Cameron Diaz found 'peace in my soul' after quitting acting
Cameron Diaz says she found “peace” after walking away from her Hollywood career.
While chatting with her old pal Gwyneth Paltrow for a Goop Health segment, the There’s Something About Mary and Charlie’s Angels star, 47, talked about stepping back from making movies in 2014 and focusing on her personal life. Diaz welcomed daughter Raddix with husband Benji Madden in January.
Asked how it felt to retire from showbiz, Diaz — who’s been promoting her organic wine brand — said, “I got a peace in my soul because I finally was taking care of myself.”
Diaz said it may sound like “a strange thing to say. I know a lot of people won't understand it — I know you understand it — but it's so intense to work at that level and be that public and put yourself out there.”
Diaz, whose every move was tracked in the tabloids, said “there’s a lot of energy coming at you at all times when you're really visible as an actor and doing press and putting yourself out there.”
So she “stopped and really looked at my life,” Diaz said. “When you're making a movie, it’s a perfect excuse, they own you. You're there for 12 hours a day for months on end, you have no time for anything else.”
Diaz said she “handed off parts of my life to all these other people,” and she “had to basically take it back and take responsibility for my own life."
She said, “I really needed to know that I could take care of myself and that I knew how to be an adult.”
And to focus on her private life.
“I had been going so hard for so long, working, making films, and it’s such a grind. I didn't really make any space for my personal life,” Diaz said.
But in 2014, she started seeing musician Madden in 2014 and they married in a surprise ceremony the following year. The next few years was constant speculation over whether they’d have kids, and them keeping a low profile.
“We got married pretty much immediately because we both knew we just had to do it,” Diaz said. “We went hard for a few years where we just ironed [our relationship] out, hacked it out. It was a lot of work, but we had to.”
She said, “I'm older than him, not so much older, but he was at the place in his life too where he also wanted to do that as well.”
Raddix was born in January with Diaz recently saying that being a new mom is “the best part of my life.”
During the Goop chat, Diaz talked about how Paltrow — who has also largely stepped back from acting to focus on her lifestyle brand — used to give Diaz the business about having kids.
Diaz, who had long vowed not to marry or become a mom, recalled saying to Paltrow, “‘I’m not having kids.’ And you’re like, ‘You are having kids. You’re getting married. You’re having children.’ And I was like: ‘No, I’m not!’ And you’re like, ‘You have to do it. You have to.’”
Diaz said Paltrow was “just on me all the time” about it. “You were like, ‘You have to... If you don’t do this you will be so sad.' ... “I credit you so much with the fact that you never let up on me.”
Paltrow admitted she was “a pain in the a**” about it, but said, “I think I could see, and I knew what a natural mother you are. Some women aren’t, but you, I was like: ‘You’re born to do it.’”
That led Diaz to admit, “All of my: ‘I'm not going to do this’... I was just scared... I was afraid I wouldn't, you know, find a partner. I had no luck — you know,” referring to exes including Justin Timberlake, Matt Dillon, Jared Leto and Alex Rodriguez.
“Yeah, you had some real humdingers in there,” Paltrow quipped.
Diaz’s retirement from acting may not be permanent. Appearing on Makeup & Friends earlier this year, she said, "Look, I'm never going to say never. I'm not a person who says never about anything." And in an essay for InStyle last year, she said that this is what feels right to her right now.
Read more from Yahoo Entertainment:
