Sally Field reveals how Jack Nicholson saved her career

Sally Field owes her career to Jack Nicholson, apparently.

In a new interview with People, the Mrs. Doubtfire star opened up about the time in Hollywood when she “couldn’t get in a room to audition,” because she had become so typecast following her three-season stint in The Flying Nun between 1967 and 1970.

“I couldn’t get on the list,” Field explained to the publication. “They thought they already knew what I was. ‘No, thanks. We don’t want any of that.’”

Despite finding the industry “rotten” and “unfair,” the actress wanted to take back control over her own life and career.

“I had to say to myself that if I wasn’t where I wanted to be, I had to get better,” she explained, adding that “it had to be that it was on me to make it different. I felt if I wasn’t doing that, then I was just handing them all the power.”

That’s when she decided to study at the legendary Actors Studio in Los Angeles, practicing new acting techniques “constantly, as much as I possibly could.”

She recalled, “I said to myself, ‘It will change when I’m good enough.’ And ultimately, in a weird way, it happened because I was acting at the studio so much.”

At the time, plenty of big stars frequented the acting school, including Nicholson. The Something’s Gotta Give actor ended up referring her to a casting director and a film director as “an undiscovered talent,” a recommendation which ultimately led to her starring in 1976’s Stay Hungry.

“So in some weird way, my theory was right,” Field added. “I worked at the Actors Studio for so long — and it was so hard — that Jack had seen it and the word spread.”

That moment, she said, “was the beginning of the change.” She went on to become an A-list actor, with star turns in the likes of Steel Magnolias, Forrest Gump and Norma Rae.

But even those incredible successes haven’t dampened Field’s hunger for knowledge and desire to constantly improve her craft.

“[Acting] is what I do,” she told People. “I’m supposed to go into rehearsals for a play at the end of summer. I still have my head down, and I’m always hoping to get better.”

She also echoed that sentiment in a recent interview on the Today show, when she was asked if she thinks about her legacy.

“No, I don’t,” she said confidently. “I don’t even think about it. I really think about what’s next, and will there be a next? As you get older and, boy, they’re hard to find. People don’t think older women are interesting, I guess, but I got news for ya! It’s all those older women who raised you.”