Opening up. Kaley Cuoco didn’t hold back about the aftermath of her divorce from Karl Cook — which she still considers one of the “hardest years” of her life.
“I’ve been very open about it, because I think for the first time, I wanted people to know that things just aren’t always what they seem. And things aren’t always so perfect,” the actress, 36, told Variety on Thursday, August 11, about how filming season 2 of The Flight Attendant took a toll on her.
Cuoco recalled the moment she realized she needed to get help. “One month in, I had an intervention on myself in my trailer — all my producers were in there,” she said. “It was interesting to say that out loud. And to have everyone be like, ‘Yes, we want to help!’ I’m a working woman, and so independent, and I really take pride in being able to do everything. Well, this time, I literally couldn’t.”
For the Big Bang Theory alum, dealing with her personal life brought up a lot of issues she wasn’t ready to handle.
“Going through my divorce, it was really a super dark time. I just didn’t know how to deal with it,” she explained. “I was throwing myself into work to deny my depression, and how upset I was. Unfortunately, the character was so depressed that it wasn’t helping me! I was really, really, really struggling. A lot of tears.”
The California native, who was previously married to Ryan Sweeting from 2013 to 2016 before her marriage to Cook, 31, admitted she struggled with how “tormented” her character on the HBO Max series needed to be.
“It was the first time that I started therapy — I’ve been very open about that. I started at the beginning of season 2, just because I was going through so much right before we started shooting. It was horrible,” the Meet Cute star detailed. “And I developed a stress rash that ran all the way down my body for three straight months that wouldn’t go away. I literally, like, had fire on my leg for three months. I could barely walk.”
According to Cuoco, moving in with her costar Zosia Mamet helped ease her concerns. “I really needed someone with me. I was really losing my mind. And then so many of these scenes were so hard to do because they were so hateful, so sad, and so dark, and there wasn’t a lot of levity,” she explained. “Like, it was the loneliest I’ve ever felt, and I am not really someone to share that.”
The Emmy award winner’s rare insight into her personal life comes after her divorce from Cook. The former couple started dating in 2016 after developing a bond over their love for animals.
“I finally found my horse guy,” Cuoco said during an interview on The Talk in September 2016. “It was very meant to be. He’s an amazing rider, amazing equestrian and a great human. We shared a passion for horses and dogs. It’s been lovely.”
The duo got engaged after one year of dating and tied the knot in June 2010. At the time, the Charmed alum revealed that she preferred to live separately from her then-husband.
“We’ve been married for a year and a half, been together for almost four years and this quarantine has forced us to actually move in together,” Cuoco told Jimmy Kimmel in April 2020. “It’s been great for our relationship, and we like each other we realized, which is even better.”
In September 2021, Cuoco and Cook took to social media to announce their split.
“Despite a deep love and respect for one another, we have realized that our current paths have taken us in opposite directions,” they wrote in a joint statement at the time. “We have both shared so much of our journey publicly so while we would prefer to keep this aspect of our personal life private, we wanted to be forthcoming in our truth together. There is no anger or animosity, quite the contrary. We made this decision together through an immense amount of respect and consideration for one another and request that you do the same in understanding that we will not be sharing any additional details.”
Us Weekly confirmed that Cuoco filed the divorce paperwork the same day as the social media post.
