Hospitalized Broadway star Nick Cordero awakens from coma after coronavirus, says wife

Tony Award-nominated Canadian actor Nick Cordero has awakened in a Los Angeles hospital after suffering complications from the novel coronavirus, according to a social media post from his wife.

"Nick, dada, is awake... He is awake, guys!" Amanda Kloots said in an update on Tuesday shared via Instagram Live.

"Nick is so weak right now, even opening his eyes, closing his eyes takes all of his energy," she continued in her post, adding that Cordero is following directions given from medical staff, "which means his mental status is coming back."

On March 31, the Hamilton, Ont.-raised actor entered the intensive care unit at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, where he was placed on a ventilator and in a medically induced coma. In April, doctors amputated part of his right leg after blood clotting issues arose during his treatment. 

Kloots has been keeping fans, friends and colleagues updated with daily posts via social media and said she'd been sending Cordero daily videos of her and their son, Elvis, so he could see them when he woke up.

She started a social media campaign urging fans to join a daily sing-a-long in his honour. A GoFundMe campaign started by friends has also raised more than $517,000 US to help pay for his treatment.

Cordero earned a Tony nomination for his turn as a mob soldier in Broadway's 2014 adaptation of Woody Allen's 1994 film Bullets Over Broadway. In Waitress, he originated the menacing role of Earl, the estranged husband of the lead character, a small-town waitress played by Jessie Mueller. Cordero also played the role of Sonny in Chazz Palminteri's A Bronx Tale. He moved to Los Angeles to star in Rock of Ages.

Cordero's other credits include appearing in several episodes of Blue Bloods and Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, Lilyhammer and the film Going in Style.