Drew Barrymore: ‘I Had Let Myself Go'

Drew Barrymore felt like a zombie. Then playing one helped snap her back to life.

In the new Netflix series Santa Clarita Diet, she stars as California real estate agent Sheila Hammond, who just happens to crave human flesh. The role had a personal effect on her, the recently single star revealed during a Friday, January 27, appearance on the Today show.

“It came sort of in the middle of a moment in my life where I had let myself go due to personal circumstances,” Barrymore, who split from husband Will Kopelman in April 2016 after four years of marriage, told Natalie Morales. “I thought, ‘I could come alive with Sheila.’ It was a really great goal line for me because I think, as much as the weight loss, everything is very subtle. It’s attitudinal. It’s empowerment. It’s confidence. It’s all of these things that she’s lost in her life that I feel like I had sort of lost in my life. It was such a blessing to come alive with her. It really was so positive for me.”

So much so that the 5-foot-4 actress dropped 20 pounds while filming the satire, which she also produces.

“I was 144 and now I’m 124,” the mom of daughters Olive, 4, and Frankie, 2, told Us Weekly in November. “I feel really great. I followed Kimberly Snyder’s methods, but I added some protein like fish and chicken, since she’s all vegetarian or vegan. I’ve been very disciplined, and all I did was cry and dream about pizza. I still am dreaming and crying about pizza.”

Santa Clarita Diet begins streaming on Netflix on Friday, February 3.

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