Living in the heart of Hollywood isn’t for everyone. While movie premieres, after parties, and paparazzi may sound cool, constantly being in the spotlight can be draining for most people. That’s why quite a few celebs have decided to flee the city, in favor of living a quieter lifestyle when they’re not working. These former Hollywood-dwelling stars include Blake Shelton, Mark Ruffalo and Busy Philipps, who have all said they’re much happier with life in their new locales.
Here’s what these celebs had to say about LA…
Blake Shelton isn’t a big fan of living in Los Angeles — or any city, for that matter! While he makes an exception when he’s with his wife Gwen Stefani, he says he’s much happier on his ranch in Oklahoma as opposed to LA.
”It’s miserable. And it’s not a reflection of people there, it’s just the fact that it’s a city. And I don’t feel any different about that as I would New York or Chicago or St. Louis or Dallas. It’s just a city, for me, is just I feel trapped a little bit. And like you, I like to be able to walk outside and burn something…I just feel a little bit like I’m in detention, you know, when I’m in a city somewhere, like I got in trouble for something,” Blake shared.
2. Chris Hemsworth & Elsa Pataky
When Chris Hemsworth and his wife Elsa Pataky decided to have children, they made the move back to Chris’ native Australia. He says that the family found Los Angeles “suffocating” and it wasn’t how he wanted his kids to grow up.
“I love what I do as an actor, but when you are surrounded by it constantly, it becomes a bit suffocating…We were living shoulder to shoulder in the suburbs and thought that’s not how we want our kids to grow up. Moving to a kind of farm setup back here on the coast in Australia has been the best thing,” Chris told Modern Luxury.
3. Mark Ruffalo
As Mark Ruffalo rose to fame, he chose not to stay in California. Instead, Mark and his wife packed their bags and headed to upstate New York for a more rural lifestyle, away from the hubbub of Hollywood. Since the late ’90s, the couple has called Callicoon, NY their home, where they can raise their children outside of the spotlight.
“No matter where I was in the world, this is what I called my home. This has been a fine community with a balance between the locals and the newcomers that I always found embracing. People in this community are good people, and I think the place has held together well. Here, I am no better and no worse than the next guy. It makes no difference if I am an actor or not. I appreciate that kind of respect. It is the respect that one earns by the quality of person they are, not what they do for a living. That is rare today,” Mark told their local newspaper.
Despite her rising success in the ’90s, Neve Campbell chose to move away from Hollywood and relocate across the globe for more anonymity. She settled in England, where she was happy to be “completely anonymous.”
“I just wasn’t interested in the scripts and I was feeling a bit unhappy with the things that were coming to me and I was feeling a little bored of the whole thing and I thought, ‘I want a change.’…It’s just very different there. I literally did not get bothered once. People would ask me what I did for a living. I’d say, ‘I act’ and they go, ‘Oh, OK.’ It was so lovely,” Neve said on “The Late Show.”
5. Nicole Kidman & Keith Urban
Originally hailing from Australia, Nicole Kidman and Keith Urban have chosen to make their U.S. homebase in Nashville instead of Los Angeles. Nicole says she’s thankful to be able to walk around and go to shops without being bothered by paparazzi.
“It feels like a normal life which is what I [wanted]. I’m a weird mix. I’ve always said I love the drama and the creating of a role and a performance and what comes with that but then also like to have the white picket fence life…So I like the routine of family and breakfast together and dinner together. I don’t need much. I don’t need to be going out at night. I’m a bit of a homebody so it totally suits me to live in the South and have a very simple life,” Nicole said “The Queen Latifah Show.”
After a decades-long career in Hollywood, Harrison Ford says he and his family headed for the mountains of Wyoming so they could enjoy a sense of freedom away from the entertainment industry.
“I’m old news. I’ve been [in Hollywood] for 35 years. When I’m up in Wyoming, I just walk out the door and keep walking…if my chores are done and there’s nothing more pressing and the weather’s good, I’ll go flying — I love to fly up there — or walk in the woods, do some work, ride my road bike or mountain bike,” Harrison told Parade.
Daniel Day-Lewis dropped his Hollywood home in favor of a low key lifestyle in Ireland, where he lives on a farm in a small village. He says that he feels most free there and has been able to escape the pressures of being in the spotlight.
“Living in this place that I have now for 15 years I’ve always felt, more than any other place that I’ve been, that Wicklow is in harmony, complete harmony, with the demands that life has made. The truth is I don’t notice [the pressure of celebrity] around here because I’m allowed to live. I notice it elsewhere,” Daniel said.
During the pandemic, Busy Philipps relocated to New York with her husband, screenwriter Marc Silverstein, and their children, Birdie and Cricket. Busy explained that she was fed up with the “toxicity” of Los Angeles and had some growing health concerns about the city.
“I don’t know one f–king person in Los Angeles who doesn’t have Irritable Bowel Syndrome. It’s why we all give up gluten and wheat, but maybe it’s the toxicity of the city. I don’t know, just a theory. When the fires started again this year I just had this real lightning bolt moment where I turned to Marc and said, ‘We have to leave. We have to go to clean air,'” Busy told Shondaland.
9. Jeff Daniels
Jeff Daniels decided to move his family to Michigan over 30 years ago when he realized he couldn’t provide them with a “sense of normalcy” while living in Los Angeles. While it may have been a big deal at the time, the family has never looked back.
“It was a very dramatic move in 1986 to move to Michigan, but that was to keep the family number one. And that worked,” Jeff told People.
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