In the hills above the Sunset Strip, far from red carpets and courtrooms, a very different Johnny Depp story was unfolding. As Eric Dane faced an ALS diagnosis and mounting financial worry, a friend with global name recognition quietly offered him a home.
TLDR
In the months before actor Eric Dane’s death from ALS, Johnny Depp reportedly let him live rent-free in a Los Angeles home, while Dane’s loved ones and advocates highlighted his work raising awareness of the disease.
According to reporting shared by Daily Mail from the New York Post’s Page Six column, Depp opened one of his Los Angeles properties to the “Grey’s Anatomy” star in the final stretch of Dane’s life. The arrangement was not a splashy public gesture. It was, sources say, a private effort to remove at least one burden from a friend running out of time.
A Quiet Gift in the Hills
Dane and Depp met years earlier through mutual friends, long before ALS entered the conversation. As amyotrophic lateral sclerosis began to reshape Dane’s life, that connection reportedly took on a new meaning.
A source quoted by Page Six, as relayed by Daily Mail, said Depp allowed Dane to move into one of his homes above the Sunset Strip, easing a growing financial strain that can come with serious illness and reduced work.
The insider described how Depp tried to lift one worry from Dane’s shoulders. “Eric had one less thing to worry about,” the source said, explaining that Dane was “living basically rent-free in one of the homes Johnny owns above the Sunset Strip.” According to the account, Depp told him to contribute whatever he could, or could not, toward rent.
The source added that “Johnny wanted to do what he could to ease the financial burden.” Daily Mail reported that Depp’s representatives were contacted for comment on the story.
For Depp, a star whose public image has been shaped in recent years by legal battles and intense scrutiny, the portrait here is different. It is not about spectacle. It is about a private act of generosity toward another actor navigating a diagnosis that rarely offers easy outcomes.
Inside Dane’s Final Months
Dane, best known to millions as Dr. Mark “McSteamy” Sloan on “Grey’s Anatomy” and later for his unflinching turn on “Euphoria,” publicly shared his ALS diagnosis approximately ten months before his death at age 53, according to Daily Mail.
ALS, also known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease, attacks nerve cells in the brain and spinal cord. Over time, it robs patients of the ability to move, speak, swallow, and eventually breathe. The Mayo Clinic notes that life expectancy after diagnosis often ranges from three to five years, although the disease can progress more quickly or more slowly.
In Dane’s case, the decline was described as swift and painful. Daily Mail reports that in one of his final interviews, he called ALS “something so horrible,” a plain-spoken description of a condition that quietly devastates families.
His family announced his death with a statement shared with People, quoted by outlets including Daily Mail. “With heavy hearts, we share that Eric Dane passed on Thursday afternoon following a courageous battle with ALS,” the family said.
They described a deeply intimate final chapter. “He spent his final days surrounded by dear friends, his devoted wife, and his two beautiful daughters, Billie and Georgia, who were the center of his world,” the statement continued. The family noted that throughout his journey with ALS, Dane became “a passionate advocate for awareness and research, determined to make a difference for others facing the same fight.”
They added that he “will be deeply missed, and lovingly remembered always,” and that Dane “adored his fans and is forever grateful for the outpouring of love and support” he received. The family asked for privacy as they navigated what they described as an impossible time.
Rebecca Gayheart Redefined Family
Behind the public headlines about diagnosis and advocacy was a complicated, enduring love story. Dane’s ex-wife, actress Rebecca Gayheart, emerged as one of his closest allies in his final years, blurring the traditional boundaries of exes and redefining what it means to remain a family after divorce.
Their lives first intersected in the early 2000s. Gayheart, familiar to a generation of viewers from “Beverly Hills, 90210” and “Nip/Tuck,” was already an established face. Dane, by contrast, was still climbing. He had stacked guest spots on shows like “Saved by the Bell,” “The Wonder Years,” and “Roseanne,” inching his way toward the role that would catapult him into the pop culture bloodstream.
Marriage, children, and the heat of network stardom followed. The couple welcomed two daughters, Billie and Georgia, who would later be named at the heart of his family’s farewell statement.
By 2018, the marriage had run its course. Gayheart filed for divorce after roughly 14 years together, and public coverage framed it as the end of a Hollywood partnership that had seemed unusually stable.
Then came Dane’s ALS diagnosis. According to Daily Mail, that moment became an unexpected turning point. Gayheart reportedly halted the divorce process and recommitted to being by his side as a confidante, co-parent, and caregiver.
Speaking to E! around the time of his public announcement, Gayheart offered a rare glimpse into how they had chosen to move forward as a modern, reconfigured family. “We are best of friends. We are really close. We are great co-parents,” she said.
She explained that they had “really figured out the formula to staying a family” even as their romantic relationship ended. “I think our kids are benefiting greatly from it and we are as well,” she added.
In the context of Dane’s illness, those words read less like a platitude and more like a roadmap. The image that emerges is of an ex-wife who refused to abandon the man she had once built a life with, even after the legal framework of that life fell away.
An ALS Advocate’s Final Legacy
As Dane’s health declined, he did not retreat completely from the public eye. Instead, he chose to confront ALS in the open, using his platform to bring attention to a disease that is still searching for more effective treatments and, one day, a cure.
The ALS Network honored him publicly for that choice. In a tribute shared on social media and quoted by Daily Mail, the organization remembered Dane as a figure “whose courage in the face of ALS inspired millions.”
“After publicly sharing his diagnosis, Eric used his voice to raise awareness, reduce stigma, and shine a global spotlight on the urgent need for treatments and cures,” a representative wrote. The group noted that it had named him its 2025 Advocate of the Year and said his “strength, honesty, and compassion” helped the world better understand what families living with ALS endure every day.
The ALS Network extended “heartfelt condolences to his loved ones and to all who were touched by his advocacy,” adding that his impact on the ALS community “will not be forgotten.”
Taken together, these threads paint a fuller picture of Dane’s final chapter. There is the actor who once embodied a swaggering surgeon on one of television’s biggest dramas, now using his real-life vulnerability to educate others. There is the ex-wife who stepped back into the center of his world when it mattered most. There is the megastar colleague who, sources say, quietly opened a home so rent would not be the loudest worry in the room.
For fans who followed Dane from “Grey’s Anatomy” to later work, and for viewers who formed their own memories around Depp’s films, the story reaches beyond Hollywood myth. It is about how reputations, families, and friendships behave when the cameras pull back and a diagnosis redraws the script.
In the end, the public will remember Eric Dane as more than a character on a medical drama. His final years suggest a man who turned a personal nightmare into a platform for change, surrounded by people who refused to let him face it alone.
Join the Discussion
How does hearing about the private support and evolving family dynamics around Eric Dane’s final years influence the way you think about friendship, legacy, and love in the face of serious illness?
