Jennifer Lawrence recently said on “The Graham Norton Show” that she was “relieved” that she didn’t return to Hollywood during her two-year hiatus from acting several years ago. After earning his fourth Oscar nomination for 2015’s “Joy,” Lawrence went on to star in “Passengers” (2016), “Mother!” ” (2017), “Red Sparrow” (2018), and the “X-Men” spinoff “Dark Phoenix” (2019). She then took a two-year hiatus from acting, but returned in late 2021 with Adam McKay’s ensemble comedy Don’t Look Up.
“It took a while,” Lawrence told Norton. “I worked all through my 20s, and then I thought…what do we have here? What’s going on?”
When asked if he was worried that he wouldn’t be able to return to Hollywood, the Oscar winner said, “I was reassured that it was a possibility.[Hollywood]is tough… I think I would have been[okay]but at the same time I would have been really upset. I don’t know.”
Speaking to Vanity Fair in 2021 ahead of the release of Don’t Look Up, Lawrence said he needed to take a two-year hiatus from Hollywood because he was “not delivering the quality that he should have.” She added at the time: “I think people were tired of me. I was tired of it too. It got to the point where I couldn’t do anything right. If I was walking the red carpet, they’d be like, ‘Why didn’t she run?’
Lawrence continued, “I think I’ve been a people-pleaser for most of my life. As I worked, I started to feel like no one could get mad at me. ‘Okay, I said yes, we’re doing it. No one’s mad at me.'” And he felt like he reached a point where just existing was no longer pleasing. So I was freed from the idea that a job or a career would bring any kind of peace to the soul. ”
Justin Polsky, Lawrence’s longtime best friend and producing partner, summed up Lawrence’s need to take a break from acting in Vanity Fair at the time: “The rituals of stardom began to kill her creativity and throw her compass off course. So she disappeared, which was probably the most responsible way to protect her genius and her sanity.”
Lawrence is currently back in the spotlight promoting her new psychological drama Die My Love, in which she co-stars with co-star Robert Pattinson and director Lynne Ramsay. The film, in which Lawrence plays a woman whose life is meandering as she balances marriage and motherhood, had its world premiere at Cannes earlier this year. Mubi will release “Die My Love” in theaters on November 7th.
