Julia Louis-Dreyfus Speaks Out About Her Youngest Sister’s Death

“It was out of the blue,” Julia told the New Yorker about her sister’s passing. Emma, a social worker, was on a camping trip in August when she suffered a seizure and died. She was 44.

After her death, it was discovered that Emma had cocaine and alcohol in her system.

Some had interpreted the 57-year-old’s silence on her sister’s passing as a sign that the sisters were estranged, but Julia said that wasn’t true.

“Given the fact that that heinous s— came out, I would simply say I’ve kept this under wraps out of reverence for my dearest Emma,” Julia confessed.

“It’s been a very bad period of time,” Julia continued, tearing up.

In 2016, the Veep star cried at the Emmys while accepting her seventh award, revealing her father William had died two days earlier. “I’m so glad that he liked Veep because his opinion was the one that really mattered,” she said at the time.

The next year she won again, but got bad news the next day.. “Monday morning, I found out — it’s cancer,” she said. “I mean, is that crazy?” Veep went on hiatus while she went through treatment and will finally return this spring.

Julia is now in remission and moving forward with the help of her family. “When I was getting my hideous chemotherapy, I’d cram a bunch of family and friends into this tiny treatment room with me, and we really did have some great laughs,” she said when she accepted the Mark Twain Prize for American Humor earlier this year. “Of course, I was heavily medicated and slipping in and out of consciousness, so I was probably a pretty easy audience, but my point is that laughter is a basic human need, along with love and food and an HBO subscription."