Bruce Willis' wife reveals how he secretly continued acting amid dementia battle
Bruce Willis ' wife Emma Heming is opening up for the first time about how the action legend continued working on film sets even as his health quietly declined behind the scenes.
In her upcoming book The Unexpected Journey, out September 9, 2025, Heming shares intimate details about the extraordinary lengths taken to help Bruce remain in front of the camera as symptoms of frontotemporal dementia (FTD) began to take hold.
Emma, 46, reveals directors reduced his dialogue, and a close friend was brought in to discreetly feed him lines through an earpiece during filming, per The Daily Beast.
These strategies allowed the Die Hard star, now 70, to complete roles in movies like Assassin (2023) and the Detective Knight trilogy (2022–2023) without drawing public attention to his condition.
Willis' diagnosis was first revealed in 2022 as aphasia, a language disorder, but by February 2023, his family confirmed it had progressed into frontotemporal dementia (FTD)—a degenerative brain disease that impacts speech, behavior, and cognitive function.
Since then, Bruce has stepped out of the spotlight, with rare updates from his wife and daughters.
Emma and Bruce have been married since 2009 and share two daughters: Mabel, 12, and Evelyn, 10.
He also has three adult daughters with ex-wife Demi Moore — Rumer, 36, Scout, 32, and Tallulah, 30.
Earlier this spring, Rumer told Extra that her father is 'doing great,' adding, 'He's really good.'
Emma revealed on Instagram that she wrote the book to support others navigating a similar diagnosis, offering guidance to both patients and their loved ones.
'I really wrote the book that I wish someone had handed me the day we got our diagnosis with no hope, no direction … not much. Today life looks different for me and our family because I was able to put support into place,' she said.
She added, 'This isn't a memoir, it's a self-help guide for caregivers, written to hold space for our heartbreak and our healing.'
It comes after a 2022 report by the Los Angeles Times detailed the cognitive decline Willis displayed on movie sets before his aphasia battle forced him to retire.
In the three years leading up to his retirement, Willis appeared in 22 low-budget action films often referred to as 'geezer teasers.'
But behind the scenes, crew members began noticing troubling signs.
The action icon, once known for his commanding presence, had become increasingly confused on set, frequently requiring an earpiece to have his lines fed to him and sometimes struggling to remember why he was there.
'It was clear that he was not the Bruce I remembered,' said White Elephant director Jesse V. Johnson, who had known Willis since his stuntman days, told the LA Times.
During filming, Willis asked crew members, 'I know why you're here, and I know why you're here, but why am I here?' Johnson was told to complete Willis' scenes by lunch to avoid taxing him.
Other troubling moments were reported across multiple productions.
On the set of Hard Kill, at least two crew members said Willis misfired a gun loaded with blanks, missing his cue and putting castmates at risk.
Actress Lala Kent recalled one misfire during a scene where he was supposed to deliver a line before pulling the trigger.
'The first time, it was like, 'No big deal, let's reset,'' she said.
But when it happened again, she asked the director to remind him of the timing.
Other crew members confirmed the incident and noted they were always cautious to keep people out of the line of fire when Willis handled weapons.
Despite this, some close collaborators denied the gun misfires ever occurred. Producer Randall Emmett and the film's armorer both disputed the reports.
Still, concern among crews grew. The LA Times reported that nearly two dozen people who worked with Willis raised red flags about his health.
Willis' team took significant steps to accommodate his condition.
His roles were shortened, his shooting days capped at two, and he often worked only four hours a day.
In a June 2020 email, Out of Death director Mike Burns requested a last-minute rewrite: 'We need to knock down Bruce's page count by about five pages… and abbreviate his dialogue so that there are no monologues.'
Willis' struggles were visible to many.
On the set of American Siege in 2020, he was spotted wearing an earpiece—two years before his family publicly revealed his diagnosis of aphasia, a language disorder that later progressed into FTD.
Paradise City, filmed in Maui, was one of his final projects.
Director Chuck Russell praised his effort, saying he 'brought his A-game,' but others on previous sets, like White Elephant's production supervisor Terri Martin, painted a more somber picture: 'He just looked so lost… He always tried his best.'
Mike Burns, who worked with Willis again on Wrong Place, was told by one associate that Bruce was 'a whole different person' and in better shape than the previous year.
Still, the actor increasingly relied on stunt doubles for action sequences and needed extensive off-camera support.
Before his diagnosis, Willis had racked up more than 70 film credits since beginning his career in the 1970s.
He rose to fame on Moonlighting and became an international star as John McClane in Die Hard.
Beyond Die Hard, Willis left his mark with roles in Pulp Fiction, The Sixth Sense, Unbreakable, 12 Monkeys, and more—cementing himself as one of Hollywood's most bankable leading men.
He is now retired from acting, with his family periodically updating fans on Willis amid his dementia battle.
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