Celebrity4 min(s) read
Published 17:43 10 Jan 2022 GMT
Kristin Davis has opened up about how it's been difficult for her to be on-screen again now that she's older.
The actress, 56, found fame starring as Charlotte York in Sex And The City - a role she's reprising once again 20 years later.
In 1998, Sex and the City premiered on HBO and it ran for six seasons until it ended in 2004.
More than 17 years and two movies later, HBO decided to revive the series and bring back the show's original cast members.
"I can only speak for myself, but it can also be extremely stressful to be aging and to be compared to your much, much, much younger self," Davis said about joining the show when she was 33.
She told New Beauty magazine: "If I was from regular life, I would feel fine; I would feel great! I'm healthy, I'm strong, I've got this little three-year-old son, and I carry him around and it's all good—but, no, I'm on television, where every bit of my physical being is analyzed.
"That part was always very stressful and difficult for me, because, as much as I can look back on my life and think, 'Oh, I looked great then,' you never think that at the time. I guess no one does."
Davis also noted that it didn't help to be compared to co-star Sarah Jessica Parker over the years.
"I also became famous when magazines were king, and every week there'd be an article saying I was 'pear-shaped,'" she said. "That was difficult, and no amount of working out could change my shape or how those articles were written."
"They just loved to compare me to Sarah Jessica, who, at the same time, no matter what she did, was always going to be a very tiny thing," she added.
Although Davis found it hard to age in the public eye, she didn't think that Cynthia Nixon felt the same way. She described her co-star as someone who is "very strong" and "very grounded in her talent," even though Davis thought differently of herself.
"I also grew up feeling insecure about my body. I don't know why, but I did," she added.
To help her cope with "age stress," Davis found it helpful to surround herself with "calm" individuals like And Just Like That... creator Michael Patrick King.
"Michael is very, very calm about it all, and he’s very much, ‘Listen, none of us are not trying to look like we used to look,'" she explained.
"Charlotte still has her style that she had before, but now she’s 55, which we dealt with in the first episode and it’s an ongoing storyline. But, obviously, there’s a lot of other things that come with aging."
"Some are great, like wisdom, feeling grounded, life experiences, and those wonderful things, but then there’s other stuff that’s stressful," Davis added.
In hindsight, Davis says she wished she told herself to "give up the stress" when she was younger.
"The stress is all simply wasted energy. Working out, doing yoga, walking, running or doing whatever you enjoy doing … all of that is health," she said. "At least for me, those have always been the things that work and the things that have brought me joy."
