Alec Baldwin is eyeing retirement, saying he would rather stay home with his seven young children than continue acting.
The 68-year-old actor has had a prolific career, spanning nearly 50 years. However, it was marred by the death of his Rust cinematographer, Halyna Hutchins, who was fatally shot on set in 2021 after the prop gun he was holding accidentally discharged.
Following the tragedy, the Emmy-winning 30 Rock star spent the better part of three years fending off involuntary manslaughter charges. The case was finally resolved in December 2024, after prosecutors withdrew their appeal of the initial July 2024 dismissal.
During that period of uncertainty, which he described as “very painful,” in a new interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Alec said he “wound up staying home a lot.”
“I was home with my kids for three-and-a-half years — I hardly worked at all — and that’s just changing now,” he said. “I’m going to go off and do a bunch of things. But I was home and I got used to it, and I don’t want to leave my house anymore. I don’t. I don’t want to work anymore. I don’t. I really don’t. I want to retire and stay home with my kids.”
Alec shares seven young children, all under the age of 12, with his wife, Hilaria, to whom he’s been married since 2012. He also has one older daughter, Ireland, 30, from his first marriage to Kim Basinger.
Months after his trial victory, he and Hilaria released their critically derided family reality show, The Baldwins. The one-season show documented their life split between their Manhattan apartment and East Hampton summer home, while raising seven children.
While the series was filmed before Alec’s involuntary manslaughter trial, it faced fierce criticism from reviewers, who argued it was a distasteful attempt to restore the actor’s image.
In the series, Hilaria addressed her husband’s declining mental state since the Rust shooting, saying: “Everyone who is close to Alec has seen his mental health decline. He was diagnosed with PTSD and he says, in his darkest moments, ‘If an accident had to have happened on this day, why am I still here? Why couldn’t it be me?’”
“My good friend said to me the other day, he said, ‘How are you doing?’ and I said, ‘I’m happier when I’m asleep than when I’m awake,’” Alec responded.
During the trial, he worked with director Rory Kennedy on The Trial of Alec Baldwin, a documentary exploring the aftermath of the incident. The film had its world premiere at DOC NYC in November 2025, but no wider release date has been announced.
“There was a lot of that during the trial — before and during — and the movie, I think, exemplifies how it was beyond prosecutorial overreach; it was people who committed a crime,” Alec told The Hollywood Reporter. “They committed a crime in hiding evidence during my trial and so forth. And it impacted me in every way — financially, career-wise, my wife, my kids, my health. I was so sick.
“I mean, we had to go back and finish the movie Rust in Montana as a component of the settlement with her husband. We had to finish,” he added.
The Western movie was completed and debuted in select theaters last May.
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