“I’ve always been a little awkward,” she explained. “And I’ve always been a studier and a smudgy eye-glass person and tripping [over things]. My mind is always thinking of so many things that I don’t think about presenting myself.”
Shields, 57, is so dorky, in fact, that she credited “color-coordinated pens” as the reason she “got through college” in the ’80s.
Her husband, Chris Henchy, with whom she shares two daughters, Rowan, 19, and Grier, 16, agreed with the “Suddenly Susan” star’s self-assessment.
“She’s very nerdy,” he told us. “She can embarrass the family, laugh at the stupidest jokes.”
However, the director, 59, went on to marvel at his superstar wife’s normalcy.
“One thing with Brooke that I learned whenever I introduced her to people, like, back in the day — my mom and dad and my family, they were like, ‘Um, she’s the most normal,’” he recalled. “It’s insane that she is as normal as she is. I don’t think I take it for granted.”
Henchy, who co-created the website Funny or Die with Will Ferrell, was equally amazed when comparing Shields’ teen years to his own.
“You sit there and you think about what you were doing at 16,” he said, speaking directly to the legendary model. “And I was, you know, pumping air in my bike tires and driving to 7-Eleven, and she’s doing amazing things, movies, and … it’s a whole different world. So it kind of puts things in perspective, for sure.”
Shields is currently promoting her two-part documentary, which explores her decades-long career in the spotlight, including her famed Calvin Klein ads — “Nothing comes between me and my Calvins” — and playing a child prostitute in the movie “Pretty Baby.”
She also reveals that an unnamed movie executive raped her when she was in her 20s.
In the trailer, the “Endless Love” star says she was “catapulted into the world of adult sexuality,” which “seared” her.
She described seeing the finished film, which her longtime pal Ali Wentworth co-produced, as a cathartic experience.
“It all came full circle,” she told Page Six. “And I was able to be proud of the things that I’ve really never given myself credit for and let myself process the sadder parts but know that the joy of not being jaded and coming through and still being excited about this insane business and what I do.”
With everything she’s been through, Shields sounded a little astonished that she came out of her childhood and teen years unscathed.
“I’m not angry. I’m not jaded. I’m just excited,” she continued. “That is such a gift and a blessing. And seeing this movie, with all of it together, cut together — I’ve only compartmentalized everything in my life, so I’ve never seen it all together, you know — and it really made me just feel that I did it. Still doing it!”
Other celebs at the premiere of “Pretty Baby: Brooke Shields,” which hits Hulu on April 3, included Wentworth and husband George Stephanopoulos, Debra Messing, Huma Abedin, Marlo Thomas and Mariska Hargitay.
Source: Page Six
