Bob Odenkirk is shining a light on the heart attack he suffered while filming the movie Better Call Saul in 2021.
“When I got off, Leah[Seehorn]and Patrick[Fabian]grabbed me and they were screaming and[the crew members noticed]I thought they were laughing,” the 63-year-old actor recalled in an interview with the London Times on Friday. “So we were all far away from each other, which delayed our response.”
“I’m gone. My hair is gray,” Odenkirk said. “Eventually the doctor on scene came and he didn’t know what to do. He had never done CPR.”
After being taken to a local hospital, the “Breaking Bad” alum was treated without surgery.
However, Odenkirk remembers little about the incident.
“A lot of people get a great film of their life or say, ‘Do you want to go back?’ For me it was nothing,” he explained to the media. “My first memory is arriving at the hospital and being discharged a week later.”
Since his health crisis, Odenkirk has started a new life.
“It was such a gift to have those few weeks where I felt that way about my place in the world,” exclaimed the “Nobody” star. “I felt very, very happy and engaged.”
After the incident, in July 2021, Odenkirk went online to confirm that he had suffered a heart attack while filming the sixth season of the hit AMC show.
“Hi, I’m Bob,” the Emmy winner tweeted at the time. “Thank you. To my family and friends for surrounding me this week.”
Odenkirk added, “And for the outpouring of love from everyone who has expressed care and concern for me. I’m overwhelmed. But I feel the love and it means so much.”
A follow-up tweet read, “Thanks to Rosa Estrada and the doctors who knew how to fix the blockage without surgery, I’ll be OK.”
“It will take some time to recover, but I will be back soon,” he promised.
A month later, Odenkirk gave his followers a positive update.
“I’m doing great,” he tweeted in August 2021.
“I spent my own ‘It’s a Wonderful Life’ week surrounded by people who insisted I make the world a little bit better,” Odenkirk revealed, referring to Frank Capra’s film about what the world would be like if George Bailey had never been born. “Wow! Thank you, I love you all now, but let’s keep our expectations in moderation!”
A year later, in an interview with “Sunday Today,” Odenkirk revealed how serious the medical emergency was.
“My widow-making artery was completely blocked,” he said at the 2022 rally. “That’s why they call me a widow maker, because then people die. But I fell.”
“I was not present at all,” Odenkirk said. “I hear it was a pretty traumatic day on set. I hear it was a traumatic day for my co-stars and staff, and all the co-stars and staff who loved me and were by my side and went to the hospital with me, and the people I love so much.”
In 2023, he told Yahoo!Life that the heart attack “didn’t really affect” him “for a long time.”
“Literally the next day and every day was filled with a weird kind of upbeat energy,” Odenkirk recounted. “That’s because I was wiping my head every night.”
He reiterated that his “ability to even think about what happened” was impaired.
“I needed to get my brain back on track,” Odenkirk mused. That’s what I think about every day. ”
