Ananda Lewis died at the age of 52.
The former MTV VJ’s sister, Lakshmi, revealed her death in a Facebook post on Wednesday, June 11.
She tweeted, “She’s free, and in His heavenly arms,” accompanied by a succession of broken heart emojis and a black and white image of Lewis. “Lord, rest her soul 🙏🏽.”
Lewis rose to prominence in 1997 after being recruited as a VJ for MTV, where she hosted series such as Total Request Live and Hot Zone. In 1999, The New York Times described her as “the hip-hop generation’s reigning It Girl.” She quit MTV in 2001 to launch her talk program, The Ananda Lewis Program.
Lewis stated in a 2020 Instagram post that she has been diagnosed with stage 3 breast cancer. She stated that she had not been obtaining regular mammograms due to a concern about radiation. In October 2024, Lewis participated in a roundtable conversation with CNN’s Stephanie Elam (a college acquaintance) and CNN presenter Sara Sidner, during which she stated that she defied medical advice and did not have a double mastectomy after being diagnosed. Her tumor had metastasized, and her cancer had advanced to stage IV, she explained.
“Initially, my objective was to eliminate extra poisons from my body. I felt like my body was intelligent, which I know is true. “Our bodies are brilliantly made,” Lewis explained. “I chose to preserve my tumor and try to get it out of my body in a different way. I wish I could go back. I must confess where I went wrong with this.”
In an editorial published in Essence in January, Lewis emphasized that “prevention is the real cure” for cancer and advised women to be mindful of their bodies.
“We aren’t supposed to stay here forever.” We come into this life, have experiences, and then we leave,” she wrote. “Being honest with yourself transforms the way you choose to live. I do not want to endure for any longer than necessary. That is not a quality of life that interests me. When it’s time for me to depart, I want to be able to look back on my life and say, “I accomplished it precisely the way I wanted to.”
Lewis was born in L.A. in 1973. When she was two years old, her parents split, and she and her sister, Lakshmi, relocated to San Diego to live with their grandmother. Lewis told Teen People in 1999 about her tough childhood and adolescent relationship with her mother.
“Mom, devastated by the divorce and working hard to support two kids, was overwhelmed from the start,” Lewis told me. However, Lewis felt ignored and “built up a lot of resentment toward her.”
“By the time I was 10, I’d become a belligerent, rebellious kid, and my mother and I were fighting about everything,” she told me.
She attended an arts high school where she participated in school productions and volunteered. She secured a position as the anchor of BET’s Teen Summit in D.C. after graduating from Howard University in 1995. In one episode, she interviewed then-First Lady Hillary Clinton.
“That experience got me noticed at MTV, and in August of 1997, I moved to New York and started working there,” she told teenagers. Months before, in December 1996, she had reunited with her mother following a period of separation. “I decided to close the chapter on being hateful and resentful toward my mom and open a new one that focused on love, forgiveness, and appreciation for her,” she told me.
Lewis became one of MTV’s most popular hosts. “In the past, our talent was sometimes just pretty people who could read cue cards,” Bob Kusbit, then MTV’s senior vice president for production, told The New York Times in 1999 of her abilities. ”But when we took Ananda to MTV, we decided we were going to do a lot more live television, and I was most intrigued by her ability to handle live TV.”
Lewis interviewed several superstars, including Destiny’s Child, Brandy, NSYNC, Britney Spears, and many others. She also covered more serious themes for the network, such as school violence and the 2001 death of Aaliyah, a close friend.
In 2000, PEOPLE named Lewis one of the World’s 50 Most Beautiful People. She also makes regular appearances at celebrity gatherings. Even Prince was a big fan, telling The New York Times, “Ananda is Cleopatra.” “You know she is a queen.”
Lewis quit MTV in 2001 and began presenting her own chat program. “I wanted a change,” she said to Teen People at the time. “It was a matter of proving to myself that I can do [this].” The series aired for one season, beginning on September 10, 2001.
In an interview with Shondaland, Lewis reflected on the series, saying, “I wish I had told the people who wanted me to do the [talk] show, ‘Not yet, it’s a little too early.'” “It was overkill for me.” She expressed dissatisfaction with the show, adding, “It wasn’t what I felt like I signed up for.”
Lewis took a sabbatical from television before returning to anchor The Insider, an Entertainment Tonight spin-off. She has also been on Celebrity Mole: Yucatán, America’s Top Dog, and TLC’s While You Were Out. Lewis also became a contractor and carpenter.
MTV News will discontinue operations in 2023. In a statement to PEOPLE at the time, Lewis said, “A pillar of creative and diverse speech is crumbling.” MTV News exposed stories that no one else could. We were able to sneak inside the trailer with DMX and Korn as they toured famous performance venues. “Artists trusted MTV News to tell their stories.”
She went further: “Even though I was technically a VJ, I did many specials with MTV News and know firsthand what a huge loss this is for the culture of music and all who love it.”
Lewis and Harry Smith, Will Smith’s brother, had their son Langston in 2011.