Jackie Stilton: Last News

Glamour. Though Bayer has never faked her diagnosis, she was inspired by her own experience with a less explored side of sickness. “I used to take full advantage of the perks of it,” Bayer explains.

, Vanessa Bayer has co-created and is starring in her first original series,, which is loosely inspired by the actress’ own childhood battle with acute lymphoblastic leukemia. On the Showtime comedy, Bayer plays an aspiring home-shopping program host named Joanna Gold, who has overcome her own childhood battle with cancer and is determined to be a top seller like her idol, longtime SVN host Jackie Stilton (Molly Shannon). But when her job at SVN is on the line, she says that her cancer has returned, much to the surprise of her colleagues as well as her own parents, played by Bess Armstrong and Matt Malloy. “This character had childhood leukemia and I had childhood leukemia,” Bayer tells ET, explaining that she always wanted to write something about that time in her life because not only was it a difficult time but it proved to be interesting and darkly funny, especially in the way she was treated.