Goldie Hawn is back on the big screen next month in Snatched, her first movie since 2002’s The Banger Sisters. But the actress, 71, hasn’t been just sitting at home for the last 15 years. In a new chat with her daughter, Kate Hudson, for the May issue of Interview magazine, Hawn reveals why she decided to step back from Hollywood for more than a decade.
“It’s been 15 years since you’ve chosen to make a movie. Why so long?” Hudson, 38, asked her mom.
“Because I believe that life is about doing. It’s about changing. It’s about transitioning. I can’t imagine, as a human being, not being able to grow,” Hawn replied.
“When I turned 50, I asked some of my girlfriends, all actresses of the same age, ‘What are we going to do now?'” she continued. “I wanted to go live somewhere for a while, learn archaeology, or take part in healing the world on some level. I wanted to dig deep and say, ‘Who am I now? What do I have to offer? What do I have to learn?’ I started learning about the brain, psychology. And after 9/11, I decided, ‘I know what I’m going to do.'”
What she did was write two books, 2006’s Goldie: A Lotus Grows in the Mud and 2012’s 10 Mindful Minutes. Through her Hawn Foundation, she also started MindUP, a program to teach kids “social and emotional learning skills that link cognitive neuroscience, positive psychology and mindful awareness training,” according to the organization’s Facebook page.
“It’s now in Jordan, Serbia, the U.K., America, Canada, Hong Kong,” Hawn told Hudson of MindUP. “I never looked back. I never wished to be acting again. I was so engaged.”
Ultimately, of course, she did decide to lend her talents to Hollywood again. In Snatched, she and Amy Schumer play a mother-daughter duo whose exotic vacation goes horribly wrong. The movie hits theaters on May 12.
