best for CELEBRITY
Sharon Stone opens up about her brush with death, knowing what it is like to reach for the credit card and her three adopted sons
Sharon Stone is one of the most famous Hollywood superstars – famed for her blonde beauty and lauded for her performances in movies like Casino – for which she was Oscar nominated - and Basic Instinct, which contained a racy scene that’s gone down in cinematic history. Now 66, she has developed a parallel career as an artist and recently debuted a new art show called Welcome to My Garden. The mother of three adopted sons suffered a brain haemorrhage in 2001, which almost took her life – but has bounced back to good health and retained her fighting spirit.
Has being well-known as an actress made it hard to be taken seriously as an artist?
Fame freezes you into one moment. Once I did Basic Instinct, it’s like, ‘If you’re not nude, we can’t talk to you’. It’s like, ‘I need stunt pay at this point!’ You know, like my boobs are at my waist – what do you want to do now?
Did you always love art?
I grew up with my aunt and my grandmother who were super eccentric. I’d stay with them and we painted all the time. My aunt painted murals on the walls. I was her short assistant and it was just wonderful. That’s what these crazy broads were doing while my grandmother was having cocktails at the kitchen table with her kooky friends. And then I went to university when I was 15 and studied art.
That’s very young to leave home..
Well I had to go to the college half an hour from home so my dad could keep an eye on me. He thought he could! I started selling my paintings for $20 which was a lot of money for a kid who didn’t have any money.
Then of course you went onto a hugely successful acting career – before as you said in 2001 your ‘life burned down’
I had a massive stroke. I had a nine-day brain haemorrhage. I came out of the MRI tube and there was all this stillness... this vast, unmistakable silence. I looked up at the doctor and I said, ‘I’m dying, right?’ He reached down and stroked my head, which is not what you want your doctor to do. He said, ‘You’re bleeding into your brain.’
I said, ‘Am I going to lose my ability to talk soon?’ and he said, ‘Probably’.
I said, ‘I should call my mom.’ And my mom arrived from Pennsylvania in her gardening shorts with mud on her feet and legs.
Were you afraid you were dying?
I guess I died. I left my body. I saw the white light, you see people who have already died, they talk to you. Then all of a sudden I felt this impact in my chest that was like being kicked by a farm animal. The doctor yelled, ‘Don’t anybody touch her!’ and the next thing I knew I was
