By playing an actress who faced pressure from getting older in The Substance, the experience impacted Demi Moore, 62, and how she views aging.
Moore, a speaker at the Time100 Submit on Wednesday and on the Time100 list, was asked by Time‘s editorial director, Lucy Feldman, “You have been such a big part of this cultural moment where women in their 50s, 60s, 70s are being celebrated and recognized in their stories being told about them that haven’t before. And that’s very exciting. What are the stories that you really want to see?”
Moore believes things are “very different” today than they would’ve been in the past. “I think that there was a sense of things ending at a certain point as opposed to the reality, which is just that we’re evolving, it’s not ending,” she said.
“I also have thought recently about this idea that aging and being old are not the same thing. And somehow we’ve confused that and that aging actually is a tremendous gift,” the actress said before adding, “I would not trade — you could not pay me to be 21. As good as it might sound, it was torture!”
Now, Moore explains how she’s in a “peaceful space of acceptance and freedom” that she wouldn’t change.
Earlier in the conversation, Moore was asked if she could see herself on the Dolby Theatre stage in the future, following her best actress loss to Mikey Madison after being called the frontrunner during awards season.
“I think that would be nice. I can’t say I would be mad at it,” Moore said. “The question is, ‘Should I have won?’ It is certainly not the perspective of how I hold it because I didn’t. And I really do subscribe to this idea that everything in life is happening for me, not to me.”
She continued, “Of course, there’s disappointment. I also immediately recognize that there is something that is greater that I am to be in service to, even if I don’t know what that is.”
The Ghost star also noted how Madison gave an “incredible performance.” As far as what Moore’s future will tell, she said, “The message here is that there’s more work to be done, that this issue is not complete.”