Gwyneth Paltrow said on a recent episode of the “Call Her Daddy” podcast that her 1999 best actress Oscar win for “Shakespeare in Love” led to an unhealthy identity crisis. Paltrow was only 26 years old at the time when she won the Academy Award against the likes of Cate Blanchett (“Elizabeth”) and Meryl Streep (“One True King”).
“once I won the Oscar, it put me into a bit of an identity crisis, because if you win the biggest prize, like what are you supposed to do? And where are you supposed to go?” Paltrow said. “It was hard the amount of attention that you receive on a night like that and the weeks following, it’s so disorienting. And frankly, really unhealthy. I was like, ‘This is crazy. I don’t know what to do, I don’t know which way is up.’ It was a lot. Not that I would give it back or anything, it was an amazing experience, but it kind of called a lot of things into question for me.”
Paltrow’s Oscar acceptance speech was defined by her breaking down into tears while thanking her parents, Blythe Danner and Bruce Paltrow. Both of Paltrow’s parents were sitting next to her when she won the Oscar. Paltrow recalled the press hounding her for sobbing on stage.
“I felt a real pivot on that night because I felt like up until that moment everybody was kind of rooting for me in a way,” Paltrow said. “And then when I won, it was like too much, and I could feel a real turn.”
What the media did not know at the time was that Paltrow’s father, Bruce, was sick with cancer. He passed away in 2002.
“He was really debilitated. It was just this totally overwhelming moment,” Paltrow said. “And, you know, I was 26. I cried and people were so mean about it and I just thought, ‘Wow there’s this big energy shift that’s happening. I think I’m going to have to learn to be less openhearted and much more protective of myself and filter people out better.’”
Paltrow added, “I remember I was working in England… and I remember the British press being so horrible to me because I cried. And they didn’t necessarily know that my father was dying of cancer.”
Watch more of Paltrow’s interview on the “Call Her Daddy” podcast in the video below.
