Robert Redford once revealed heartbreaking biggest regret of his life

Robert Redford, iconic actor and Oscar-winning director, has died at the age of 89.

Redford died peacefully in his sleep early Tuesday morning at his home in the Utah mountains near Provo, according New York Post and his publicist, Cindi Berger.

At the time of writing, no cause of death has been shared.

Born on August 18, 1936, Redford lived a life few could ever match. Yet behind his success as an actor and director, he endured heartbreak and unimaginable loss.

As a child, the future star battled polio, and in his teens, he admitted he was a “bad student.” He lost his scholarship to the University of Colorado in Boulder after turning to heavy drinking. While living in Boulder, he worked as a janitor at the city’s oldest restaurant, The Sink — a place he never forgot. In fact, at the 2018 Sundance Film Festival, he wore a shirt with the restaurant’s logo as a quiet tribute to his past.

“The one person who stood behind me was my mother,” he said at the Sundance Film Festival Utah Women’s Leadership Celebration in 2018.

“She believed that all things considered, she just had faith that I had something in me that was going to turn out OK,” he said, as cited by Womans World.

Indeed, years prior to his death, Redford described his Texan-born mom Martha Hart as an adventurous person who always saw things in a positive light. He also credited her for his strong connection to women.

Sadly, his devoted mom passed away when she was just 40 years old.

“She had a hemorrhage tied to a blood disorder she got after losing twin girls at birth 10 years after I was born,” he said, adding that his mother had been warned that another pregnancy would be dangerous.

“She wanted a family so badly, she got pregnant again,” said Redford, adding that her death “seemed so unfair.”

Speaking on the impact her passing had, Redford would later claim that not telling his mother “thank you” was the biggest regret of his life.

“I took [her] for granted because that’s the way kids were at that age,” Redford admitted. “My regret is that she passed away before I could thank her.”

Robert was just 18 years old at the time and had just started his course at college. After he lost his college place he ended up traveling around Europe and later studied painting at the Pratt Institute in Brooklyn and took classes at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts.

Despite experiencing a series of tragedies in his long life, including the loss of his infant son, Scott, who died at only 2½ months from sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), and the death of another son, James “Jamie” Redford, from bile-duct cancer in 2020, Redford never stopped creating.

He left his mark on Hollywood with unforgettable films, founded the Sundance Film Festival, and inspired countless independent filmmakers.

According to the New York Post, Redford is survived by his wife, his daughters Shauna Schlosser Redford and Amy Redford, as well as seven grandchildren.

Rest in peace, Robert Redford!

VA

Related Posts

At My Mother’s Funeral, a Woman Slipped a Baby Into My Arms and Said, ‘She Wanted You to Have Him’

I used to think “home” was something you outgrow. I built a life where nobody asked if I was happy, only if I was reliable. I was a Regional Director…

Read more

“Sign The Papers And Leave,” My Husband Said At His Father’s Birthday Dinner Because I Had Two Daughters — One Year Later, His Entire

My name is Meredith Holloway, and the evening my marriage finally collapsed began inside the dining room of my husband’s childhood home in Greenville, South Carolina, where nearly thirty members…

Read more

I Paid for an Elderly Man’s Bread After He Tried to Take It – The Next Morning, a Dozen Official Vehicles Showed Up at My House

That moment cost me most of what I had left until payday. What came to my door the next morning, I couldn’t have imagined in a thousand years. The banging…

Read more

Three Year Old Whispered To A Police Dog In Court And Then Pointed To The Truth No One Could Ignore

The courtroom air felt thick enough to breathe, packed with anticipation and a dread that made every small sound seem too loud. Reporters filled the back rows, pens ready, faces…

Read more

The line behind me was huffing. A man with a cart full of sports drinks kept checking his watch like she had personally ruined his life. Her hands shook while she counted my change. Not wildly. Just enough to tell the truth. She looked up at me with that practiced smile people wear when they have cried in the car and still need to finish their shift. “Sorry, honey,” she said. “My eyes get tired at night.” I saw the little gold pin on her vest. Eighteen years. Eighteen years standing on swollen feet under bad lights while teenagers called her slow and managers asked her to smile bigger. I said, “Take your time.” Three simple words. The line behind me got quieter. She handed me my receipt and leaned in a little, like kindness had cracked open a door she’d been holding shut all day. “My husband’s oxygen machine quit last month,” she said softly. “So I picked up evening shifts.” Then she straightened her shoulders and called, “Next guest!” That was it. No speech. No complaint. Just survival with lipstick and a name tag. I walked out feeling ashamed of every time I had mistaken exhaustion for incompetence. An hour later, I stopped at a drive-thru coffee place. The kid at the window couldn’t have been older than nineteen. He had acne along his jaw, tired eyes, and a college parking sticker on a car so old it looked held together by prayer. The man in front of me had spent a full minute yelling because the foam on his drink was wrong. Not cold. Not poisoned. Wrong. The kid kept saying, “I’m sorry, sir. I’ll remake it.” By the time I pulled up, his face had gone flat in that way people do when they are trying not to cry in public. I handed him my card and asked, “You okay?” He gave a quick nod, then shook his head. “Midterms,” he said. “And my mom’s rent went up again, so I picked up extra shifts.” He laughed after saying it, but it was the kind of laugh that sounds like a door trying not to slam. I wanted to say something wise. All I could come up with was, “You’re doing better than people twice your age.” That made him smile for real.

The line behind me was huffing. A man with a cart full of sports drinks kept checking his watch like she had personally ruined his life. Her hands shook while…

Read more

The People We Call Invisible Until Their Survival Breaks Right in Front of Us

Sharing is caring! The woman bagging my groceries was seventy-two, wearing a five-dollar pair of compression gloves under a store vest, and she whispered, “Please don’t let me be short…

Read more

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *