Emma Willis Reveals Bruce Willis’s Commitment to Act Amid Health Struggles

The world found out that Bruce Willis was diagnosed with aphasia, a form of dementia, in the spring of 2022. Almost a year later, Willis’s family announced that he had a more specific diagnosis: frontotemporal dementia (FTD).

However, before his illness became public knowledge, Willis was still working, appearing in films like “Detective Knight” and “A Day to Die,” among others. In her upcoming book, Emma Willis, his wife, details the lengths the “Die Hard” actor went to to make the films he had already committed to.

Emma Willis’ Book Breaks Silence on Actor’s Early Dementia Struggles

Emma penned the book “The Unexpected Journey” as a guide for caretakers who are trying to make sense of life after receiving a diagnosis like dementia.

“Born from grief, shaped by love, and guided by purpose, this is the book I needed back when Bruce was first diagnosed and I was frozen with fear and uncertainty,” Willis wrote on Instagram. “This is the book I trust will help the next caregiver. It is filled with support, insight, and the hope needed to navigate this journey.”

According to The Daily Beast, the book will detail how Bruce Willis was able to complete film projects. Not only was Bruce’s dialogue cut down, but he also wore an earpiece. A trusted friend or team member could then feed him his lines.

This information aligns with a 2022 LA Times article. It featured interviews with the cast and crew of “Out of Death” and other films.

For “Out of Death,” director Mike Burns emailed the screenwriter, asking them to cut Willis’s dialogue by five pages. Crew also confirmed that he was using an earpiece.

Bruce Willis’s Stutter Hid His Serious Health Decline

Remarkably, part of the reason those closest to him, such as his wife, weren’t able to gauge the seriousness of his decline had to do with his stutter. Willis was described by many as having a “slow speech pattern.” The stutter, which he’d had since childhood, exacerbated it.

“I could hardly talk. It took me three minutes to complete a sentence,” Willis is quoted as saying in “Bruce Willis: The Unauthorized Biography.” The reason he got into acting in the first place, as he recalled, was that “when I became another character, in a play, I lost the stutter. It was phenomenal.”

Emma, too, didn’t realize what was happening as he started to have more trouble with his words. “As his language started changing, it [seemed like it] was just a part of a stutter, it was just Bruce,” she told Town and Country. “Never in a million years would I think it would be a form of dementia for someone so young.”