Emma Heming addresses backlash over 'letting' ailing Bruce Willis work

Emma Heming Willis is addressing the backlash over letting her ailing husband, Bruce Willis, make movies while he was struggling with aphasia, an impairment of communication and processing language.

In March 2022, Bruce was diagnosed with aphasia, and the family released a statement announcing that he would stop working. Before the diagnosis, the Die Hard actor had been acting with the help of an earpiece feeding him his lines.

At the time, there was backlash over having let the actor work until then. Addressing that in a Vanity Fair interview, Emma said, "When someone wants to work. How do you stop someone from working?"

"He loved what he did," she continued. "I’m happy that he was able to do it for as long as he was able to do it."

Elsewhere in the interview, the author and model shared insight into the time when Bruce began suffering from frontotemporal dementia, which has now left the actor with memory, speaking, and understanding impairment.

In the beginning, Emma noticed a shift in the The Sixth Sense star’s behavior. For the unversed, FTD often manifests as rude or insensitive behavior. Emma thought the marriage was falling apart and she’d have to get a divorce from the actor.

"I felt like my marriage was crumbling," she shared.

The change in her husband’s attitude left Emma shocked. "What is going on? This is not the person that I married. Something is just so off. And I just couldn’t figure it out," she recalled.

Bruce thought there was nothing wrong with him, and the author had to go over his head and directly consult his doctor, which is how they ultimately got his diagnosis. 

Bruce Willis and Emma Heming tied the knot in 2009 and share two daughters, Mabel and Evelyn Willis.