Kristen Bell's life revolves around family. She only accepts local jobs and spends her weekends playing pickleball with her husband, Dax Shepard, 49, and their children, Lincoln, 11, and Delta, 9, on the driveway court they "drew" themselves.
The actress enjoys these times since "time is the only nonrenewable resource I have," she explains. She left the spotlight a few years ago after becoming "so tired" of performing.
"I've been practicing trying to say no, and it's very hard. I have to remember that if you're saying yes, that time is expensive because it's coming from somewhere else," she stated to PEOPLE Magazine.
Bell was ready to return to acting and feel the "electricity" of being in front of the camera when she found something worth the cost: the new Netflix rom-com series "Nobody Wants This", opposite Adam Brody.
"If it's funny enough and seems like it'd be fun to shoot, it's like, 'Let's do it,'” she said.
Although she calls herself a "people pleaser," Bell, 44, is outgoing. In high school, the Michigan actress fell in love with theater at 15.
"I'd found my people," she stated. She appeared in “Reefer Madness” on Off-Broadway in 2001 while at New York University.
"I left school during my third year and started working consistently in New York, and I was happy as a clam," Bell said of her early theater days.
Her “Reefer Madness” cast and crew felt she'd do well onscreen and convinced her to come to Los Angeles, where her career took off. "I had an agent and started working quickly enough that I could pay all my bills, which I know is an incredibly unique experience and not the norm," she said.
Bell quickly appeared in hits like “Veronica Mars” and “Forgetting Sarah Marshall." "With all the acknowledgment of how crazy this sounds, it all seemed to line up for me," she added.
Bell became famous in 2013 when she played Anna in the Disney animated musical "Frozen," though she says people still wonder if she's singing. "But why would they know that was me?" she said. "It's not our faces in the movie."
She enjoys joining the popular franchise. "I've apologized to a few parents for getting those songs stuck in their head, but I consider myself very, very lucky to be part of that juggernaut," Bell said.
Bell can play dramatic, but she likes lighter roles. "I'm definitely drawn to projects where I think I'm going to have a good time rather than go through some intense hardship and hope for a good creative outcome," the former “House of Lies” and “The Good Place” star stated
The new series “Nobody Wants This," which was released on Sept. 26, was her ideal endeavor. The show follows Bell, a boldly agnostic sex podcast producer, falling in love with a gentle rabbi (Brody), based largely on Erin Foster's real-life experience.
"I liked it so much because it felt like a very modern take on romance, and the characters are not 22, they're, like, 38," she stated. "It addresses everything from the perils of dating apps to more serious topics like what it actually means for people with different backgrounds and outlooks on life to bridge those differences in the name of love."
Bell married Shepard in 2013, and Shepard has openly discussed the ups and downs of a long-term marriage on his popular podcast “Armchair Expert," TODAY.com reported.
Both credit treatment with their marriage's health, and Bell prioritizes her family. "I don't work outside of L.A. I can't. My husband works here. My kids go to school here. It's not an option for me to leave them and not an option to bring them with me without it being incredibly disruptive," Bell stated.
She's helping her kids adjust to school.
"I'm doing my best to support and not make it too serious. Like, 'If you forgot that homework, it's not like you won't make it into college. But let's try to be better tomorrow." She says she gets joy out of motherhood, "except when they're screaming at me," she joked. "There's a fulfillment I get from being nurturing."
Despite the daily chaos, she takes care of herself.
"If I have an hour to myself, sometimes I just sit," Bell said. "I'll listen to [an audio] book just to pause. I like pausing a lot. I find it vital."
