Kathleen Turner became well-known in the 1980s due to her beauty and strength; she is regarded by many as one of the most beautiful actors in Hollywood.
The actress has experienced both good and difficult circumstances throughout the years, and her tenacity has seen her through them all.Despite her challenging history, Kathleen Turner was raised in a home with four other children.
She was raised in Venezuela as well as in London with her siblings. She unfortunately witnessed her father’s untimely demise as a small child as he was mowing the lawn of their Hampstead home.
Kathleen and her family were expelled from the United Kingdom by the foreign service one month after his death. Turner moved her family to Springfield, Missouri, where everyone was still in mourning for their father and their former house.
After relocating to New York to pursue an adult acting career, Tuner felt at last at peace. Despite her success on stage, her big break came when she was cast as the femme fatale in the 1981 movie “Body Heat.”
Three years after starring alongside William Hurt in “Romancing the Stone,” Turner received a chance to co-star with Michael Douglas. Douglas was going through a challenging divorce from his wife Diandra when the movie was being filmed, and he began to bond with Turner.
We were falling in love as we were passionately flirting and giving one other longing glances. “Then Diandra came down and reminded me he was still married,” said Kathleen.
She ultimately married the real estate developer in the film, Jay Weiss, in 1984. The couple’s sole daughter was born not long after. Rachel Ann Weiss was born on October 14, 1987.
Unfortunately, the couple’s relationship began to unravel as they took on the role of raising their daughter.
“I would insist on longer weekends or extra passes from the movie studios in order to bring my wife and children to visit me. But I felt horrible because there was a perception in the marriage that he did all the effort. That was one of the many reasons it ended. I started to feel really oppressed. “I realized, ‘Hang on a minute, you’ve done very well out of being married to me also,'” recalled Kathleen.
Their marital issues escalated after Turner played Martha in the Broadway version of “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” in 2005. Weiss didn’t seem to want to spend much time with Turner at home as she got very busy doing eight gigs a week.
The two got along well at that period, when Turner was nominated for a Tony Award for her performance as Martha.
In 1987, the actress received an Oscar nomination for her performance in “Peggy Sue Got Married.” In the 1980s, she produced a number of movies, including three successful blockbusters with Michael Douglas.
However, Kathleen had a medical setback in the 1990s when she had a locked neck, which prevented her from turning her head. Besides, she couldn’t use her hands because of the swelling in them.
According to Kathleen, “It was crippling.” You cease to take anything for granted when it disappears, even for a brief period of time. My strength, my ability to move with power, and my freedom to move however I pleased were things I took for granted. When I lost it, I experienced a true identity crisis, asking myself, “Who am I if I can’t do this?”
Her circumstances were tragically caused by a diagnosis of rheumatoid arthritis, which is defined by swelling of the lining of our joints. It might be challenging to manage the persistent pain this sickness causes.
“When it was first diagnosed, I was terrified because they said I’d be in a wheelchair,” said Kathleen. I reasoned that if I couldn’t move, I couldn’t do anything. Acting is not the only thing I want to do. This was my destiny. It has been a part of my life the entire time. The most horrifying part was the feeling that I might not be able to complete it, in addition to the continuous pain.
Kathleen used booze and drugs to dull her agony. Even while they made her job easier, her alcohol habit caused her to pass out during dress rehearsals for productions like the 2002 stage production of “The Graduate.”
After the show, the actress really entered herself into recovery, where it was discovered that she was not an alcoholic. Rather, she was instructed to simply keep a more detailed record of her drug schedule and any adverse affects.
To maintain her flexibility and control her discomfort, the actress now practices yoga and pilates.
The celebrity started to improve her pain management and concentrated more on her theater career. Even though she continued to occasionally work in cinema and television, as she grew older, she mostly stayed true to her origins, even landing the lead role in a stage version of “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof” in her forties.
Kathleen said, “I am really proud of myself for having a little bit of foresight because I knew that the better roles as I got older would be in theater, which is absolutely true.”
The actress has more time to follow her passions, such as volunteering for Amnesty International and working for Planned Parenthood of America, because she is concentrating on the theater.
Turner has dedicated her life to supporting other women and has been an enthusiastic feminist for the majority of her life. Send Yourself Roses, Gloria Feldt’s 2008 biography of the actress, does a superb job of capturing her ideas.
Being female-led, we are the first generation to attain financial autonomy. According to Kathleen, women are going back into the workforce. They are redefining themselves. I thought I could do even more to help with it. As such, it includes a great deal of my personal beliefs along with philosophy.
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