Downton Abbey stars devastating end of life admission | UK News

Downton Abbey and House of the Dragon actor Simon Russell Beale made a devastating end of life admission after being recognized with colon cancer. The Shakespearean legend, 65, starred as Sir Hector Moreland in the Grand Finale characteristic movie based on the period drama, as nicely as showing in every little thing from Blackadder to the Marvel universe over the years.

In a new interview with The Telegraph, he admitted: “I’ve been ill recently and lost a bit of weight. So I no longer have all my padding,” explaining that it’s “not very comfortable” to sit down these days. The actor revealed he had been recognized with colon cancer in April 2026, and he’s still present process chemotherapy treatment.

He said: “They had discovered a blockage in my gut and that made me very ill.” He was taken to intensive care and finally told it was cancer after a PET scan.

Simon requested the marketing consultant bluntly: “Am I going to die?” and was told “Nonsense” – so now he “refuses to acknowledge that possibility”.

He added: “I mean, for all of us there will be a time when we do have to, but I’m not quite ready. They said they could cure it, and I thought, ‘Great.’”

Thankfully he has had “very few side effects” from treatment, other than shedding weight and some of his voice, which he admits has gone “foggy”.

Simon misplaced his mom to pancreatic cancer in 2000, and when he was just 11 years outdated his four-year-old sister Lucy died from a lacking chamber in her coronary heart.

For Simon, it was being away from his “endlessly stimulating” job that was the “worst part” about being in poor health. He moved to a grand home in the nation to recuperate, but said: “I realised there was absolutely nothing to do, which I hated.”