Steven Spielberg 'felt helpless' watching Drew Barrymore's decline
Steven Spielberg felt like he was unable to help his goddaughter Drew Barrymore when she was 'robbed of her childhood' as a young actress
Steven Spielberg felt like he was unable to help Drew Barrymore when she was "robbed of her childhood" as a young actress.
The movie director became Drew's godfather after working with her as as child on his 1982 movie 'E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial' and he grew concerned when he realised she was being exposed to an adult world way too young - paving the way for her spiral into drug addiction - and he felt powerless to step in.
He told Vulture: "She was staying up way past her bedtime, going to places she should have only been hearing about, and living a life at a very tender age that I think robbed her of her childhood. Yet I felt very helpless because I wasn’t her dad. I could only kind of be a consigliere to her."
Spielberg also told the publication Drew she once into his office wearing red lipstick and he told her to wipe it off. He also tried to give her some more normal childhood experiences - gifting her with a cat named after her 'E.T.' character and taking her on trips to Disneyland and Knott’s Berry Farm.
During the interview the actress, now 48, described Spielberg as "the only person in my life to this day that ever was a parental figure."
Drew, who has daughters Olive, 10, and Frankie, nine, with her ex-husband Will Kopelman, 44, has been open about her struggles to reconcile with her parents after her difficult childhood. Her mum Jaid was her manager when she was a child star and regularly took her to parties around Hollywood, including at Studio 54, which exposed her to drugs and alcohol – before she landed in rehab aged 12. A year later, she was placed in a California mental health facility for a year and a half and by 14, Drew became emancipated from her mum and dad John, who died in 2004 following a diagnosis of multiple myeloma.
