Anne Hathaway Discloses Her Major Sobriety Milestone

Hathaway has been sober for more than five years now, but she has said it may not stay that way forever.

By Michael Hein

Anne Hathaway just invited fans to celebrate a huge milestone with her – five years of sobriety. In an interview with The New York Times last week, Hathaway was asked about turning 40 as a woman in Hollywood. She said that she didn't think much of that birthday, and was more focused on things like the anniversary of her sobriety.

"There are so many other things I identify as milestones," Hathaway said. "I don't normally talk about it, but I am over five years sober. That feels like a milestone to me. Forty feels like a gift. The fact of the matter is I hesitate at calling things 'middle age' simply because I can be a semantic stickler and I could get hit by a car later today. We don't know if this is middle age. We don't know anything."

Hathaway decided to stop drinking in October of 2018, and she first spoke publicly about it in January of 2019 during an interview on The Ellen DeGeneres Show. She didn't describe her relationship with alcohol as dramatic or rapidly destructive, but said that she had decided to make this change at least while she was raising her son. Hathaway married actor Adam Shulman in 2012 and they had a son named Jonathan in March of 2016. In July of 2019, they had a second son named Jack.

"I'm gonna stop drinking while my son's living in my house," Hathaway said at the time. "I don't totally love the way I [drink] and he's getting to an age where he really does need me all the time in the mornings... I did one school run one day where I dropped him off at school, I wasn't driving, but I was hungover and that was enough for me. I didn't love that one."

When asked about sobriety later in an interview with Modern Luxury, Hathaway said: "I didn't put [a drink] down because my drinking was a problem; I put it down because the way I drink leads me to have hangovers and those were the problem. My last hangover lasted for five days. When I'm at a stage in my life where there is enough space for me to have a hangover, I'll start drinking again, but that won't be until my kid is out of the house."

Related:

Still, Hathaway describing herself as "over five years sober" calls to mind addiction recovery programs where patients are discouraged from ever drinking or using intoxicants again. Hathaway has not mentioned plans to resume drinking later in life for several years now. Either way, many commenters were inspired by her achievement when she mentioned it last week.

Hathaway is currently promoting her new movie The Idea of You – a rom-com and an adaptation of the novel by Robinne Lee. Hathaway stars as a 40-year-old single mom who falls into an unlikely romance with a 24-year-old man – the lead singer of the most popular boy band at the time. The movie has gotten positive reviews so far, and it premieres on Prime Video on May 2.

Trending Now: