Diaz’s 10-year retirement is the ‘best years’ of his life

Actress Cameron Diaz has said that the decade she spent retiring from acting was the “best 10 years” of her life.

The Holiday star returns to screens this month in a new spy thriller – Back in Action – alongside actor Jamie Foxx.

However, it is unclear whether this is a permanent return to acting, as he said on the Graham Norton Show, “It’s probably the beginning… I don’t know”.

When asked if she liked the anonymity of taking a step back, she said, “Oh my God, I love it”, adding that she was “free” to be a mother and wife, but she wanted to come back. She was “truly grateful”.

Her last role was that of Ms. Hannigan in the 2014 remake of Annie – a film which also starred Fox. However, Diaz formally confirmed her retirement from acting in 2018.

Fox, who has worked with Diaz twice before, said that he convinced her to return to the industry by “very politely” asking if she would come back and “delight us with her incredible talent”.

She said she is back in the film world “at least for the sake of it” after “not paying attention” to it for 10 years.

But when Diaz received the script for this new project, she and her husband Benji Madden said, “Maybe it’s time to change it up a little bit for the family because, you know, it’s Jamie”.

“It would take a special person to leave my family for 10 hours a day,” he said.

In Back in Action, Diaz and Jamie Foxx play a married couple – with kids – and former spies who are pulled out of retirement when danger threatens their lives.

Speaking about her hiatus, Diaz described it as the “best” 10 years of her life.

“I was free to say things (like) ‘I’m a mother, I’m a wife, I’m living my life’ – it was lovely.”

“After ten years, it made sense for my family,” she explained.

When she first stepped away from acting, Diaz said she was still asked to play roles.

“Everyone would be like: ‘Would you like –’ No.

“‘You know, that’s the thing -‘ I don’t care.

“‘Would you like to join us –’ No, and then people stopped asking.”

Now, 10 years later, she told Norton that she thinks acting is a “privilege.”

“If I let it go, all this goodwill that I’ve built up over so much time, this passion to entertain people and make movies that people smile and laugh at and have a good time with… If I don’t do that Don’t get involved again, and give him a chance and take part in it and be grateful for it, then I would be a fool,” she explained.

He added: “Maybe I tiptoe forward, maybe I just hum, I don’t know.”