Actor Richard Dreyfuss Reveals Grim Diagnosis

Actor Richard Dreyfuss announced that he was diagnosed with bronchitis, which forced him to miss his SharkCon appearance celebrating his role in the film Jaws over the weekend.

‘Hello fellow cons,” Dreyfuss said in a video showing him covered in a Jaws blanket in a hospital bed shared by SharkCon's Instagram page. “I am very, very sorry to tell you that I’ve been diagnosed with, viral, er…What is it?”

"Bronchitis," his wife, Svetlana Erokhin, answered off-camera.

“I’ve been told by my doctors I cannot fly and I would have to fly five hours to get there. I’m terribly sorry because I had planned to be there and I had been looking forward to it, but I am unable to do so," Dreyfuss continued.

“I don’t want to get anyone else sick and I don’t want to get sicker myself," he added.

“I feel terrible about not showing up and I feel worse about exposing you to this apparently very viral illness,” Dreyfuss continued. “But there will be other times and I will make it my business to show up.”

Dreyfuss, 77, apologized again to the fans attending the Tampa event before adding “I want you all to feel very sorry for me, and very sorry for yourselves.”

“I’m in a lot of pain and that has to come first, my health,” he added. “I feel very good about having the time and enough health.”

“And such great fans!” Erokhin added, to which he agreed, “And such great fans.”

“We love you, we miss you all and we will see you soon,” Erokhin said.

SharkCon confirmed that "All prepaid autographs and photo ops will automatically be refunded" in the caption of the post. Dreyfuss is one of the few surviving members of the Jaws cast, which recently celebrated its 50th anniversary.

The actor is also best known for roles in Close Encounters of the Third Kind, What About Bob? and American Graffiti among numerous other films.