legend posted to X to reveal his diagnosis and plans to cancel appearances at various cons this summer, in order to receive treatment. “I apologize if that’s a shock,” Campbell writes in the post. “It was to me too.”
— Bruce Campbell (@GroovyBruce) March 3, 2026
“The good news is,” adds Campbell, “I’m not gonna go into any more detail.” He explains that he’s making the news public to explain his disappearance from conventions and appearances over the coming months, and then burst back onto the scene in time for the release of his new movie Ernie & Emma, written and directed by Campbell, in the fall.
Bruce Campbell was childhood friends with director Sam Raimi, and together the pair made the 1981 cult horror movie Evil Dead during a summer vacation from college in 1979. Both then remade the cabin-in-the-woods gore-fest six years later, calling it Evil Dead II, before capping the trilogy with 1992’s wonderfully ridiculous Harryhausen-inspired fantasy Army of Darkness. Campbell played main character Ash Williams in all three films, and the character has stuck with the actor throughout his life. While the recent reboot of the Evil Dead franchise isn’t much to do with anything beyond very subtle cameos, Campbell returned as the iconic, chainsaw-armed antihero in the truly wonderful TV series Ash vs. Evil Dead from 2015 to 2018, and leveraged his closeness to the role in his 2007 self-directed horror flop Call Me Bruce.
Alongside all those appearances, Bruce Campbell has routinely depicted Ash in many Evil Dead video games, from 2000’s Evil Dead: Hail to the King to 2022’s Evil Dead: The Game. He’s also voiced the character for appearances in other franchises, like Dead By Daylight and even Call of Duty. Oh, and he was the voice of Pitfall Harry in Pitfall 3D!
Of course Campbell has also had many other major roles, including the fantastic Sam Axe in Burn Notice, Elvis in the utterly bonkers Bubba Ho-Tep, and his infamous run of cameos in nearly all of Sam Raimi’s movies, including his Spider-Man trilogy, Doctor Strange 2 (which featured a glorious recreation of his possessed hand scene from Evil Dead II). He even shows up as a painting in this year’s Send Help. Oh, and there’s his recurring role as Autolycus in Raimi’s Xena: Warrior Princess and Hercules: The Legendary Journeys.
Why am I listing all this while he’s still alive? Because I love him, and I am grabbing this opportunity to celebrate how much I love watching Campbell and his mighty chin in everything.
The nature of the cancer is not identified, and Campbell says it’s incurable though treatable, which hopefully points to one of the types you die with rather than of. “Fear not,” the actor and director says in his post, “I am a tough old son-of-a-bitch, and I have great support, so I expect to be around a while.”
We wish him the very best, and many more years of life.
