American actor and rapper Donald Glover, who performs as Childish Gambino, revealed on stage during a concert that he had a stroke last year.
While performing at Tyler, the Creator’s Camp Flog Gnaw festival in Los Angeles on Saturday night, Glover opened up about the reason he had to cancel his tour not long after it began in 2024.
“I had a really bad pain in my head in Louisiana and I did the show anyway,” Glover said on stage. “I couldn’t really see well, so when we went to Houston, I went to the hospital and the doctor was like, ‘You had a stroke.'”
About a month after his New World tour began in August 2024, Glover postponed the tour, and then later cancelled the remaining dates, citing health issues.
During his performance on Saturday, Glover, 42, sat down on the stage as slow music continued in the background, videos widely shared on social media show.
Glover – who is famous for both his music and his acting roles in shows like Community, Atlanta, and Mr and Mrs Smith – joked that he was copying fellow US actor and comedian Jamie Foxx, who suffered a stroke in 2023 that also at first presented as a bad headache.
On stage, Glover then turned more serious, telling the crowd that when he first found out he had had a stroke, he felt like he was letting everyone down. Specifically, he said, he had always promised to perform in Ireland, but he still hasn’t been able to.
Glover added that doctors also found a hole in his heart, so he had to have two surgeries.
“They say everybody has two lives and the second life starts when you realise you have one,” Glover said.
“You got one life, guys, and I gotta be honest, the life I’ve lived with you guys has been such a blessing,” he told fans.
When Glover first postponed his world tour in September 2024, he wrote on social media that he had to focus on his “physical health for a few weeks”, but still urged his fans to hang onto their tickets. But a month later, Glover announced he was forced to cancel the rest of the tour because of an “ailment” that required tests, surgery, and “time out to heal”.
“As my wife says, which I love, ‘If this life is the flavour, as soon as I’m done, give me another scoop'”, Glover told the crowd on Saturday after revealing his medical struggles.
