‘Redefined for me’: Gwyneth Paltrow shares real reason she ‘stepped away’ from acting

Oscar winner Gwyneth Paltrow has revealed the main reason she stepped away from her Hollywood career at the height of her fame.

Gwyneth Paltrow shares real reason she ‘stepped away’ from acting. Picture: ANGELA WEISS / AFP

Gwyneth Paltrow revealed the main reason she stepped away from her successful acting career was because of her daughter.

The Hollywood star was at the top of her game in 2004, but when she became pregnant and welcomed daughter Apple with rocker Chris Martin, life was “redefined” for the actress.

“I really stepped away from acting when Apple was born,” Paltrow told Peoplemagazine. “The last time I was in every scene of a movie was when I was pregnant with her.”

“When I had her, it just, everything felt redefined for me, and I thought, ‘I’m not sure that I want to do this so much as a career. I definitely don’t want to … I’m not going to go away for months on end’.”

Paltrow and Martin went to welcome their son Moses in 2006 and in 2008, she launched her wellness and lifestyle brand, Goop.

Gwyneth Paltrow and daughter Apple watch Apple’s dad Chris Martin perform in London in 2005. Picture: MJ Kim/Getty Images

In a recent Q&A at a Goop launch event, Paltrow also said she just wanted to be home with Apple as the lights of Hollywood weren’t doing it for her anymore.

“I was really lucky that I was able to do that and take this pause and be home and have my little kids,” she said at the event, as per People.

“And then I had this voice inside me. ‘I don’t know if I really want to go back to doing that.’”

Gwyneth Paltrow says she stepped away from acting after having daughter Apple, now 19.

Paltrow prefers to spend her days at home than on a movie set.

“And then it gave me a bit of a crisis, well then what does that mean about me and who am I if I’m not, am I worth anything? It was very confusing.”

Back in 2020, Paltrow also admitted that another big Hollywood turn-off for her was her relationship with Miramax boss Harvey Weinstein.

The actress also has a son, Moses, 17.

Paltrow shares her children with ex-husband Chris Martin.

“And again, like this wasn’t conscious at the time, but I started to feel, and, you know, frankly, I think part of my, part of the shine of acting wore off, you know, being in such intense public scrutiny, being a kid who’s like living every break-up on every headline,” she said on SiriusXM’s Quarantined with Bruce back in 2020.

“So if you compound those things with the fact that like, you know, to be totally candid, I had a really rough boss for most of my movie career at Miramax,” she added.

Under the Miramax banner, Paltrow starred in Emma and won the Oscar for Best Actress in 1999 for her role in Shakespeare in Love.

Paltrow, who in 2018 accused Weinstein of sexually harassing her in a hotel room, is credited with helping the New York Times bring down the former Hollywood heavyweight, who in February was sentenced to 23 years behind bars after being convicted of sex crimes against multiple women.