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A lot of fans have trouble separating Sarah Jessica Parker from Carrie Bradshaw, the fashionable columnist that she played in the hit TV show Sex and the City. Though there are some similarities between the two fashionistas, they’re not one and the same. Parker is an accomplished actress with several impressive credits to her name that go far beyond Sex and the City.
Her rise to fame may have been kicked off by SATC, but Parker’s career has branched out into several different and surprising directions since then. Keep reading to find out 10 surprising details you never knew about Sarah Jessica Parker’s career.
Ballet Helped Her To Become An Actor
Sarah Jessica Parker is yet to play a ballerina in a film or TV show, but that doesn’t mean that her dance training was totally useless when it came to her becoming an actress. In fact, she revealed in an interview that it actually helped her to be able to have a career in the film and TV business.
Parker revealed that ballet allowed her to be “physical in [her] work.” She even said that it helped her to play her starring role on Sex and the City. “And even as Carrie Bradshaw, running all the time, or moving around, finding ways to be physical in lots of things, [it] had been maybe something that I call upon.”
While Filming SATC, She Worked Up To 20 Hours A Day
To many fans of SATC, playing one of the four leading ladies sounds like an ideal job. While there’s no denying that Parker, along with Kim Cattrall, Cynthia Nixon, and Kristin Davis had fun on set in New York, it was still hard work. Much harder work than most fans give them credit for.
Parker explained in an interview with the National Public Radio that sometimes playing Carrie Bradshaw meant she had to work for between 18 and 20 hours a day. Those hours only reduced when she had her first child toward the end of the show.
She Likes Doing Projects With A Smaller Budget
Though most people have trouble separating Parker from Bradshaw, the truth is they’re completely different people. In many ways, their personalities are different. While Bradshaw loves all things glitz and glamour, Parker tends to be a little more down to earth. She recently revealed that she likes doing acting projects that have a smaller budget, rather than working on huge movies and TV shows.
“I’ve always liked all those experiences … There wasn’t a hair-and-make-up trailer. I got ready in the back of cars and strangers’ apartments and ran from one location to the next,” she said, adding that too much money is often wasted on big movies.
She Nearly Missed Out On A Role In Footloose
The most famous role that Parker has even taken is undoubtedly Bradshaw in Sex and the City. But before she signed on to play Manhattan’s favorite columnist, she appeared in a few other major films. One of her earliest was the ‘80s flick Footloose, where she played Rusty.
Though Rusty wasn’t a major role, it did help Parker to get her name out there in front of the people who matter. But she almost didn’t get the role because she didn’t want to dye her hair red to play it.
She Heads An All-Female Production Company
Since playing Carrie Bradshaw, Sarah Jessica Parker has become something of an icon for female empowerment and women’s right. She is very supportive of women working towards their own success without the help of men and strives to empower them to achieve their dreams.
A lot of fans don’t know that Parker actually heads a production company called Pretty Matches which she founded in 2005 with Alison Benson. According to an interview Parker did with Collider, the company consists of a team of five women, and their goal is to create more professional opportunities for women.
She Experienced Sexism During Her Career
Unfortunately, one of the things that has driven Parker’s passion for women’s rights and equal opportunities for women is the fact that she’s witnesses so much sexism, discrimination, and harassment against women in show business.
The actress and mother of three told the National Public Radio that she has seen “countless experiences of men behaving poorly” though she’s only noticed them in the later years of her career. The #MeToo movement has inspired Parker to stand up and speak up when she witnesses examples of men harassing women or women being discriminated against in the industry.
Her Background Is In Theatre
Parker is one of the world’s most iconic stars and has appeared in endless commercially successful projects that go beyond Sex and the City. She also has films like The First Wives Club, Hocus Pocus, and The Family Stone under her belt. But before all that, Parker got her first taste of show business in the theatre.
In the 1970s, she appeared with four of her siblings in a production of The Sound of Music in Missouri. In 1979, Parker won the role of the world’s most famous red-headed orphan in the Broadway production of Annie.
She Had Some Doubts About Starring As Carrie
The world would definitely be a different place is Parker had never played Carrie Bradshaw. Sex and the City made both Parker and Bradshaw icons and changed the way modern audiences viewed some of the issues that were raised on the show. So it’s difficult to imagine that there was a time when Parker was seriously considering not accepting the role.
Her main doubts revolved around not wanting to sign on to do a TV series for the long term. But in the end, Darren Starr wanted her to play Bradshaw and she agreed to sign on.
Thank goodness for that!
She Established Herself As A Fashion Icon During The MTV Movie Awards
During SATC’s six-season run, Carrie Bradshaw evolves from a kind of clueless columnist (as far as style is concerned) to a total fashionista. Today, both Parker and Bradshaw are considered fashion icons. It wasn’t until the year 2000 that Parker really showed the world that she did fashion just as well as her character.
That year, she hosted the MTV Movie Awards, making headlines when she changed outfits 14 times during the duration of the evening. Since then, she had appeared as the face of several prestigious fashion brands.
She Signed A Contract With Gap For $38 Million
When you’ve played a character like Carrie Bradshaw, the world is your oyster. After the last season of SATC had finished in 2004, Parker was presented with a deal to collaborate with Gap. The $38 million multi-season contract was the first of its kind for the company.
Not all fans took to the idea of Parker working with Gap, a company whose style is considered less high-end fashion than what Bradshaw wore on the show. Despite receiving some criticism, the ads that Parker shot with Gap were successful for the company.