Stanley Tucci reveals he lost his appetite while going through his cancer treatments: 'Everything tasted like wet cardboard'

Daily Mail ^ | 3 October 2021 | Brian Gallagher

[Trillian]

Stanley Tucci is opening up about his cancer treatments, and how he lost something very precious to him: his appetite.

The 60-year-old actor revealed in September that he was diagnosed with cancer three years earlier, after a tumor was found at the base of his tongue.

He revealed in a wide-ranging interview with New York Times that everything he ate during that time tasted like, 'wet cardboard slathered with someone's excrement.'

He added that his biggest fear was losing his sense of taste, adding, 'I mean, if you can’t eat and enjoy food, how are you going to enjoy everything else?'

'It was hard because I could taste everything, but I couldn’t necessarily swallow,” he added, recalling a time he tried a Florentina steak.

'I had to chew it for 10 minutes to get it down my throat … [sometimes] I just had to get rid of the food,' he added.

Still, despite this unfortunate condition, he didn't want to stop working on his CNN show Stanley Tucci: Searching For Italy.

'There was no way I wasn’t going to make it. I wanted to tell for a long time the story of Italy and the disparate cuisine in every region,' Tucci said.

The interview was to promote his new novel Taste: My Life Through Food, which will be published on Tuesday.

The book is described as an unconventional memoir where he writes about many things, including the dreadful food he's eaten on film sets.

'The only thing that makes Italian set catering bearable is that wine is always served. Tragic for a country that is a culinary oracle,' he said.

When asked why he didn't discuss his acting career at all in the book, Tucci added, 'All that’s terribly boring stuff.'

[Trillian]

I lost my sense of taste during cancer treatments. It took forever to get some, not all of it back. I had a huge loss of appetite and textures became much more important to me than usual.

[EEGator]

Hopefully both of you are doing well now.

[max americana]

I recommend his 1996 classic The Big Night set in the 1950’s as an owner of a small Italian restaurant just trying to survive.

[Trillian]

I have it on DVD. Primo e Secondo.

[digger48]

I lost mine after a stroke.

Lost a bunch of weight from not eating, and had another one.

Lost half my eyesight after that one

And stuff still tastes like crap

[entropy12]

I lost my appetite after Biden was certified b y the electoral college, fake votes and all.

[max americana]

hai buon gusto ;)

[Jonty30]

I have no idea who this person is.

[Trillian]

I’m feeling much better due to better meds. Awaiting thyroglobulin results in a week and will have an ultrasound soon. Too many new nodules popping up that my doctor and I are concerned about.

[Chode]

at one point, without the Magic mouthwash, i prolly would have starved...

[Trillian]

Is there anything that is at least comforting? I made a lot of mashed potatoes and breaded fried chicken the first few months. The crunchy chicken and creamy potatoes were very satisfying, even without taste. Now a lot of things just don’t taste the same or taste bad. I’ve stopped eating a lot of stuff I used to enjoy.

[Magic Fingers]

I have no idea who this person is.

---

Thanks for your contribution.

[Trillian]

What’s magic mouthwash?

[digger48]

I’ve never been big on Italian food, but oddly enough, it has enough flavor to suffice

But tomatoes from the garden taste like schitt

I just power through stuff so I don’t lose any more weight

Gone from 260 to 145 in 5 years. The last 30 lbs 2 months

[EEGator]

I wish you the best.

[Brandybux]

I lost my sense of taste during cancer treatments.

Yup. It's a common "adverse event" when receiving various forms of chemo.

Since June, I've had six week-long infusions of a cocktail of drugs for a rare, essentially incurable immune system cancer: Rituximab, Etoposide Phosphate, Prednisone, Vincristine Sulfate, Cyclophosphamide, and Doxorubicin Hydrochloride. In my case, the cyclophosphamide was wretched! For 72 hours after its infusion, my breath smelled like a recently bombed-out chemical refinery, so bad that I could smell my own breath so strongly, I had trouble falling asleep.

Taste? Water tasted like rancid and salty oil.

Eventually, things returned to normal.

[EEGator]

He's been in a ton of things.

https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001804/

[mass55th]

My friend’s husband was diagnosed with cancer of the larynx and pharynx over five years ago. He underwent extreme radiation treatments, along with chemo. My friend had to eventually feed him through a tube during his treatments. The main issue he has had since then, is that the radiation destroyed his salivary glands, so he has no spit at all. The doctor tried a few different medications, but nothing has worked. He has to make sure he drinks plenty of milk or soda when he eats, so the food will go down without any problem.

[Jonty30]

I have been to IMDB and looked him up, but I don’t watch tv. My main media entertainment has been mainstream movies.

Having said that, there are many character actors who have a talent for being in hundreds of productions but still remain unrecognizable to most of the population.

THese days, I’m not into movies either anymore.

[mass55th]

"I lost my appetite after Biden was certified b y the electoral college, fake votes and all."

I'd already lost 16 pounds over the last two years, and lost three more in the past six months. If I keep this up, I'll weigh what I did when I was a senior in high school 56 years ago...that, or I'll be dead.