Gwyneth Paltrow is grateful that she got her wild partying out of her system in the ’90s, long before everybody started carrying a camera around in their pocket to document all her scandalous behavior.
The Goop founder made an appearance on The Late Late Show with James Corden on Monday to promote her new four-part Audible series, The Goop Pursuit, during which she admitted that she wasn’t always as healthy as she is today. Paltrow was also joined on the program by a very pregnant Hilary Swank who was there to discuss her role on the show Alaska Daily.
At one point, Corden asked the two stars, “You both came up in the nineties, which is having quite the renaissance at the moment—the fashion, the music, what was it like for both of you being so famous at a time when there was no social media, no nothing…what do you remember about that time?” Paltrow replied with a laugh, “It was great—I mean talk about doing cocaine and not getting caught! Like, you could just be at a bar and be, like, having fun, dance on a table, you could…no camera phones! Especially in New York, interestingly enough, there were no paparazzi. You could stumble out of a bar and go home with some rando and no one would know.”
Later on in the conversation, the two actors also compared career achievements and their early acting experiences. “You won your Academy Award in 1999?,” Swank asked Paltrow before adding that she won hers “right after” her in 2000, leading them to high five. Swank noted, “You were famous in the nineties and I wasn’t,” as her breakout film Boys Don’t Cry didn’t come out until 1999.
But while Paltrow may have fond memories of living it up during that time, she’s now focused on loving herself exactly as she is in the present moment. In 2021, she told People that while she still catches herself evaluating her own body with “a critical eye,” she said, “I would love to get to a place where I don’t do that anymore. I want to show up for myself in a more loving way, because it’s all going south from here! There’s nothing we can do about it.” She continued, “I am focusing more on the fundamentals of wellness, like meditation, hydration, nutrient-dense foods and not having tons of alcohol, which I had way too much of during the pandemic! I would never want to go back to my 20s, or even my 30s for that matter. I know myself, I like myself and I am so grateful for the wisdom that comes with age.”