Gwyneth Paltrow Faced an Identity Crisis After Oscar Win: ‘What Are You Supposed to Do? Where Are You Supposed to Go?’ (Video)

The actress made the comments on Alex Cooper’s “Call Her Daddy” podcast

Gwyneth Paltrow said she had an “identity crisis” after winning a Best Actress Oscar in 1999 for “Shakespeare in Love” at age 26.

Talking to host Alex Cooper on Wednesday’s edition of the “Call Her Daddy” podcast, Paltrow discussed exes Brad Pitt and Ben Affleck and how winning the Oscar so young messed with her head. “I was so driven, I was working so hard and I didn’t know exactly what I was working towards. I just wanted to be successful and to be well regarded and I was kind of on this really fast track and it happened so quickly,” she told Cooper.

“Once I won the Oscar, it put me into a bit of an identity crisis, because if you win the biggest prize, like what are you supposed to do? And where are you supposed to go?” she continued. “It was hard the amount of attention that you receive on a night like that and the weeks following, it’s so disorienting. And frankly, really unhealthy. I was like, ‘This is crazy. I don’t know what to do, I don’t know which way is up.’ It was a lot. Not that I would give it back or anything, it was an amazing experience, but it kind of called a lot of things into question for me.”

The actress was openly mocked for sobbing her way through her acceptance speech, and the fact that “Shakespeare in Love” upset Steven Spielberg’s “Saving Private Ryan” for Best Picture didn’t sit will with a lot of movie fans.

“I felt a real pivot on that night because I felt like up until that moment everybody was kind of rooting for me in a way. And then when I won, it was like too much, and I could feel a real turn,” she said.

Paltrow explained why she was so emotional that Oscar night, her father: the late director Bruce Paltrow, who was seated with her, was undergoing cancer treatment.

“He was really debilitated. It was just this totally overwhelming moment,” she said. “And, you know, I was 26. I cried and people were so mean about it and I just thought, ‘Wow there’s this big energy shift that’s happening. I think I’m going to have to learn to be less openhearted and much more protective of myself and filter people out better.’”

She added, “I remember I was working in England…and I remember the British press being so horrible to me because I cried. And they didn’t necessarily know that my father was dying of cancer.”

In 2008, Paltrow launched her wellness brand Goop, which takes more of her focus than acting. Earlier this year, a jury decided in her favor when she was sued over a skiing accident.

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