Mena Suvari Says It’s ‘Amazing’ What Has Come Following the Radical Honesty of Her Memoir: ‘I’d Rather Be Free’ (Exclusive)

Mar. 15, 2025

Mena Suvari.Photo:Jeremy Chan/Getty

Jeremy Chan/Getty

Ever since writing a book,Mena Suvari’s life has become an open one — and that’s how she prefers it.

Settling in for a conversation at the Toronto International Film Festival, Suvari is marking 25 years since she was here with 1999’sAmerican Beauty, a film that ultimately won Best Picture at the Academy Awards and jettisoned Suvari, then 20, into the spotlight following her breakout success inAmerican Pie.

It was an exciting, confusing time. “I overextended. I was too impressionable,” she recalls of those years while speaking about her new film, the Joseph Kahn-directed sci-fi horrorIckat the PEOPLE/Entertainment Weeklystudio at the festival.

In Suvari’s2021 memoirThe Great Peace, she revealed her history with a predatory manager following her arrival in Hollywood at age 15, along with surviving childhood sexual abuse and drug use used to numb her pain. Since releasing the honest tome, Suvari, 45, is still living in a more radically honest place, which she says has been freeing.

“I wrote my book because I just needed to get it out of my life, and I wanted to move forward. I couldn’t hide anymore, and I knew that I needed to do it for myself. And after I’d finished writing the book, I got pregnant,” she says of her now three-year-old sonChristopher Alexanderwith husbandMichael Hope.

Ick.Courtesy of TIFF

Courtesy of TIFF

She has since officially cast off the front she’d been putting on for years. “I just felt like I was playing a game with myself all the time: ‘I’m this person. I didn’t have that past, and I’m everything that you want me to be.’ That’s what my life was: ‘Who do you want me to be, and how you want me to be?’ That’s what I learned how to do,” she recalls. “And so now I’m sort of like, ‘No, I’m getting to know me, and this is what I like,’ and I’m learning to be okay with just learning how to accept myself.”

But what has surprised Suvari is how much living her truth has attracted to her life.

“What’s amazing is the things that have come out of that — people that have thought of me, other work that’s come. And that was only because I had to step out of my own way. It’s just about fear. We’re so afraid that if we make this move, if we do that move, we’re not going to be accepted. I still don’t have all of those answers, but… I’d rather be free, and I’d rather have these conversations and hope that it helps somebody.”

Starring inIckhas been exciting, Suvari says of the satirical filmTheDaily Beastcalled “a horror-comedy cult classic in the making,” which probes the events of a small town when alien life invades Earth and the headline-weary population fails to see the threat at their door.The Film Stagecalled the film “a riotous take on the creature feature and a scathing satire of society’s apathetic attitude in the face of existential threats.”

Mena Suvari and Michael Hop.Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty

Alberto E. Rodriguez/Getty

Kahn, who has directed iconic music videos from Britney Spears' “Toxic” to Taylor Swift’s “Look What You Made Me Do” “is exactly the type of person that I like to work with because he knows exactly what he wants,” says Suvari.

“It just really means a lot to me that any creative sees me as a part of their vision,” adds the actress, who had to choose between attending the festival and the Sept. 9 Creative Arts Emmy Awards, where she was nominated for Outstanding Performer in a Short Form Comedy Or Drama Series for the dystopian streaming seriesRZR.

Mena Suvari and Brandon Routh.Jeremy Chan/Getty

“Everything that I’ve experienced in my life has really tried to bring me into this place of ‘I only have so much control, and I am letting go, I’m trusting, and I’m going with it.’ And I’m enjoying it more. That was one thing that I had to learn, too. You filter out the noise.”

And at home, she’s happily living that toddler life.

“He’ll be three and a half next month. He’s great,” says the proud mom. “He’s shining. He’s very fiery Aires. He’s a little negotiator. I’m like, ‘Are you a lawyer?’ He is always negotiating, but he’s my greatest teacher, and I tell him every day that he’s the best thing that ever happened to me.”

Ickis currently seeking distribution at the Toronto International Film Festival, which runs through Sept. 15.

source: people.com