Kim Cattrall says she almost walked away from Sex and the City because she feared “no one wants to see a sexy 40-something,” a doubt she now labels “self-inflicted ageism.” At 41 she turned the role of Samantha Jones down four times before a late-night call from producers convinced her to reconsider, a decision she now hails for helping “make forty sexy.”
In her new interview Cattrall stresses that she and Samantha are opposites—she is “a serial monogamist”—but remains proud the character normalised mid-life desire on television. She confirms she will not reprise the role in Max’s And Just Like That season 3, a stance echoed by Sarah Jessica Parker, who says another cameo “has never been discussed,” while showrunner Michael Patrick King calls a full return “not realistic.” Instead, Cattrall will headline the BBC Radio 4 spy drama Central Intelligence later this month, playing CIA trail-blazer Eloise Page.
Advocates say her candour exposes a wider industry problem. Madeline Di Nonno of the Geena Davis Institute notes female characters over 50 occupy just four per cent of speaking roles on U.S. television—despite comprising nearly one-fifth of the population—and warns that “older women are particularly erased.” Research highlighted by Ms.
Magazine shows the share of women over 40 leading films fell from 20 per cent in 2015 to 14 per cent in 2022. Even so, a Guardian survey this year found studios slowly warming to mature heroines as awards attention for Demi Moore and Nicole Kidman challenges the “babe-to-Driving Miss Daisy” career cliff. Marketing analysts argue the shift is overdue, noting older women now drive a majority of consumer spending.
Cattrall hopes her story will speed that change: “Age is seasoning, not expiry,” she told fans after the interview posted. Whether Hollywood agrees, she added, “depends on who’s brave enough to write the next Samantha—for a woman in her sixties.”
