John Candy knew he was going to die. He told me on his 40th birthday. He said, well, Maureen, I’m on borrowed time.

Maureen O’Hara recalls John Candy expressing a premonition about his early death, framing it as a sense of living “on borrowed time.” The remark suggests an awareness—whether medical, psychological, or intuitive—of mortality and the fragility of health, especially for someone whose public persona was exuberant and comedic. In O’Hara’s retelling, the line functions as a poignant contrast between Candy’s warmth and humor and a private apprehension about his lifespan. It also underscores how friends later interpret casual or half-joking comments as prophetic after an untimely death, turning a personal memory into a narrative of foreknowledge.