LOS ANGELES, (Reuters) – Michael Douglas said yesterday he felt optimistic about recovering from throat cancer  but drew gasps when he told a television audience he had the  most advanced stage.

The 65-year-old “Wall Street” actor told TV talk-show host  David Letterman that a biopsy indicated that his cancer was at  stage IV, which he described as “intense, and so they’ve got to  go at it …”

Letterman asked whether stage IV was a good diagnosis.

“Um no,” Douglas replied, according to a transcript  provided by CBS’ “Late Show with David Letterman.”

Stage IV cancer has spread far beyond the original tumor  and is usually impossible to cure.

“No, you like to be down at stage I … but it has not —  the big thing you’re always worried about is it spreading …  and the expectations are good …

“The percentages are very good,” Douglas added. “I would  hate to say, but right now, it looks like it should be 80  percent, and with certain hospitals and everything, it does  improve.”

According to the National Cancer Institute, patients with  stage IV head and neck caner usually undergo surgery, radiation  and chemotherapy.

Douglas told Letterman that his cancer was caused by his  drinking and smoking.

He said his throat had been bothering him for a while, and  a multitude of doctors put him through a battery of tests in  the early summer, but had found nothing.

After a summer break, he underwent a biopsy, which revealed  his advanced cancer.

He expressed frustration with the doctors who could not  find anything, “because I was on it early in the summer and  started complaining about something, but they couldn’t see it  then.”

Douglas is married to actress Catherine Zeta-Jones, with  whom he has two children, Dylan, 10, and Carys, 7.