A reboot of Matlock, the Andy Griffith legal drama from the '80s and '90s, is set to hit the small screen in two weeks—and the Independent reports that Kathy Bates, the franchise's new star, is already announcing her retirement ahead of the premiere. "This is my last dance," she tells Alexis Soloski of the New York Times of her decision to call it quits after her Matlock run has concluded. "Everything I've prayed for, worked for, clawed my way up for, I am suddenly able to be asked to use all of it. And it's exhausting." Soloski notes it's not the first time Bates, 76, has contemplated hanging up her acting hat: At one point, a "movie shoot had soured (no, she won't specify the movie) and she found herself alone, on her sofa in Los Angeles, sobbing." Seeing the Matlock script made her reconsider an early departure from the acting arena—but apparently only temporarily.
It all seems to tie back to Bates' hard-driving work ethic, and to what Soloski writes is the actor's seeming inability "to enjoy her own achievements." "Pain, pain, pain, pain, pain," Bates says. "Do I have the right to feel this pain? When I was given so much?" Plus, despite her accolades—she won an Academy Award for her role as Annie Wilkes in 1990's Misery, and Emmys for her work in TV's American Horror Story and Two and a Half Men; Us lists even more of her best-known roles—Bates never really felt like she fit in in Hollywood. "I never felt dressed right or well," she says. "I felt like a misfit. It's that line in Misery when Annie says, 'I'm not a movie star.' I'm not." Still, despite her seeming dissatisfaction and disappointment, acting always remained her calling. "It was the only thing I've had, ever," she says. Matlock debuts on Sept. 22 on CBS. More from Bates' interview here. (More Kathy Bates stories.)
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