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Stories

Donna Mills From ‘Knots Landing’ On Why She Stopped Acting For 18 Years

by Lauren Novak

10 months ago

Donna Mills on why she took a 18 year break from Hollywood

Donna Mills is best known for her role as Abby Fairgate in the Dallas spinoff, Knots Landing. She had a successful career but still longed for one thing: children. So, she decided to adopt a daughter when she was in her 50s and took about 18 years off to raise her.

Now her daughter, Chloe is 27 and Donna is talking about her extended break from Hollywood. Donna shared, “I was very concentrated on my career, but at a certain point, I realized there was something missing — it was a child. So I went after it. I adopted her when she was four days old.”

Donna Mills explains why she put her career somewhat on hold for 18 years

KNOTS LANDING, Donna Mills, 1979-1993
KNOTS LANDING, Donna Mills, 1979-1993. ©CBS / courtesy Everett Collection

She continued, “By that time, I was 54 and people said, ‘You’re going to be so old [to] have a little toddler running around. I never felt that. I never felt older than the other mothers who were probably in their 20s.”

RELATED: ‘Knots Landing’ Cast Then And Now 2022

While many others struggled to accept that Donna adopted later in life, she said she doesn’t regret a thing. She said she and her daughter are very close and that it helped her career to have a child later in life.

KNOTS LANDING, Donna Mills, (1989), 1979-1993
KNOTS LANDING, Donna Mills, (1989), 1979-1993. ph: Charles William Bush / TV Guide / © CBS /Courtesy Everett Collection

Donna explained, “I took off 18 years. I didn’t work. Well, for the first couple of years, I did work. I did some movies for television and stuff like that because I could take her wherever I went. But then when she started school, I wasn’t going to go out of town for two months at a time. And I didn’t become a mother to give her to a nanny.”

CHRISTMAS WISHES & MISTLETOE KISSES, (aka CHRISTMAS WISHES AND MISTLETOE KISSES), from left: Donna Mills, Jill Wagner
CHRISTMAS WISHES & MISTLETOE KISSES, (aka CHRISTMAS WISHES AND MISTLETOE KISSES), from left: Donna Mills, Jill Wagner, (aired Oct. 26, 2019). photo: Josh Stringer / ©Hallmark / Courtesy Everett Collection

Donna continues to work today, recently appearing in the TV series Mood Swings and a film called Abused Again!

RELATED: 122 Classic (and Not-So-Classic) TV Sitcoms from the 1970s

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