Al Pacino opens up about near-death experience with Covid: ‘I didn’t have a pulse’

Al Pacino said a bad case of Covid-19 almost cost him his life in 2020.

Four years ago, amid the unprecedented pandemic, the 84-year-old Hollywood star had a near-death experience when he contracted the infectious disease.

In conversation with The New York Times, Pacino detailed the time his doctors weren’t sure if he would make it in tandem with the topic of aging. The Scarface lead called aging “absurd” and “crazy,” arguing he didn’t know what it really was.

“I sometimes think, why can’t I find some steroids that won’t kill me? I took some when I had bad Covid,” he told the outlet in the interview published on October 5.

Reflecting on the harrowing experience, Pacino remembered being unable to find his pulse at one point. He noted: “They said my pulse was gone. It was so — you’re here, you’re not. I thought: ‘Wow, you don’t even have your memories. You have nothing. Strange porridge.’”

open image in gallery

The on-screen legend knew he was “unusually not good” when he took his temperature and saw his fever spike and became severely dehydrated. In fact, his dehydration was so bad, he needed to hire a nurse to assist him.

“So I got someone to get me a nurse to hydrate me. I was sitting there in my house, and I was gone. Like that. I didn’t have a pulse,” he explained. “In a matter of minutes they were there — the ambulance in front of my house.”

Pacino continued: “I had about six paramedics in that living room, and there were two doctors, and they had these outfits on that looked like they were from outer space or something.”

As he went in and out of consciousness, Pacino was shocked to see the staff of people surrounding him saying, “He’s back. He’s here.” The near-death experience sent The Godfather actor into deep reflection. Ultimately, Pacino concluded what he went through might actually be beneficial for him as an actor.

“As Hamlet says, ‘To be or not to be’; ‘The undiscovered country from whose bourn, no traveler returns.’ And he says two words: ‘No more.’ It was no more. You’re gone,” Pacino said. “I’d never thought about it in my life. But you know actors: It sounds good to say I died once. What is it when there’s no more?”

Death to him now is not something to be fearful of as it’s inevitable.

Pacino has four children – Julie, 34, Anton, 23, Olivia 23, and Roman, one. He welcomed his youngest son with his 29-year-old girlfriend, Noor Alfallah, in June 23. Pacino shares Anton and Olivia with his ex-wife Beverly D’Angelo. He welcomed his oldest, Julie, with Jan Tarrant in 1989.

The movie regular is set to release his new memoir, Sonny Boy: A Memoir, in late October. The book details his rise to fame after starring in New York’s “avant-garde theater” for several years and his upbringing in the South Bronx with his mom, Rose.