ER: Julianna Margulies left a lot of money on the operating table when she left NBC’s ER – Emergency Duty series in 2000, after six seasons. Now, she has told the reason.
In the latest edition of Super Soul, a program that opens on May 1, at Discovery +, the Emmy winner – who is promoting her new book, Sunshine Girl: An Unexpected Life – reveals to Oprah Winfrey the exact moment when she decided to refuse Warner Bros. offer. $ 27 million to continue playing nurse Carol Hathaway for two more seasons.
She says: “I heard that a friend bought some spiritual books and I was studying Buddhism, so I went to the Bodhi Tree bookstore, ran my finger over a shelf and picked up a book. It was Awakening the Inner Buddha. I brought it home…. I opened the book, closed my eyes and pointed to a line. And I opened my eyes and the sentence was, ‘I knew I wanted to learn more, not earn more’ ”.
Margulies would still receive another Emmy for her character in CBS’s The Good Wife.
While attending the virtual ER meeting last week, she shared that it was George Clooney who told her that her participation in the seemingly failed production pilot was about to become a full-time project.
She explains: “George called me and said, ‘If you’re thinking about taking another job, I recommend that you don’t do it. I think in the next few days you may be offered a regular role in the series. And I said, ‘But Carol died, how would that work?’ And a week later they called and said, ‘Let’s make it regular on the show’ ”.
Margulies is expected to return to TV later this year, with a role in Season 2 of The Morning Show, from Apple TV +.
