After leaving Hollywood, Emmy winner Joan Cusack made an unusual career pivot

Decades ago, and despite being one of its biggest stars, Joan Cusack realised Hollywood wasn’t for her – so she left it for good and set herself up a very different business on the other side of the country.

The two-time Oscar nominee, 63, is back in the spotlight for Toy Story 5, but she’s not afraid to admit that she feels like a fish out of water.

“I’ve been in Chicago raising my kids, which there’s nothing more important to me than that,” Cusack told People.

“And it’s been kind of crazy to be part of it, a red carpet thing. It’s just not what I do. I don’t even dress up that much.”

While red carpets are not commonplace in her life any more, Cusack spends a lot of time in a less glamorous job – running her gift store.

She opened Judy Maxwell Home, named after Barbra Streisand’s character in her favourite movie, What’s Up Doc?, in 2014 and billed herself as the “intern/cleaning lady” on its website.

The labour of love is a far cry from her movie career, but the idea was sparked while she was working on beloved 2003 comedy School of Rock, when her youngest son was just seven months old.

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“I wanted to be around and raise my kids, and if you’re acting, you always have to go away to work,” Cusack told The New York Times.

“I was trying to find something creative to do and still be at home. I wasn’t a big shopper, but I’d been on lots of really interesting sets, and so I thought, if I could make it easy and around the corner, what would be fun things to sell?

“It’s been a low-pressure way to be creative, and to have people come into the shop and laugh. Mostly everything in the store is funny!”

The Emmy winner laid down roots in Chicago in 1996 with her lawyer husband, Richard Burke, and it became the place where they raised their two sons, Dylan John, 29, and Miles, 25, and have lived ever since.

Cusack tried out the Hollywood lifestyle, but it was not for her.

“I think a couple of times I tried to go out to LA, and I’d be in a coffee shop and the waitress would be like, ‘Oh my God, I just got a part doing blah-blah-blah.’ Everyone’s so beautiful. It’s too sunny. I don’t even like the sun, so I couldn’t do it,” she told People.

Despite her aversion to Los Angeles, Cusack has managed to balance her acting career, quiet lifestyle and unique career pivot.

Cusack joked to People that she has “never made any money” from the store, but it’s been “a great hobby”.

That should not matter too much, with Toy Story 5 breaking franchise records at the box office.