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The Every Year After actress explains why she took a four-year hiatus from acting before finding a role in Prime Video's new smash TV show based on Carley Fortune's popular book series.
"I realized I worked all four years through our first child, and it was really hard," Cuthbert, who has two children with husband Dion Phaneuf, admitted during her June 17 interview on Today, "to separate that mom from the working person I was. "So, when we had our second, I really didn't want to waste any time and didn't want to be on set."
The 43-year-old is most known for acting in '00s films including The Girl Next Door and Old School, as well as hit TV shows including 24 and Happy Endings—and added, "I just felt like I needed to be at home with the kids, and I enjoyed every minute."
But now that Cuthbert and her retired hockey player husband's daughter Zaphire and son Fable—born in 2017 and 2022, respectively—are a little bit older, the Canadian star is ready to take on new acting roles.
"They're in school now full-time," she noted on Today. "I feel like I have the space and the energy and the heart to kind of leave them and do it."
Cuthbert also tapped into her maternal instincts for her first television role in four years, playing Sam (Matt Cornett) and Charlie's (Michael Bradway) mother Sue in Every Year After (currently available on Prime Video).
"It's crazy because I hadn't read any of Carley's books and then I got on the show," she said about the series' source material. "I already had the script, but I wanted to read the novel. And then I'm like, 'Oh, I'm a superfan now.'"
"So," Cuthbert continued, "I read all her books; they're amazing. "I recommend them."
Cuthbert is also pleased that series star Sadie Soverall is rising to prominence at a time when women in entertainment are being treated more fairly.
"It was a lot of pressure," she said of her 2000s icon status. "It's great that Sadie Soverall is no longer concerned with those issues. "It's very different."
