Lars von Trier with Parkinson’s diagnosis

Lars von Trier has been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease, Zentropa announced. The production company, which von Trier co-founded with producer Peter Aalbæk Jensen in 1992, said the director is “in good spirits and being treated for his symptoms” as he continues to complete “The Kingdom Exodus,” the forthcoming third and final season of his ” The Kingdom series.

Zentropa added that von Trier will be attending limited press events for the series when it releases later this year. The Kingdom Exodus has its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival. Mubi announced in July that it had secured distribution rights for the television season in North America, the UK and Ireland, Latin America, Turkey and India.

The Kingdom Exodus concludes the director’s controversial TV series, which first premiered on Danish public broadcaster DR in 1994. The series follows the staff and patients of a neurosurgical ward in a Copenhagen hospital. In Season 3, sleepwalker Karen seeks answers to the series’ unsolved questions in order to save the hospital from collapse. “The gates to the kingdom open once more…” teases an official synopsis for the series.

The new season’s cast includes Mikael Persbrandt, Lars Mikkelsen, Nikolaj Lie Kaas, Tuva Novotny and David Dencik, with guest starring Alexander Skarsgård and David Dencik.

Von Trier co-wrote The Kingdom Exodus with Niels Vørsel. The two previously written earlier seasons of the show. Other works by von Trier include The House That Jack Built (2018), Nymphomaniac (2014), Melancholia (2011) and Dogville (2004). His 2000 musical Dancer in the Dark, starring Björk, won the Palme d’Or at the Cannes Film Festival.

The Danish filmmaker was banned from the Cannes Film Festival for seven years in 2011 for declaring at a “Melancholia” press conference that he “sympathized” with Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler.