Dana Carvey is taking a break from work and social media, he announced on Instagram this weekend, as he thanked people for their support after the death of his son, Dex, who died Wednesday night.
Carvey and his wife Paula Zwagerman said Dex, 32, died of an “accidental drug overdose.”
In an Instagram post Saturday, Dana Carvey said he and Zwagerman “have been overwhelmed by your love, your personal stories, your compassion.”
“We received so many beautiful messages from people who knew Dex,” he wrote. “These touched us more than we could ever express in words.”
And now, Carvey said, he will be “taking a break from work and social media — trying to figure out what life looks like now that we are a family of 3.”
Carvey and Zwagerman have a younger son, Thomas.
“We will heal the best we can and carry on,” he added. “Our darling Dex would have wanted it that way.”
Announcing Dex’s death on X (formerly Twitter), Carvey and Zwagerman said in a signed post, “Dex packed a lot into those 32 years. He was extremely talented at so many things — music, art, filmmaking, comedy — and pursued all of them passionately.”
“It’s not an exaggeration to say that Dex loved life,” the post continued. “And when you were with him, you loved life too. He made everything fun.”
Dex was a comedian who opened for his father’s 2016 Netflix special Straight White Male and appeared in the 2013 miniseries The Funster and 2015 movie Joe Dirt 2.
Also Saturday, Carvey’s Saturday Night Live family appeared to show their support, with “Weekend Update” co-anchor Colin Jost holding up a sign at the end of the show that read “We love you, Dana and Paula.”
