Robert Redford Says He’s Retiring From Acting

Variety

Robert Redford will retire from acting after completing production on his final two films, he announced in an interview with his grandson Dylan, posted online Thursday.

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In the conversation, Redford discusses the importance of storytelling and painting, and reveals that he plans on quitting acting to focus solely on directing and sketching. Dylan asked Redford if he wants to return to painting, another one of the actor’s longtime passions.

“Yeah, a lot — and a lot lately because I’m getting tired of acting,” Redford said. “I’m an impatient person, so it’s hard for me to sit around and do take after take after take. At this point in my life, age 80, it’d give me more satisfaction because I’m not dependent on anybody. It’s just me, just the way it used to be, and so going back to sketching — that’s sort of where my head is right now.”

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He continued, “I’m thinking of moving in that direction and not acting so much.”

Redford says he plans on retiring from his long career in front of the screen after two acting projects in the works come out — Our Souls at Night with Jane Fonda and Old Man With a Gun with Casey Affleck and Sissy Spacek. According to IMDb, he will also appear in the upcoming films, The Discovery and Come Sunday.

“Once they’re done then I’m going to say, ‘Okay, that’s goodbye to all that,’ and then just focus on directing,” he said.

Related: Netflix Acquires Robert Redford, Jason Segel, Rooney Mara's Sci-Fi Film 'The Discovery'

Redford recently starred in the 2015 film A Walk in the Woods, which chronicles two long-lost friends’ 2,000 mile journey across the Appalachian trail and became an indie success. He won a directing Oscar in 1980 for his film Ordinary People, and was honored by the Academy in 2002.

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