Patricia Arquette has fully embraced life and aging.
“I’m really enjoying getting older,” the actress, who made her debut in 1987’s A Nightmare on Elm Street 3, said at the recent Planned Parenthood of Greater New York Spring Action Celebration.
Arquette, 58, believes those years have taught her hard-won wisdom and important life lessons.
“I don’t accept fools willingly,” she said, adding, “I’m still coming to terms with it and trying new things, like saying no.”
The actress, who won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in 2015 for her role in Boyhood, admitted that she still struggles with those two-letter words.
“I still feel grumpy (about saying ‘no’) sometimes. Maybe I’m not communicating it in the best way,” she explained. “It’s like there are boundaries. And how do you communicate that and learn about all of that?”
Arquette started her career in films like True Romance, but has made it big in recent years with appearances on TV shows like The Act, Escape at Dannemora, and of course, Severance.
Last year, Arquette told Page Six that as a young actress she was trying to avoid being labeled as Hollywood’s new It girl.
“I was really conscious of getting out of that insidious situation as quickly as possible,” she explained. “For me, beauty felt really dangerous and a little scary. It also felt monotonous and felt like it had a short shelf life.”
“I didn’t want to be limited by my beauty,” she added. “I didn’t even consider myself beautiful, but the world treated me that way, so I always had a very intense conflict with that.”
The “Lost Highway” star also spoke to Page Six at a recent Planned Parenthood event about her growing concerns about how women are portrayed on social media today.
“Once Grok came out, non-consensual sexual images of millions of women, girls and children were immediately made available,” she noted. “And you look at the Epstein (file) situation… and you look at these podcasters and all these people who are teaching boys to hate girls.”
Arquette argued that what was needed was “sex education about mutual respect” and teaching teens “what consent really means.”
The “Medium” actress also said that Planned Parenthood is “America’s No. 1 health care provider,” offering more services than just abortion care, including cancer screenings, breast exams, and STD/STD testing and treatment.
With so many clinics closed, it’s not just women who are affected. Arquette claims that “men and young children” are also affected.
