Glee star Lea Michele Sarfati speaks out months after the death of her on-screen and off-screen boyfriend Cory Monteith in honor of the tribute episode airing on Wednesday.
Monteith overdosed two months ago due to a combination of heroin and champagne, according to multiple reports. "Glee" creators decided to address the actor's accidental death by honoring his character Finn.
To Lea, the episode dubbed "The Quarterback" was therapeutic during a difficult time, according to PerezHilton.com.
"For me personally, I've lost two people: Cory and Finn. We had a beautiful memorial for Cory in the auditorium and some of the cast members sang and people spoke about him. It only felt right that we would do the same thing for Finn, so I felt it was very therapeutic," Lea said.
"Everyone is asking: 'Is it hard to do this? Is it hard to be back at work?', but the truth is it's no harder at work than it is in life," she added. "So we might as well all be together as a family supporting each other to get through this together."
Through all the pain Lea has experienced associated with the loss of Monteith, she consider herself "lucky" to have shared time with him in her life.
"I woke up every single day feeling like I was in some sort of spell or something, that I was lucky enough to have him in my life. There was no greater man than Cory, so for the time we spent together, c," she said.
Show's creator Ryan Murphy told E! News filming the tribute episode was very difficult.
"It was really emotional because I really loved Cory. And Brad [Falchuck] and I and Ian Brennan, who created Glee, all had very close, good relationships with him," Murphy said. "He passed away not so long ago, and we sort of were in a position where, what do you do when that happens? So we chose to write a tribute, not just to the character Finn that he played, but to Cory."
