Oct 23, 2008 11:19 pm US/Eastern
Acclaimed Actress Lynn Redgrave Opens Up On Cancer
TOWSON, Md. (WJZ) ―
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Acclaimed actress Lynn Redgrave talks about her personal journey with breast cancer in Baltimore.
CBS
It's a form of cancer that strikes more than 180,000 people in the U.S. every year. It hits women of various ages, races and professions.
Kelly McPherson reports acclaimed actress Lynn Redgrave opened up about her personal journey with breast cancer in Towson.
Lynn Redgrave found out she had breast cancer in 2002.
She's now using her stage presence to spotlight one of the most trying years of her life.
Her daughter Annabel never thought she'd photograph her famous mother at some of her least photogenic moments, but she found those struggles turned into art.
Lynn and Annabel talked about their experience with breast cancer at St. Joseph Medical Center Thursday night.
"I was a basket case. I was four-years-old. I was sobbing and completely hopeless and so surprised at myself that I couldn't handle it," said Lynn. "I just fell apart, and that's when Annabel became the adult, and I became the child. And she shaved my head for me."
That raw emotion is helping others.
"It sent me back through my journey, but through the eyes of a movie star," said Loretta Lukowski, two year survivor of breast cancer.
She relates with every moment, like when a woman figures out she's become a patient.
"I'd never met her before, and she put her arms around me and said, 'good luck Ms. Redgrave.' And as she pulled away, she was crying. And that's when I knew it was really bad because if she was crying, and she doesn't know me, then the pictures must be saying more than I wished to acknowledge," said Lynn.
"It makes me feel like I can continue on in my journey, and it's a sisterhood. And we can all give each other support and do it together," said Lukowski.
Hope is the the essence of Lynn's story.
"Eighty-five percent of our patients, taking all comers at all stages, survive, and I think people don't realize that. They think breast cancer is a death sentence," said Dr. Michael Schulz, St. Joseph's Breast Center.
Instead, for this mother and daughter, their unexpected year in 2003 brought them closer together. And it's now comforting other women across the world.
"The end of the project should and would be her with her hair grown back and better. So I kind of tried to project this is what I want the end of it to be," said Annabel.
A general admission donation of $50 was taken for the event. Proceeds benefit the Breast Cancer Center at St. Joseph Medical Center.
(© MMX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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