Katherine Heigl, Eva Mendes, and Janine Turner are among the stars who stepped away from Hollywood to focus on raising their kids.

10 stars who left Hollywood to raise their kids

Katherine Heigl, Eva Mendes, and Janine Turner are among the stars who stepped away from Hollywood to focus on raising their kids.

By Brianna Zigler

August 19, 2026 5:20 p.m. ET

Leave a Comment

Ann Jillian; Katherine Heigl; Eva Mendes. Credit:

Greg Doherty/Getty; Frazer Harrison/Getty; Todd Owyoung/NBC via Getty

Having a kid changes everything — even for some of the most famous faces in entertainment.

Over the years, numerous celebrities have opted to leave Hollywood and shack up in smaller cities or remote ranches once children enter the picture. While some famous parents will eventually return to the industry full-time, others have continued working while building lives far removed from Los Angeles. Sometimes, getting away from it all can be too good to leave behind.

Ahead, we take a look at 10 celebrities who traded Hollywood life for somewhere more low-key while raising their kids — and whether they ever returned to the spotlight.

David Charvet

David Charvet attends 30th Anniversary of ‘Baywatch’ at the Viceroy Hotel on Sept. 24, 2019, in Santa Monica.

Presley Ann/Getty

David Charvet was recognizable in the ‘90s on shows like *Melrose Place* and *Baywatch**,* but he eventually stepped away from acting in 2013. In July 2025, he reflected on his choice with PEOPLE, saying that while he missed some aspects of his entertainment career, fame wasn’t one of them.

“I miss the camaraderie that I had with the people on the sets. I had old-school producers and old-school people that worked as a unit, and it was a real family,” he said. “I don’t miss the fame. I don’t miss the workload that we had because we used to work a lot, and it’s very hard to raise a family that way. I commend all of the actors who have families that are able to balance that.”

When Charvet and then-wife Brooke Burke started a family, he decided he wanted to be a hands-on father to their two children, Heaven Rain and Shaya Braven. The actor subsequently made a dramatic career pivot, shifting into construction. In 2008, he and a business partner started Jones Builders Group, which primarily builds luxury homes in the Los Angeles area.

“It was one way for me to leave Hollywood and to still be creative,” he explained. “It was also one way for me to ensure that I would be home every morning and home every night so that I could raise my two children.”

“I wouldn’t change anything,” he said of leaving Hollywood behind.

Barbara Crampton

Barbara Crampton at The 52nd Annual Saturn Awards at The Hilton Universal City Hotel on Feb. 2, 2025, in Los Angeles.

Alberto Rodriguez/Variety via Getty

Barbara Crampton built her career in horror, and she’s still renowned as a scream queen to this day. She’s a legend for her roles in *Re-Animator *(1985)*, Chopping Mall *(1986), *From Beyond *(1986)*, *and* Castle Freak *(1995). After years of steady work, however, Crampton eventually stepped away from acting for several years to raise her kids. She was lured back for 2011’s *You’re Next*, directed by Adam Wingard, and she was ready for it.

“It was really a turning point in my career and my life and one that I didn’t see coming,” Crampton told *** *in 2020*. *“I hadn’t talked to my agent in six years. He hadn’t dropped me from his roster, which a lot of agents do if you have an actor who hasn’t worked in a while. I got a call from him and I said, ‘Oh, Mike, you haven’t lost my number!’ He said, ‘No. In fact, I have an offer for you to be the matriarch-mom in this horror movie.’”

She continued, “At that point in my life, I was thinking, motherhood is really hard and acting is really fun. It’s true! My kids were little at the time, and they’re less than two years apart, and I thought, yeah, this would be a really fun departure for me. Why don’t I just go and have a good time? I thought, this film will go nowhere probably but I’ll have a good time.”

Since *You’re Next,* Crampton has worked consistently for more than a decade, particularly in horror and other genre projects, appearing in titles like *Suitable Flesh *(2023)*, The Last Stop in Yuma County *(2023)*, *and season four of *Channel Zero.*

***Get your daily dose of entertainment news, celebrity updates, and what to watch with our ******EW Dispatch newsletter******.***

Cary Grant. John Kobal Foundation/Getty Images

Old Hollywood star Cary Grant was once one of the biggest names in the world, starring in classics like *The Philadelphia Story *(1940)*, To Catch a Thief *(1955)*, *and* North by Northwest *(1959).* *He* *eventually retired from acting to raise his daughter, but it took a while for him to embrace fatherhood. When he fell in love with actress Betsy Drake at age 43, he was still too “restless” for children and family life.

“He often said that he would have been too selfish to become a father [earlier in his life],” Cary’s last wife, Barbara Grant*, *said in a 2022 interview with *Closer Weekly*.

Ultimately, Grant and Drake’s marriage would fall apart, and the actor later became romantically involved with his *The Pride and the Passion *costar Sophia Loren.

Grant welcome his only child, Jennifer, with his next wife, Dyan Cannon, in 1966. By that point, he was ready to leave acting behind and devote himself to fatherhood. “He made his last film before she was born,” Mark Glancy, author of *Becoming Cary Grant*, said. “He stayed home, saw her as often as possible and really enjoyed her childhood.”

He died at age 82 in 1986, 20 years after Jennifer’s birth.

Joy Harmon in 1972 on ‘The Odd Couple’.

ABC Photo Archives/Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty

The late Joy Harmon, who died at age 87 in April 2026, was an actress best known for her memorable role in the 1967 Paul Newman film *Cool Hand Luke. *Her other credits included *Village of the Giants *(1965)*, One Way Wahine *(1965)*,* and* Angel in My Pocket* (1969), as well as shows like *Bewitched. *

After marrying film editor Jeff Gourson in 1968, Harmon eventually left acting behind to raise their three children. “I was never one who said, ‘Oh, I’ve got to be a big star,’” Harmon told EW in 2017. “I just took whatever came to me. It got to be the point where I would just get calls — I didn’t have to go in and read for it — go in for wardrobe and do scenes in all those TV shows that were out at that time. It was simple and easy and fun.”

In addition to raising her kids, she also became a small-business owner. She opened Aunt Joy’s Cakes, a wholesale bakery in Burbank that supplied homemade desserts to craft services at film and TV studios.

Katherine Heigl

Katherine Heigl attends Wine, Women & Shoes Benefiting Big Dog Ranch Rescue at Mar-a-Lago on March 8, 2026, in Palm Beach.

Manny Hernandez/Getty

Katherine Heigl was a mainstay of the 2000s, achieving mainstream recognition — and winning an Emmy — as Dr. Izzie Stevens on *Grey’s Anatomy*, while appearing in successful rom-coms like *Knocked Up *(2007) and *27 Dresses *(2008).

After leaving *Grey’s* in 2010, Heigl and her husband, singer Josh Kelley, made a ranch in Utah their full-time home, where they raised their adopted daughter, Naleigh. The couple adopted another daughter in 2012, and Heigl gave birth to their son in 2016.

“I didn’t know how to raise [my kids] in L.A.,” she told E! News (via Fox News) in 2023. “I felt like I could do it here. I could be more on top of things that scare me and I could be more on top of the kinds of friends they have and places they’re going, the kind of activities they’re involved in — and what the hell they’re doing on their phones!”

She continued, “I could kind of decompress and let that hustle part of me go — a little bit.”

Ann Jillian attends The Thalians Holiday Party with Kira Reed Lorsch as Chair at Bel Air Country Club on Dec. 1, 2018, in Los Angeles.

Greg Doherty/Getty

*It’s a Living* star Ann Jillian gave birth to her son at age 42, and she decided soon after to prioritize raising her son over her career in film and television. In an April 2026 appearance on the *Famous with Jacy Dawn Valeras *podcast, the 76-year-old actress discussed her decision to leave Hollywood.

“I’ve been out of it for a while,” she said. “I’ve been out of it for a good reason ... I gave birth to my one and only son when I was 42, and I took that seriously too.”

While she admired women who could balance both a career and motherhood, she felt that life was not for her. “Maybe somebody out there can do this, and good for them… For me, I recognize that I cannot,” she said.

“I can do everything that I want to do, but not all at the same time,” Jillian added, explaining that trying to juggle too much meant that “something is going to suffer.”

9 celebrities who disappeared from Hollywood

14 TV stars who walked away from the shows that made them famous

Kelly McGillis

Actress Kelly McGillis poses for a portrait during the 2013 Sundance Film Festival at the Getty Images Portrait Studio at Village at the Lift on Jan. 18, 2013, in Park City.

Larry Busacca/Getty

Kelly McGillis stole hearts playing Charlie Blackwood opposite Tom Cruise in *Top Gun** *(1986). She also starred in hits like *Witness *(1985) and *The Accused *(1988)*.*

As she raised her two daughters in the ’90s, McGillis began working more selectively, eventually taking a significant break from acting. She later returned for projects including *The L Word* — a role that preceded McGillis’ own coming-out — and horror movies like *The Innkeepers* (2011). By 2013, she was living in North Carolina and teaching acting in Asheville, something she was still doing as of 2019. She also previously worked as a drug counselor at a rehab center in New Jersey.

In a 2019 interview with *Vanity Fair**, *McGillis explained that raising her kids wasn’t the only reason she stepped back from Hollywood. “It was very challenging for me to have any kind of sense of self or self-identity or real self-worth other than what I did for a living,” she said. “And it just — it didn’t become a priority; what became the priority initially was raising my girls and being the best sober parent I could be.”

Eva Mendes poses backstage on Sept. 18, 2024, at ‘The Tonight Show’.

Todd Owyoung/NBC via Getty

Eva Mendes was a star on the rise throughout the 2000s, making an impression in films like *Training Day *(2001)* *and* Hitch *(2005). She fell for actor Ryan Gosling while making 2012’s *The Place Beyond the Pines*, and they’ve been together ever since, sharing two daughters.

After becoming a mother, Mendes stepped away from acting. Speaking about her decision with *Variety* in 2022, she said her daughters, Esmerelda and Amanda, gave her a different purpose. “I thought, ‘Oh, this is what I’m supposed to do right now.’”

She elaborated during a 2024 interview with *Today*, saying that the decision to focus on parenting was “a no-brainer.” She said, “I’m so lucky, and I was like, if I can have this time with my children — and I’ve still worked, I just didn’t act, because acting takes you on locations, it takes you away.”

However, she’s open to making a return at some point. “There are more opportunities for Latina actresses now, but when I bowed out 10 years ago I wasn’t being offered things that weren’t specifically Latina,” she told *Variety*. “It is exciting that things are different now, so who knows what I will do in the future. But right now, I’m keeping it in the home with my kids.”

Meg Tilly attends a special screening of ‘War Machine’ at The Metrograph on May 16, 2017, in New York City.

Jason Kempin/Getty

The younger sister of actress Jennifer Tilly, Meg Tilly had her own successful Hollywood career throughout the ‘80s and ‘90s, notably starring in *Psycho II *(1983), *The Big Chill *(1983)*, *and *Leaving Normal *(1992)*.* Unlike her sister, though, Meg largely stepped away from acting in the mid-‘90s to raise her three children. She shares two with producer Tim Zinneman and one with actor Colin Firth.

In 2017, Tilly opened up to PEOPLE about her decision to leave Hollywood, as she returned to the big screen to play Brad Pitt’s wife in *War Machine. *“I would always take my children with me when I went on movies,” she explained. “That worked really well for a few years. But then one year, we went to shoot* Leaving Normal* and when we came back, my daughter’s best friend was best friends with someone else. She was devastated.”

She continued, “I couldn’t be gone six to nine months from my children’s lives. I had a challenging childhood, so I didn’t feel like I could trust somebody else to raise them. My children didn’t ask to be born. I had a responsibility to be there.”

Since 1999, Tilly has primarily lived in British Columbia and built a second career as an author of literary fiction and romantic thrillers.

Janine Turner

Janine Turner attends Ellis Island Medals Of Honor Ceremony at Ellis Island on May 10, 2025, in New York City.

Chance Yeh/Getty

Janine Turner starred on the CBS series *Northern Exposure* from 1990 to 1995, but eventually scaled back her career and settled in Texas after the birth of her only child, Juliette, in 1997.

Turner spoke to Jennie Garth on her podcast, *I Choose Me with Jennie Garth*, about her choice to leave Hollywood behind — something she said she did twice in her career. The first time came when she was a young actress engaged to Alec Baldwin. “I thought, ‘I can’t do any more bikini roles,’” she said. “I’m watching Alec get all these fabulous male roles, and I’m being sort of objectified.”

Turner ultimately changed course rather than giving up acting altogether. “I found the method acting coach, cut my hair, no fingernail polish, things of that nature, and really studied,” she explained. “I checked out of Hollywood at that point and booked *Northern Exposure* out of New York.”

Once her daughter was born, however, Turner’s priorities shifted again. “The second time I kind of walked away for my daughter,” she said. “CBS, they used to call me all the time, beg me to do a series and to move back to Los Angeles. But I’m like, ‘Well, I have my daughter now.’”

Turner and her daughter ultimately settled in Texas, where the actress had grown up. Though Turner continued taking sporadic jobs — including a starring role on *Strong Medicine* from 2000 to 2002 — she eventually stepped away from that series as well to spend more time with Juliette. She has continued acting occasionally over the years, most prominently as Katie McCoy in season 3 of *Friday Night Lights**.*

- Celebrities & Creators

Original Article on Source

Source: “EW Celebrities”