The Devil Wears Prada’s Stanley Tucci opens up about how cancer affected his mouth and voice

If you’ve watched The Devil Wears Prada 2 in the cinema, you may have wondered why Stanley Tucci’s voice sounds different from the first film. Stanley Tucci has spoken honestly about his battle with oral cancer, and the impact this had on him.

After experiencing throat pain in 2017, Stanley Tucci was diagnosed with oral cancer (oropharyngeal cancer). Doctors found a 3cm tumour at the base of his tongue. If a surgeon removed the tumour, there was a rick that Stanley would lose the ability to speak. Instead, he underwent radiation therapy and chemotherapy.

Stanley Tucci described his symptoms in his memoir Taste: My Life Through Food. He wrote: “It destroyed everything in my mouth.

“I had a feeding tube, not down my throat but in my stomach, for six months, and the recovery has been a long one.”

The treatment had several side effects, such as nausea and vertigo. Stanley Tucci explained to People: “Your mouth is just filled with ulcers, and it’s horrible. It’s truly horrible. At first, you can barely swallow.”

Thankfully, the treatment was successful, and doctors considered it was very unlikely that the tumour would return. However, the experience had a lasting impact on Stanley Tucci’s mouth and throat.

Several years after treatment, he still struggled to swallow some food such as steak. “For over two years my mouth was incredibly sensitive,” he wrote in his memoir, “I couldn’t drink anything carbonated and certainly could not eat anything spicy. I was able to drink and taste alcohol but mostly stuck to white wine with copious amounts of ice.”

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Featured image credit: 20th Century Fox / 20th Century Studios