Ted Danson Reflects on Recent Health Scare: 'Mortality' Is the 'Real Deal'

Ted Danson opened up about having a previously undisclosed health scare, calling the experience the "best thing that could have happened" to him.

"The last thing that hit me that was kind of liberating is that I had a bit of a health scare," the Cheers alum, 78, revealed on the Wednesday, May 6, episode of his "Where Everybody Knows Your Name" podcast. "I'm totally fine, but it was like, ‘Oh! Well, that's real!' It was humbling - mortality, it's the real deal."

Danson shared his recent health ordeal during a discussion with Hot in Cleveland actress Valerie Bertinelli, who has gone through her own medical challenges in recent years. (Danson never specified the exact nature of his medical issue.)

"[Mortality] is not just a rumor," Danson quipped. "Ted Danson doesn't get a free pass. ‘Love his work but' … I hadn't f***ed up in some way. So, I couldn't go, ‘Oh, Ted!' It was very humbling and calming and I'm fine but it was, I think, it was the best thing that could have happened to me."

The two-time Emmy Award winner confirmed that he is "doing some things differently" since his health scare.

"I am meditating twice a day now with [wife Mary Steenburgen]. I've always talked about it and lied about it, but now I really am," he quipped.

Later in the interview, Danson mentioned that "the biggest gift of all" from his recent experience is that he's learned to be "more curious about other people."

"You can listen and you can be supportive, caring. You can witness them and I do believe that's the rest of my life, is to be curious and listen," he said. "That's the best thing I can offer."

Danson said he has also felt much more present with his wife, Steenburgen, 73, whom he wed in 1995. (The Good Place star shares two daughters, Kate and Katrina Danson, with his second wife, Cassandra Coates, whom he was with from 1977 to 1993. Steenburgen welcomed two children, Lilly and Charlie McDowell, during her previous marriage to Malcolm McDowell from 1980 to 1990.)

Late last year, Danson revealed on The Late Show With Stephen Colbert that he "hates love scenes" with any other actress besides Steenburgen.

"They never paid me to do sex," he teased. "I kissed. But no, I was the guy who made jokes about sex, but not actually [film a sex scene]."

The couple recently got the chance to play lovers on the Netflix comedy series A Man on the Inside, which was renewed for a third season in February. Danson stars as a retired professor who becomes an assistant investigator at a private detective agency, with Steenburgen joining in season two as her real-life husband's onscreen love interest.

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This story was originally published May 6, 2026 at 8:06 PM.