Sorry Cate Blanchett, but artists should never ‘retire'

Telegraph

16-04-2025

In one of several parallel fantasy lives that I live, I have retired. I am 'dividing my time' between London and Southern France (probably Languedoc-Roussillon), with January spent on an island off the coast of Colombia. But I won't have made a fuss about my retreat from the rat race: no grand speeches, no pitying donations on collectionpot.com and certainly no leaving drinks. I will have made a French exit.
Cate Blanchett, however, has made public the fact that she wants to retire from acting and do other things. The 55-year-old actress is actually making her radio drama debut on the BBC this coming Saturday, but no matter, she told Radio Times that she was serious about leaving a profession at which she has excelled.
'Yeah, right,' I thought, as Blanchett contemplated a Saga holiday to Madeira. Actors are always announcing their retirements, and they rarely mean it. Cameron Diaz 'formally confirmed' she was quitting the biz they call show in 2018, only to return in the execrable – though appropriately named – thriller Back in Action. Daniel Day-Lewis has retired at least twice; the last time was in 2017 after he appeared in the film Phantom Thread, for which he received an Oscar nomination. A representative announced the fact through a slightly pallid statement which expressed 'immense gratitude to all his contributors and audiences over the years'. Surprise, surprise, Day-Lewis is back, in a film called Anemone which will be directed by his son, Ronan. If I had bought Day-Lewis countless beers at his Be At One leaving do, I'd want my money back.
Why do they do it? If I was a cynic, I would say it is because, as an actor, you are constantly seeking validation. It is as if you are expecting people to say: 'Oh, please don't, you are an inspiration. You still have so much to give.' Yet if you really have that much of an ego, it's better to be like Greta Garbo, who announced her temporary retirement at the age of 36 and never came back. Her life became shrouded in an almost ghoulish mystique, and her status as a cultural icon was assured.
I can understand going back on your word for financial reasons: after all, the state pension is not going to buy you many nights in the Priory. But money rarely seems to be the motivation. Perhaps we should be sympathetic to the idea that people renege on their retirement simply because they love what they do. I certainly get that impression with older musicians: in the past, Tina Turner, Mötley Crüe and David Bowie all officially stepped out of the spotlight only to return.
However, when Turner said she was going to give it all up in her early 60s, she stated: 'I should really hang up my dancing shoes'. This inadvertently highlighted two things – that women in a sexist industry are expected to retire – and that carrying on well past your prime (particularly when you are a rock god) can look a little tragic. Do we really want to see Granddad throw himself around the stage, ever fearful that he's going to dislocate something?
Otherwise, artists can carry on ad nauseam. Writers usually do, though their best work is often behind them (Diana Athill and Hilma Wolitzer are exceptions). A poignant example of a public withdrawal was the Nobel-winning South African writer Nadine Gordimer who quit, at 90, saying she was too disillusioned to continue. She died shortly afterwards. Women, on the whole, tend to do these things with more grace than men – think of the classical music world which is well known for perpetuating the careers of ageing maestros even when they are well past their prime.
Yet sometimes, a Bernard Haitink or a Herbert Blomstedt continues, or so I imagine, because they have a compulsive attitude towards creativity. It's the same with the painter Frank Auerbach who died last year and met our chief art critic, Alastair Sooke, in his studio where, at the age of 91, he was still working every day: 'I've always painted as if I was going to die tomorrow,' he said. The German-Jewish Auerbach endured a horrendous early life, and it is not hard to see that he painted daily in the face of life's transience. Most artists and celebrities continue because they can, but there are a handful, like Auerbach, who continue because they must.
A few days before Cate Blanchett announced her retirement, a lesser-known actress did the same. Courtney Henggeler, one of the cast of Netflix's Cobra Kai (a sequel of sorts to The Karate Kid), stated on publishing platform Substack that: 'After 20 plus years of fighting the good fight in the acting business, I hung up my gloves on Friday.' Unlike the garlanded Blanchett, Henggeler had had to endure countless knock-backs and had had enough of a rackety life that promised much and delivered little. 'The hustle, the grind, sprinkled occasionally with the odd acting job. Perhaps a line or two to TV's Dr. House – 'Sorry' (that's it. That was my line. Genius),' she wrote.
While I feel that celebrity retirements are often disingenuous, I found this one very moving. Henggeler's statement was not akin to a grand dame taking a final bow, but the honest ranting of a jobbing actor. It's all very well Blanchett et al retiring in a public fashion, but isn't it a bit insensitive? A lot of people in this country, particularly those of us born after the 1960s, are beginning to realise that retirement is almost a pipe dream. Any such proclamation thus seems to confirm what we already knew: that celebrities are out of touch.