Cameron Diaz explained why she took a 10 year break from acting before coming out of retirement
Cameron Diaz revealed why she decided to take a decade long break from acting.
Known for her roles in The Holiday, Charlie's Angels and Bad Teacher, Diaz was one of the most recognisable actors in the early 2000s.
However, she would make the decision to step back from her career in 2014, after releasing the films The Other Woman, Sex Tape, and Annie that year.
In the following eight years, Diaz, 52, had largely vanished from the limelight, excluding a handful of health book projects and a guest appearance as a judge on the seventh season of RuPaul's Drag Race All Stars in 2022.
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A decade on from her original decision and Diaz is now back in Hollywood once more.
Her decision to come out of retirement was originally teased back in June 2022, when it was announced that she would be starring alongside her Annie co-star Jamie Foxx in action comedy flick Back in Action.
The film won't be a one off for the actor either, who is also reported to star in Apple TV+ movie Outcome alongside Keanu Reeves and Jonah Hill as well as reprising her role as the voice of Princess Fiona in the upcoming Shrek 5, as per the BBC.
Diaz's decision to make a comeback is one which may have surprised fans as she had previously revealed that she'd left the industry to focus on building a family.
The Mask star tied the knot with Good Charlotte guitarist Benji Madden back in 2015, before going on to welcome a their first child, a daughter named Raddix, in December 2019.
They would later welcome their second child, a son named Cardinal, earlier this year.
Speaking about her decision to retire, she told Yahoo Finance back in 2021: "[To] be married and have our little nucleus of a family, it’s just completely the best thing.
"I don’t have what it takes to give making a movie what it needs to be made. All of my energy is here."
So why did Diaz decide to make a return to acting? Well, it turns out it had a lot to do with the working relationship she had with Foxx.
Speaking about their collaboration on Back in Action with Entertainment Tonight, he said: "Cameron is such an incredible force and she has done so much in this business. We love her. We had to be very innovative in how we, you know, brought her back."
Revealing how he managed to do that, Foxx added that he asked her 'Do you wanna have some fun? Just have some fun!' which he believes was enough to bring her back to it.
Rumours would later circulate that Foxx's alleged on-set behaviour had supposedly caused her to 'quit acting' once again, however, Diaz was quick to set the reports straight in an episode of Molly Sims' Lipstick on the Rim podcast.
"I really hate all of the things that were being said about our set at the time," she said.
"Jamie is, like, the cheerleader for the entire crew. Everybody loves him. We have so much fun on the set with him, and he's just a professional on every level. Jamie is the best. I love that guy so much. He's such a special person and he's so talented, so much fun."
She also added that she'd spoke to Foxx about it, to which he said: "We know the truth."
Back in Action is set to premiere on 17 January 2025.
Topics: Cameron Diaz, Celebrity, TV and Film
Brenna Cooper