Ryan Reynolds grants terminally ill 5-year-old’s wish to meet Deadpool (video)
Actors unknowingly touch the lives of many on screen, but it’s pretty rare that people get to have a personal interaction with a Hollywood star—especially one as meaningful and touching as this one: Ryan Reynolds recently granted a terminally ill 5-year-old boy‘s wish to meet Deadpool.
The actor gave Daniel Downing a phone call, but the boy quickly asked if they could switch to FaceTime. Reynolds enthusiastically agreed to do so, and the two were video chatting in no time!
Reynolds took advantage of the video aspect and decided to give Downing a quick tour of the “Deadpool 2” set while the two talked.
Daniel, of course, seemed extremely excited to have a chance to talk with the actor and tour the set of the movie. According to his mom, this was just the kind of pick-me-up he needed.
“I’m so happy for Daniel—it’s something he wouldn’t normally have been able to do and he was so excited. He told all his friends and his teachers,” Daniel’s mom, Stephanie, told U.K. news source The Herald. “It’s nice to see him so excited because he has been a bit down lately.”
Daniel was recently diagnosed with an inoperable brain tumor and has only been given nine months to live. While the little boy admitted he’s been doing “poorly” lately, you can tell in the video that this phone call got him plenty excited and really was a very special moment.
Both Reynolds and his wife, Blake Lively, have a soft spot for kids, so it’s not surprising that the actor wanted to take the time to talk with Daniel. Lively works to put an end to child pornography in partnership with the Child Rescue Coalition.
“I didn’t really know what child pornography was, I was afraid to ask what it was, as a mother, because it would be painful to hear,” she said in a speech given at Variety’s Power of Women event. “But I felt I had to ask, and I wanted to share with you. It is the truth, and I believe if we all knew this, we would dedicate much more of ourselves to stopping it.”
Together, this couple make quite the team in their efforts to make children’s lives better.
If you’d like to aid Downing and his family, you can donate to their crowdfunding page to help make the next few months memorable for Daniel.