Jamie Foxx shares rare details of 2023 collapse, says he was 'moments from death'
Jamie Foxx was "moments from death" after he collapsed in an elevator in a hotel in April 2023, but it was his daughter's singing that brought him back to life.
"It was just pure exhaustion. His body was just exhausted due to him getting up there in age, and his body just faltering out on him," said Demecos Chambers, who attended an October taping of Jamie's new comedy special in Atlanta, which will stream on Netflix on Tuesday, December 10.
"When he passed out, he thought he was just out for a few moments," the audience member told People. "He basically passed out in an elevator and he thought he woke up a couple hours later. Well, he was actually in a coma and didn’t wake up until a few weeks later."
Jamie Foxx: What Had Happened Was… is a stand-up comedy special, despite the emotional material, and Jamie also shared that during his time in the coma one of his daughters was "playing one of their favorite songs" on the guitar, and that it was "the only thing that he could recall hearing in his sleep, and it brought him essentially out of his coma".
Jamie is father to daughters Corinne and Anelise,
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After, he was admitted to a rehab facility and Jamie "had to start from day one" when it came to relearning his motor skills, or the ability to move muscles to perform tasks.
At the time Jamie was filming the Netflix film Back in Action, which he stars alongside Cameron Diaz; it resumed the film in January 2024.
Jamie and his family have kept the details of his medical crisis private in the year since, but in July he told fans at an event in Phoenix that he had "asked for Advil, and the next thing I knew, I woke up almost three weeks later with no memory of what had happened".
After filming the special, the Oscar winner shared two photos of himself on stage, one of which saw him wiping away tears from his eyes, alongside a poignant message.
He began: "God is good…. As I post these pictures, my heart and my soul is filled with nothing but pure joy…on October 3 fourth and fifth I had an opportunity to tell my side of the story and there was no better place than Atlanta Georgia.
"I have to thank you Atlanta you showed up and you showed out, I haven't been on stage in 18 years but I needed the stage and I needed an audience that was made up of nothing but pure love and that's what you were."
He continued: "When people ask me, 'Is this a stand-up comedy show?' I say, 'no it's an artistic explanation of something that went terribly wrong.' But thanks to the great people in Atlanta, especially Piedmont Hospital, you enabled me to come back and be on stage and do what I love to do the most."
