Stone’s back to work nerves

Sharon Stone was terrified about returning to acting after overcoming her health problems. The 59-year-old actress has been out of the spotlight for several years after suffering a stroke and brain haemorrhage in September 2001, but she can now be seen in Steven Soderbergh’s new TV drama ‘Mosaic’ as murder victim Olivia Lake. And though she jumped at the chance to appear on the show, she admitted she had to mask her insecurities about being back in front of the camera. Asked if she was nervous, she said: “Yes, I absolutely felt insecure. But I certainly didn’t want anyone to think I did. “I was asking myself, ‘What’s going to happen if I can’t do it? What’s going to happen if I fall apart?” Sharon was particularly nervous because the stroke left her with memory problems, whereas she used to be famed in the acting world for quickly being word-perfect with her scripts. She said: “I lost my short- and longterm memory when I had the stroke and it took me a long time to get it back, because I had to learn to learn. “I was such a hot shot, back in the day. I had a photographic memory so I didn’t even have to learn lines. Coming back to it, I didn’t know what the hell I was doing.” But the ‘Basic Instinct’ star - who was given just a 5 per cent chance of survival after the brain haemorrhage - felt “really lucky” to be able to bring her personal struggles to the role in the drama series. She told Grazia magazine: “If Steven Soderbergh had asked me to come and read the phone book, I’d probably have done it. “But I feel really lucky that he asked me to do something that was so personal and raw and revealing because, frankly, I’ve been through hell and it was great to be able to bring all of that insecurity and compassion to the screen.”