Brooke Shields has been engaging in a thoughtful career resurgence over the past couple years. Last year the Pretty Baby: Brooke Shields documentary premiered on Hulu, and she did a solo live show at Cafe Carlyle in New York. This year she’s appeared on a panel with Duchess Meghan for International Women’s Day, has a movie coming out on Netflix next month, and will soon launch a lifestyle brand for women over 40 called Beginning Is Now. She recently answered some questions for AARP on topics that spanned the totality of her life and career. A few excerpts:
What was it like to be so famous as a tween and teen?
It only became clear to me how famous I was when we went out. If we went to Studio 54 or the Cannes Film Festival, there would be hordes of people and paparazzi screaming my name and sometimes rocking the car, and I’m like, “This is nuts.” It was like facing a firing squad. My mom would say, “You’ve got to get out of the car first. They’re not here to see me.”
College was a real wake-up call for you.
Yes. Because early on, this one professor was looking at me, saying, “Shields, what is your hypothesis on this?” And I’m like, “I don’t know.” That was such a revelation because no one had ever asked for my opinion. They didn’t need me to have an opinion in Hollywood; they just needed me to do what they said. But that professor got it, he saw it. After I graduated, I just assumed I would go do another movie a year. I was like, “I’m smart. They’re going to love a smart actress.”
Then came the sexual assault by a Hollywood executive. How did you cope?
I’m not naming the person, because then it will be about him. I want it to be on my terms. It’s a universal problem. It doesn’t matter who’s doing it, it’s still happening. I was shocked and then surprised, then fearful, then dissociated, going like, “OK, what can I do to get out of here? What needs to happen so that I can leave?” But the most crushing and embarrassing thing was that a part of me felt validated. My career was not in a great place, and it’s so sick, but my brain was telling me, “Oh, you’re cool,” because he picked me at that moment. It’s mind-blowing. You feel such shame.
As you inch toward 60, what are your thoughts on aging and the camera?
You have to change the narrative. It’s an affront to people if Brooke Shields gets older. … It’s disappointing to them that I don’t have the same face I had when I was 16. But it’s been so liberating for me not to worry about it all the time. The pressure of being skinny is just so exhausting. I like food, and I like tequila! [Laughs.] If I have a job to do, I know that I’m going to look better if I’m a little fitter. But I also look younger when I have extra weight. What was it Catherine Deneuve said? “At a certain age, you have to choose between your face and your ass.”
How is Beginning Is Now going?
It’s going! We’ll be creating a platform for women over 40 so they can age joyously and with confidence and vitality and say, “We don’t have one foot in the grave, people!” But founding a company is not for the weak of heart. I’ve never experienced anything like it before. It’s hard to ask for money, especially from men who have already left their wives who are my age and are on to the younger model. But I’m getting a kick out of wowing them with how much I know. And it’s very empowering because I’m not doing it in a snotty way. I’m just owning the power that I’ve learned to have.
There were so many moments in this interview where Brooke said something that made me gasp — in a good way. Her language is arresting, at times shocking, and utterly compelling. Where to begin! I had a bittersweet guffaw at “They’re going to love a smart actress,” and then was devastated with her brutally honest revelation of feeling some validation while being sexually assaulted. It’s not all she felt during the incident, but it was still present, and it’s brave for her to share. And then that final answer was a real kicker, about the men being on their second, younger wives. I like this emerging trend of calling this out directly, like when the neurodivergent reporter asked Michael Sheen how it felt to be with a partner only five years older than his daughter. More of that bluntness, please.
Photos credit AARP via Instagram, Sasidis Sasisakulporn/Netflix, TheNews2/Cover Images and Getty
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