A not-so-funny thing happened to Kate Beckinsale on her way to Sundance: Her appendix almost burst.
The actress, last seen on the big screen last fall in the action-horror flick Underworld, was preparing to fly to the Utah-based festival Saturday for the premiere of her new comedy Tiptoes when she fell ill at her Los Angeles home.
The actress collapsed with severe abdominal pain and was taken to Los Angeles' Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, where doctors diagnosed her with acute appendicitis and broke out the scalpels.
The surgery was successful, per Beckinsale's rep, and the suddenly appendix-less 30-year-old Brit should be back on her feet soon--which is definitely a good thing, since 2004 is shaping up to be a busy year.
Aside from the indie entry Tiptoes, a romantic comedy costarring Matthew McConaughey and Gary Oldman, Beckinsale recently wrapped filming of Martin Scorsese's Howard Hughes biopic The Aviator, opposite Leonardo DiCaprio. The film is due out in December.
Beckinsale will also star opposite Hugh Jackman in the monster mash-up movie Van Helsing, slated for a May 7 release.
She's also busy planning her wedding to director Len Wiseman. The two met during the filming of Underworld and became an item after Beckinsale split with Michael Sheen, her boyfriend of seven years and father of her four-year-old daughter, Lily. Beckinsale and Wiseman announced their engagement in June. There has been no word on a wedding date.
Beckinsale, whose credits also include Serendipity, Pearl Habor, Brokedown Palace and Last Days of Disco, will also collaborate with Wiseman on two sequels to Underworld that recount the ongoing battles between vampires and werewolves.