Leighton Meester Loves Acting—But She Loves Being A Mom More

At a cafe in Santa Monica, wearing a loose button-down and fishing for a lost AirPod, Leighton Meester looks more like a relaxed local mom than the woman who once ruled the Upper East Side as Blair Waldorf. These days, she seems more focused on being present for her kids than chasing the spotlight. She's still acting, but her children clearly come first.

“There’s been a lot of stuff that I haven’t done because I want to be with them,” Meester says about her children, who are 9 and 4. “I don’t like being away from them. I’m sure a lot of people feel this way, but I’m especially not into it.”

It’s not that she’s disappeared. Meester’s been steadily working, most recently in The Buccaneers and Good Cop/Bad Cop, and yes, she traveled with her family to Scotland and Australia for the shoots. Despite her busy schedule, she’s careful with her time. “Obviously, for the very right thing, I would probably just be like, ‘Let’s figure it out.’ I mean, I’m not going to leave my family for a year. We’re not doing that. But apart from that, we have a good system in place, where I can consider jobs carefully. And every other piece of life.”

The resurgence of interest in Meester seems to be happening without her direct participation. Netflix crowned her husband, Adam Brody, a heartthrob again thanks to Nobody Wants This, and a fresh wave of coverage followed. But Meester’s reaction to the noise is casual at best. When a reporter recounted the press, awards show buzz, and fan reactions to her, she shrugged: “That’s nice.”

Still, the same woman who, even in the middle of Gossip Girl fame, said she didn’t Google herself. “People, I think, lose track of what's important if they get too caught up in what people think of them or being famous or whatever it is.”

Even her wedding to Brody was quiet and understated. “On sets and in life, I’ve been able to wear a fancy dress and hit a mark and say lines, and I didn’t want it to feel like that,” she explains. “I wanted it to feel intimate and private.”

Motherhood hasn’t softened her ambition, but it’s shaped her priorities. She still acts, and she’s still compelling in the roles she picks. However, the characters she’s drawn to aren’t polished or perfect. “A little emotionally stunted, or make poor choices, or can’t quite get themselves together,” she says. “This person doesn’t have a dark heart, but they have this insecurity or something they haven't quite figured out or examined, and it’s up to me to figure out what’s causing them pain.”

It’s clear she applies the same introspection to her own life. “You’re like, ‘Oh, no, in trying to embody this other person I just learned about myself and how I process things and how I see the world or how I'm actually really f*cked up and not good at this thing or whatever.’”

She’s not about to overshare her own flaws – and why should she? “I just feel like being in the moment and figuring it out as I go along, because that’s all we can do, you know?”

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