Though show business links these men, they share another connection. Each has died in recent months of prostate cancer. The American Cancer Society says prostate cancer will strike 200,000 U.S. men this year, twice the number of male lung cancer cases. Some 38,000 will die.
Public notice is something new to prostate cancer.
For years, men didn't worry much about the disease. They typically thought of it as a slow-moving condition that affects men well past retirement, when they are likely to die of something else before succumbing to cancer. In many cases, that's still true. More than 75 percent of cases are in men 65 and older. But, like Bixby, who was 59 when he died, and Zappa, who was 52, younger men also can fall victim.