In a world short on self awareness and lacking in self control, it’s noteworthy whenever someone sets aside their own indulgence for better things.
Anne Hathaway revealed during a recent appearance on “The Ellen Show” she’s decided to give up alcohol — at least for the next 18 years, as she’s raising her young son — because she doesn’t like the person she is when she’s drinking.
“I quit drinking back in October,” she explained. “For 18 years. I’m going to stop drinking while my son is in my house, just because I don’t totally love the way I do it and he’s getting to an age where he really does need me all the time, in the mornings.”
She later recounted a time when she took her son, Jonathan, to school a little hungover.
“I wasn’t driving, but I was hungover and that was enough for me,” Hathaway recalled. “I didn’t love that one.”
Hathaway married Adam Shulman in 2012 and the couple welcomed their first son in April 2016. But it wasn’t until the 36-year-old actor filmed the forthcoming movie “Serenity” alongside Matthew McConaughey that she decided to give up alcohol, at least for a season.
McConaughey and his wife, Camila Alves, took Hathaway bar hopping in Mauritius, the island country in East Africa where “Serenity” was filmed, for a night she does not remember.
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“We drank the night away, and then I had to go to a meeting with Steven Knight, our director, the next day, and I was just kind of — have you guys ever had to go to a meeting hungover?” Hathaway asked the audience. “You don’t have to admit it. I was just kind of stumbling in with one eye open and I was trying to convince him about certain things about my character.”
She continued, “And at the end of it, I said, ‘Listen, I’ve got a confession: I was hungover the entire time.’ And he just goes, ‘Oh, really? I couldn’t tell.’ Then two days later, we had another meeting, and I showed up, and he said, ‘Oh, now I can [tell].’”
There’s no telling at this point if Hathaway will stick to her pledge, but it’s laudable she would so publicly step away from alcohol — a substance so prevalent in American society its abuse has reached epidemic levels — because she wants to be the best version of herself for her young child.
We live in an era of self indulgence and little restraint, so there’s no doubt Hathaway’s personal decision will ruffle a few feathers.
But from this teetotaler, welcome to the club — even if it’s only for a few years.