Changing her tune

THERE’S SOMETHING ODD ABOUT MARY

Imagine waking up after a routine minor surgery with a brand-new talent – one that could potentially win you an Oscar. It’s a real-life situation for actress

Mary Steenburgen, who found her brain “rewired” following a small operation on her arm 10 years ago.

“The best way I can describe it is that it just felt like my brain was only music, and that everything anybody said to me became musical,” the Book Club star says.

“I started feeling strange as soon as the anaesthesia started to wear off. All of my thoughts became musical. Every street sign became musical. I couldn’t get my mind into any other mode.”

It was a huge shock for Mary (66), who has been married to Cheers actor Ted Danson (71) for 24 years. “I couldn’t focus, I couldn’t have acted, I couldn’t have learnt any of my lines,” she says.

A decade later, she is signed to a major record label and a song she’s co-written, Glasgow (No Place Like Home), was used on British film Wild Rose and is a strong contender for a Best Original Song Oscar nomination.

Now she balances acting with songwriting, and loves them equally.

“I didn’t fall out of love with acting when this happened,” she says.

“And I still haven’t. But there’s so much more capability in our brains than we probably realise, and agreeing to diminishment and shutting down doors is a choice that we all make for ourselves.

It turns out you don’t really have to do that.”