'Sharing Miracles' Television Program to Feature Emmy Award-Winning Actor Joey ...( WASHINGTON April 2 2008 -- This ...),Health

WASHINGTON, April 2, 2008 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- This month, Sharing Miracles - a 30-minute public affairs television program that tells the compelling and inspirational stories of real patients - will feature Joey Pantoliano, an Emmy Award-winning actor, writer and producer who suffers from mental depression.

Pantoliano is one of the best-known character actors in Hollywood, appearing in more than 100 movies and television shows. But he is probably best known for his critically acclaimed and Emmy award-winning performance as psychopathic mobster Ralphie Cifaretto on The Sopranos. His lengthy movie credits include Risky Business, The Matrix, The Fugitive, U.S. Marshals, Bad Boys, Empire of the Sun, Running Scared and The Goonies, among others.

In his most recent film, Canvas, Pantoliano plays a husband trying to hold his family together while his wife, portrayed by Oscar-winning actress Marcia Gay Harden, battles with schizophrenia.

Making the film helped him come to terms with his own depression, a condition he revealed he has been suffering from for more than a decade. Rather than hide his struggle from the public, Pantoliano has chosen to speak out about his disease, and founded the organization No Kidding, Me Too! (http://www.nkm2.org) to help remove the isolation and stigma that often surrounds mental illnesses.

In this month's Sharing Miracles show, Pantoliano speaks of the pain he endured because of his undiagnosed and untreated depression: "Here I was, winning an Emmy award for a performance in one of the best shows that television has ever produced, and I couldn't feel good. I couldn't feel the love of my children or the love of my wife."

However, he also spoke of the change in his life now that he is successfully treating his depression through a variety of means, such as therapy, exercise and medication: "I like to say that I live with clinical depressi
'/>"/>