In a CBS interview, the 90-year-old actor discussed accepting his diagnosis, using humor and finding new ways to manage daily challenges. He also reflected on what he learned while working on M*A*S*H.
Actor Alan Alda said he tries to accept the reality of living with Parkinson’s disease without letting the diagnosis define him. In an interview on CBS Sunday Morning that aired Oct. 4, he described humor as one way of coping and joked that the condition was “just a hobby.”
Alda, 90, was diagnosed in 2015 and made the diagnosis public in 2018. He says he finds a new way to do something familiar almost every day. In a 2025 interview with People, he compared the process to a game: persevering through a small problem until he solves it gives him a sense of satisfaction. Accepting the disease, he said, does not mean allowing it to become the center of his life.
Alda began his career on Broadway and became widely known as surgeon Benjamin “Hawkeye” Pierce on M*A*S*H, which premiered in 1972 and ran for 11 seasons. He recalled that the character differed from him, though he tried to bring parts of himself to the role.
Alda said the most important lesson from the series was the value of human connection. During long breaks while crews adjusted lighting or sets, cast members stayed together, joked and talked; he said that connection carried onto the set. The show ended in 1983, and its finale became the most-watched television series finale in the United States at the time.
Alda won five Emmy Awards for M*A*S*H and received 21 nominations for acting, directing and writing on the series. He was also nominated for an Oscar for his role in Martin Scorsese’s The Aviator and later won a sixth Emmy for The West Wing. Doctors still tell him that M*A*S*H influenced their decision to enter medicine, he said.