Sharon Stone Says She Hasn’t Been Offered Jobs in Years Following Her Stroke

Sharon Stone is opening up about the toll her health struggles have had on her career.

The actress offered candid insight during The Hollywood Reporter's Raising Our Voices luncheon on Wednesday, explaining that she couldn't get work after recuperating from a stroke and brain hemorrhage in 2001.

The recovery process took seven years, she said, and there haven't been any jobs since.

"When it first happened, I didn't want to tell anybody because you know if something goes wrong with you, you're out," Stone noted. "Something went wrong with me — I've been out for 20 years. I haven't had jobs. I was a very big movie star at one point in my life."

Despite facing adversity and exclusion in Hollywood, Stone told the crowd that she's staying strong and vocal. "I'm loud, I don't take any crap, and I'm also a diversity person," the actress said at the event, attended by The Messenger.

Stone underwent surgery after experiencing a stroke and a nine-day brain bleed, which she said gave her a 1 percent chance of survival. The reception from Hollywood, particularly women in Hollywood, she told Variety in 2019 interview, was "brutally unkind." The financial toll of losing work forced her to remortgage her house.

"I lost my place in the business. I was like the hottest movie star, you know?" Stone said. "It was like Miss Princess Diana and I were so famous — and she died and I had a stroke. And we were forgotten."

These days, Stone is exploring other facets of her creativity, debuting her first art show in March, which featured landscapes inspired by her childhood.

"I am going to get up and work," the artist said, while speaking to Spectrum News 1 about this new chapter of her life. "If it's not for Hollywood, it's going to be for somebody else because I'm a worker. I come from blue-collar blood, baby."