Renee Zellweger reveals why she disappeared from Hollywood for six years

Renee Zellweger’s career was flying high when suddenly, she disappeared from Hollywood for six long years. Now she’s telling all.

Renée Zellweger says her six-year break from acting was “needed.”

In a new interview with British Vogue, the Bridget Jones’s Diary star spoke with former co-star Hugh Grant about why she took an acting hiatus from 2010 to 2016.

“I was sick of the sound of my own voice. When I was working, I was like, ‘Oh, my gosh, listen to you. Are you sad again, Renée? Oh, is this your mad voice?’ It was a regurgitation of the same emotional experiences,” Zellweger, 55, explained.

However, Zellweger wasn’t sitting around and doing “nothing” during that time off — she actually took up several new hobbies and interests.

“I wrote music and studied international law,” she shared. “I built a house, rescued a pair of older doggies, created a partnership that led to a production company, advocated for and fundraised with a sick friend, and spent a lot of time with family and godchildren and driving across the country with the dogs. I got healthy.”

Zellweger in Bridget Jones Diary.

Winning a Best Actress Oscar for Judy after she returned to the industry. Picture: AFP

In 2010, the Judy actress famously paused her acting career after filming the movie My Own Love Song. She did not return to the industry until 2016 when she reprised her role as Bridget Jones for Bridget Jones’s Baby.

Zellweger previously reflected on her “hard” decision to put her career on pause in an interview with British Vogue shortly after returning to the spotlight in 2016.

“As a creative person, saying no to that wonderful once-in-a-lifetime project is hard,” she admitted. “But I was fatigued and wasn’t taking the time I needed to recover between projects, and it caught up with me.”

It was reprising her beloved role in Bridget Jones's Baby that coaxed her out of acting ‘retirement’ in 2016.

The Oscar winner added that one of the biggest perks from her break was being able to live out of the spotlight for awhile.

“I found anonymity, so I could have exchanges with people on a human level and be seen and heard, not be defined by this image that precedes me when I walk into a room,” she continued. “You cannot be a good storyteller if you don’t have life experiences, and you can’t relate to people.”

Zellweger later told InStyle in 2019 that she also used her time off to reflect and “prioritise” what was important to her.

Zellweger said she kept busy during her six-year industry hiatus. Picture: AAP

“I just knew that there were certain things I needed to prioritise and if I kept going, there would be just no way I could do it,” she explained.

Zellweger shared that some of the things she focused on were “slowing down and working on building a life,” “getting to know somebody” and even “falling in love.”

“[I wanted] to learn new things, so I worked in a different capacity in this business,” she added. “Tried to create some things, produce some things, studied a little bit. I studied public policy, international law. And I travelled a lot. I went to Liberia. I spent a lot of time with my family on the East Coast.”

Zellweger later found herself back in the spotlight when she began dating British television personality Ant Anstead in 2021. The two have been going strong ever since.

This story originally appeared on Page Six and is republished here with permission.

Originally published as Renee Zellweger reveals why she disappeared from Hollywood for six years