No amount of PR spend could have brought Catherine Zeta-Jones the fund of sympathy and goodwill she has received after announcing she was being treated for bipolar disorder. Mental health charities congratulated her on her courage in speaking up, and even the red-top tabloids treated her with dignity.
It's only eight years since the Sun's front page screamed, "Bonkers Bruno locked up", after the former boxer Frank Bruno suffered a breakdown and was sectioned under the Mental Health Act. On Thursday the tone reserved for reporting Zeta-Jones's illness was very different: "Bipolar Zeta in clinic five days – star's depression after Michael's cancer fight," said a much more muted Sun.
Zeta-Jones, 41, came to prominence 20 years ago in the bucolic TV comedy about the Larkin family, The Darling Buds of May. Born in Swansea to a seamstress mother and sweet factory-owning father, from the off she looked destined for Hollywood.
And so it proved. Not only did she go on to star in movies such as The Mask of Zorro and Traffic, she also married leading Hollywood player Michael Douglas in 2000. They were the showbiz dream team, a source of endless stories (their 25-year age difference, their combined wealth, her looks, his drug addictions – and then there were the movies). They sold pictures of their marriage to OK! for £1.5m, and even that resulted in a dramatic court case when Hello! ran the pictures without permission.
Zeta-Jones's film career peaked in 2003 when she won the best supporting actress Oscar for her performance as Velma Kelly in Chicago. But there has been plenty of well-documented turbulence in her life too. In 2004 Dawnette Knight, who had been infatuated with Douglas, was jailed after stalking Zeta-Jones – she sent letters telling her she would die like John F Kennedy or Manson Family victim Sharon Tate. "This has affected me and it will affect me the rest of my life," Zeta-Jones testified. "I felt like a ticking timebomb."
There were also rumours in 2007 that her marriage was creaking, and last August it was revealed that Douglas, with whom she has two children, had stage IV throat cancer.
Even in her earlier 20s, there had been hints all was not well. In 1993 after splitting from Blue Peter presenter John Leslie, she said: "I get very lonely and think nobody wants me any more. I can't take a bus or tube on my own any more. It terrifies me. I get all panicked." Last year she admitted to fighting depression: "I try and stay positive because I don't just bring myself down, I bring everyone else down."
This week Zeta-Jones issued a statement that she had spent five days in a psychiatric hospital in Connecticut being treated for bipolar disorder, also known as manic depression. She is said to have struggled with stress after Douglas's cancer diagnosis. Her spokeswoman said: "After dealing with the stress of the past year, Catherine made the decision to check into a mental health facility for a brief stay to treat her bipolar II disorder."
The announcement that she is suffering from bipolar II – a form of manic depression in which the ups are not as high as with bipolar I – was welcomed by mental health organisations. In recent years, celebrities such as Stephen Fry, Paul Gascoigne and Ruby Wax have helped to normalise depression and bipolar disorder.
Marjorie Wallace, chief executive of the mental health charity Sane, said: "[Zeta-Jones's announcement] will have a huge impact on [people] recognising mental illness is a condition that everyone can suffer from. The importance is for people to accept it's a treatable illness rather than live with it for years so that they become more and more sucked into a downward spiral and at risk of suicide."
Bipolar disorder is estimated to affect up to 2.4 million people in the UK, and sufferers are estimated to be 10 times more likely to kill themselves than the rest of the population. The average time for seeking help is 4.5 years, and a US survey showed that it took an average of 10.2 years for correct diagnosis and treatment. Although bipolar disorder is often first experienced in the teens or 20s, trauma can often tip sufferers into a crisis.
"I think with the diagnosis and accepting the need for treatment, Catherine will feel liberated and believe that things can improve," Wallace said. "Whereas those with bipolar I tend to experience severe mania as well as severe depression, bipolar II presents more as depression, feelings of sadness, hopelessness and guilt."
Sue Baker, director of Time to Change, a campaign to end the discrimination surrounding mental health problems, said Zeta-Jones's statement would make it easier for others to admit to their illness. "We already know the impact of Stephen Fry's documentary and how that helped people discuss the issue more openly."
The danger, she said, is that members of the public start to believe depression or bipolar disorder is something only suffered by famous or creative people. "It can almost seem that this is the price of success, which is nonsense. Major life changes can have an impact on anybody's mental health and wellbeing."
Time to Change and Sane say that while celebrities are more willing to publicise mental health problems, there is still a stigma in many walks of life. "We want to see people in key public positions coming forward, feeling more able to talk about it," Baker said. "The former prime minister of Norway, Kjell Magne Bondevik, got re-elected with an even higher majority once he disclosed he'd had to step back for a couple of months because he'd been experiencing depression."
Yet for British politicians admitting to depression or bipolar disorder is still taboo. "A confidential survey carried out by the all-party parliamentary mental health group showed one in five politicians had experienced a mental health problem but how many of them have actually talked about it?" said Baker.
"As the law stands at the moment if you're a sitting MP and you get sectioned, you wouldn't be able to remain an MP. For me that is the very height of discrimination."Zeta-Jones, meanwhile, seems on the road to recovery after her brief stay in the Silver Hill clinic in Connecticut. Her spokeswoman said: "She's feeling great and looking forward to starting work on her two upcoming films."
