{"id":16823,"date":"2026-07-13T06:37:39","date_gmt":"2026-07-13T06:37:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/?p=16823"},"modified":"2026-07-13T06:37:39","modified_gmt":"2026-07-13T06:37:39","slug":"new-zealand-actor-sam-neill-dies-at-age-78-after-cancer-recovery-family-says","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/?p=16823","title":{"rendered":"New Zealand actor Sam Neill dies at age 78 after cancer recovery, family says"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<div id=\"beyondwords-wrapper\" data-layout-index=\"5\" class=\"beyondwords-wrapper\">\n<p><span class=\"label-bg\">NEW<\/span>You can now listen to Fox News articles!\n  <\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p data-layout-index=\"5\" class=\"speakable\">New Zealand actor Sam Neill died suddenly at age 78 on Monday after he recovered from cancer, his family announced.<\/p>\n<p data-layout-index=\"5\" class=\"speakable\">Neill was surrounded by family when he passed away.<\/p>\n<p data-layout-index=\"5\">&#8220;It is with immense sadness that the wh\u0101nau of Sam Neill share the news of his passing on Monday 13th July, in Sydney, Australia,&#8221; his family said in a statement shared on Neill&#8217;s Instagram page.<\/p>\n<div data-layout-index=\"5\" class=\"image-ct inline\">\n<div class=\"m\"><picture><source media=\"(max-width: 767px)\" srcset=\"https:\/\/a57.foxnews.com\/static.foxnews.com\/foxnews.com\/content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/343\/192\/samneil.jpg?ve=1&amp;tl=1, https:\/\/a57.foxnews.com\/static.foxnews.com\/foxnews.com\/content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/686\/384\/samneil.jpg?ve=1&amp;tl=1 2x\" height=\"192\" width=\"343\"><source media=\"(min-width: 768px) and (max-width: 1023px)\" srcset=\"https:\/\/a57.foxnews.com\/static.foxnews.com\/foxnews.com\/content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/672\/378\/samneil.jpg?ve=1&amp;tl=1, https:\/\/a57.foxnews.com\/static.foxnews.com\/foxnews.com\/content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/1344\/756\/samneil.jpg?ve=1&amp;tl=1 2x\" height=\"378\" width=\"672\"><source media=\"(min-width: 1024px) and (max-width: 1279px)\" srcset=\"https:\/\/a57.foxnews.com\/static.foxnews.com\/foxnews.com\/content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/931\/523\/samneil.jpg?ve=1&amp;tl=1, https:\/\/a57.foxnews.com\/static.foxnews.com\/foxnews.com\/content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/1862\/1046\/samneil.jpg?ve=1&amp;tl=1 2x\" height=\"523\" width=\"931\"><source media=\"(min-width: 1280px)\" srcset=\"https:\/\/a57.foxnews.com\/static.foxnews.com\/foxnews.com\/content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/720\/405\/samneil.jpg?ve=1&amp;tl=1, https:\/\/a57.foxnews.com\/static.foxnews.com\/foxnews.com\/content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/1440\/810\/samneil.jpg?ve=1&amp;tl=1 2x\" height=\"405\" width=\"720\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/a57.foxnews.com\/static.foxnews.com\/foxnews.com\/content\/uploads\/2023\/03\/1200\/675\/samneil.jpg?ve=1&amp;tl=1\" alt=\"Sam Neill\" width=\"1200\" height=\"675\"\/><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/div>\n<div class=\"info\">\n<div class=\"caption\">\n<p><span>New Zealand actor Sam Neill died suddenly at age 78 on Monday.<\/span> <span>(Manuel Romano\/NurPhoto via Getty Images)<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p data-layout-index=\"5\">&#8220;The loss was sudden and unexpected but blessed by the fact that Sam remained cancer free,&#8221; his family added.<\/p>\n<p data-layout-index=\"5\">The Jurassic Park actor announced in April he was cancer-free after undergoing treatment for stage-three blood cancer.<\/p>\n<p data-layout-index=\"5\"><i>Reuters contributed to this report.  <\/i><\/p>\n<p> <!----> <!----> <\/div>\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>NEWYou can now listen to Fox News articles! New Zealand actor Sam Neill died suddenly&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":16824,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16823","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sport"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16823","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=16823"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16823\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/16824"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=16823"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=16823"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/playball.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=16823"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}