Academy Award-winning actress Kathy Bates will retire from acting after her role in the upcoming CBS legal drama reboot “Matlock.”
Bates, 76, announced her plans to retire in an interview with The New York Times.
“This is my last dance,” she told NYT.
“Everything I’ve prayed for, worked for, clawed my way up for, I am suddenly able to be asked to use all of it. And it’s exhausting,” she added.
Bates is best known for her starring roles in “Misery,” for which she won the Academy Award for Best Actress in 1991; “Titanic;” “Fried Green Tomatoes;” “The Waterboy;” and more. She won Emmy Awards for her roles in “Two and a Half Men” and “American Horror Story: Coven” and also appeared in “The Office” and “Six Feet Under.”
Bates, who has been acting for more than five decades, said she decided to step away from acting to have more freedom in her personal life.
“It becomes my life,” she said of her acting career. “Sometimes I get jealous of having this talent. Because I can’t hold it back, and I just want my life.”
Bates also said she didn’t necessarily dream of becoming a starring actress, adding that she often felt out of place in Hollywood.
“I never felt dressed right or well. I felt like a misfit,” she said. “It’s that line in ‘Misery’ when Annie says, ‘I’m not a movie star.’ I’m not.
“I never really thought about being a movie star. I just wanted to be the best I could be,” she added.
Bates also shared that she previously planned to retire from acting after a movie shoot had “soured,” leaving her crying on her sofa at her home in Los Angeles. A few weeks later, however, Bates’ agent sent her the script for the reboot of “Matlock,” which starred Andy Griffith and ran from 1986 to 1995. The new series will star Bates as Madeline “Matty” Matlock, a lawyer who “uses her wily tactics to win cases and expose wrongdoing,” according to the show’s description.
“Matlock” will premiere on CBS on Sept. 22 and will also be available to stream on Paramount+.
