Carrie-Anne Moss was offered grandmother role the day after her 40th birthday

Carrie-Anne Moss was offered a role as a grandmother the day after she turned 40. 

The actress is now 53 and is reprising the role of Trinity, who she first played 22 years ago, in The Matrix 4. 

While moderating a conversation for New York’s 92nd Street Y with Justine Bateman about her book Face: One Square Foot of Skin, Moss said that the scripts she received changed instantly once she entered her forties.

She said: ‘I had heard that at 40 everything changed. I didn’t believe in that because I don’t believe in just jumping on a thought system that I don’t really align with. 

‘But literally the day after my 40th birthday, I was reading a script that had come to me and I was talking to my manager about it. She was like, “Oh, no, no, no, it’s not that role [you’re reading for], it’s the grandmother.” 

‘I may be exaggerating a bit, but it happened overnight. I went from being a girl to the mother to beyond the mother.’

Moss had only just become a mother for the first time four years earlier; the star is mum to Owen, 17, Jaden, 15, and Frances, 11, with husband Steven Roy. 

Moss added: ‘You don’t feel like you’ve aged much and suddenly you’re seeing yourself onscreen.

‘I would look at these French and European actresses and they just had something about them that felt so confident in their own skin. I couldn’t wait to be that. I strive for that. It’s not easy being in this business. There’s a lot of external pressure.’

Despite the pressure from Hollywood, the actress has continued to rack up roles post-40, starring in films including Silent Hill: Revelation, Pompeii and Frankenstein, as well as playing Jeri Hogarth in the Marvel series Jessica Jones, Daredevil, Iron Fist and The Defenders.

However, her most eagerly-anticipated project in years is set to come out this December, as Moss returns for The Matrix 4 alongside Keanu Reeves and Jada Pinkett Smith.

Lana Wachowski, who wrote and directed the first three films with sister Lilly, has directed, co-written and produced the sci-fi action film, which will be released 18 years after The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions. 

Priyanka Chopra, Yahya Abdul-Mateen II, Neil Patrick Harris and Jonathan Groff are among the new additions to the cast. 

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