And just like that, Sarah Jessica Parker last night took home the 2026 Carol Burnett Award, celebrating her acting accomplishments during the past five decades. The Sex and the City star began acting as a child, around age 8, and held major roles in Annie on Broadway, the sitcom Square Pegs, and the films Footloose and Firstborn.
Over her storied career, she’s been surrounded by innumerable supporters, namely her husband Matthew Broderick, best known for his role as Ferris Bueller in the iconic 1980s juggernaut Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. Broderick presented Parker with the award Thursday night and said he questioned her about taking her timeless role as Carrie Bradshaw.
“Do you really want to do TV?” Broderick recalled asking Parker, who went on to win six Golden Globes and two Emmys for her role in Sex and the City. (Parker and Broderick have an estimated combined net worth of $200 million).
And now that Parker has realized a career most actors can only dream of, she’s rethinking what work-life balance means to her.
Parker’s new definition of work-balance
In a recent CNBC interview about how she now picks projects, Parker said she is “making choices differently than [she] used to,” prioritizing roles that leave room for her life off-set. Parker, 60, has juggled decades of acting work with fashion, publishing, and wine ventures, and framed her ability to choose slower-paced or more flexible jobs as a luxury she doesn’t take for granted.
“As a journeyman, you’re trying to find work [where] you keep learning, you get better,” Parker told CNBC. “Maybe you get to travel. Hopefully you get paid, and you get to work with really interesting people … but now … I’m much more thoughtful in smaller ways about how I’ll be spending my time.”
To be sure, Parker hesitated to comment on work-life balance at all, saying many workers hold multiple jobs without reliable childcare or health care.
“The thing that surprises me most is all the women and men and parents who are holding down two and three jobs in our city, across our country, who don’t have the kind of support I have, who are really just managing every single day,” she said.
A support system is key to work-life balance
Rather than presenting herself as a solo superwoman, Parker credits her success to a wide safety net, including family, childcare, and other professional help. She said her schedule works because of the people who step in when she is on set, reading Booker Prize submissions, running her wine label, overseeing her production company Pretty Matches, or working with the States Project, an advocacy group focused on advancing Democratic state-level candidates and issues.
“I know how I get to [do so many things], because I have the kind of support I need,” Parker said.
Parker’s experience mirrors what other successful people say: What passes for balance at the highest levels usually depends on extensive support at home and at work, from spouses who absorb more caregiving to employees who can run the business while they’re away. Harvard Business School research on CEOs’ schedules shows leaders often clock 60-hour weeks but maintain performance by delegating heavily and protecting time for sleep, exercise, and family.
How leaders talk about balance
While some leaders embrace the idea of work-life balance, others say it’s impossible to achieve and be successful. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, for instance, has said he views work and life as a “circle” rather than a scale.
“I don’t love the word ‘balance’ because it implies a tradeoff,” Bezos said recently at Italian Tech Week. “I’ve often had people ask me, ‘How do you deal with work-life balance?’ And I’ll say, ‘I like work-life harmony because if you’re happy at home, you’ll be better at work. If you’re better at work, you’ll be better at home.’ These things go together. It’s not a strict tradeoff.”
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella has also described the boundary between home and office as more about achieving “harmony,” and Nespresso’s UK CEO Anna Lundstrom aims for “work-life fluidity” because she doesn’t think separating the two is possible in an executive leadership position.
Some push this concept even further, arguing work-balance doesn’t exist when building something at scale—an idea echoed by Zoom CEO Eric Yuan.
“I tell our team, ‘Guys, you know, there’s no way to balance. Work is life, life is work,’” Yuan said in a recent interview with the Grit podcast.
Top women executives have also been blunt about the tradeoffs of work and life. Former PepsiCo CEO Indra Nooyi has long argued that “having it all” is a myth, urging employers and policymakers to build better childcare and family benefits rather than expecting individual women to simply work harder.
“To integrate work and family is going to be a challenge,” Nooyi said at the 2019 Fortune Most Powerful Women Conference.
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