If you feel like you haven't seen the beautiful Daryl Hannah much since "Kill Bill," you're about right. The 52-year-old and former A-list star has intentionally fallen off the grid. In an interview with People magazine, Hannah explains her autism diagnosis as a child led to a debilitating fear of fame as an adult, which is the cause of her relative absence from the silver screen.
According to People, Hannah was diagnosed at a time when the disorder was not widely understood and doctors recommended she be medicated and institutionalized. Isolated from her peers, she found solace in old movies and her fondness for acting began. The way she saw it, movies were an escape from the real world. At 17, she moved to L.A.
But being a towering blonde beauty was not a blessing for her, as she refused to do talk shows or attend her own movie premieres. "Not because I was above it," she tells People, "but because I was terrified."
Today, she says, she still works but is "definitely not being offered the greatest roles in the world." Her true love is her environmental work -- she's been arrested multiple times for her activism (In 2012, after protesting and trying to halt the construction of an oil pipeline designed to bring crude from Canada to the Gulf Coast). She also leads an eco-friendly lifestyle, pumps well water and relies on solar power at home.
Her friend, interviewed in People, says that when Hannah "feels passionate about something, she loses all her fears."
For more on Daryl and her struggle with autism in Hollywood, pick up a copy of People magazine, on newsstands now.
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