A happy balance

Her newest admirer is Ryan Murphy,who directed her in Eat Pray Love,which opens August 13. “We laughed within 30 seconds of meeting each other and haven’t stopped since,” said Murphy,who is best known as one of the creators of Glee. “She was a real collaborator on making the movie and a real leader on the set.” Also a fan is Elizabeth Gilbert,author of Eat,Pray,Love,the best-selling 2006 memoir on which the movie is based. “There’s this luminousness to Julia,” Gilbert said. “It’s almost as if she was always lit from behind. If she wasn’t a movie star,the only other job she could have would be professional fairy.”

The object of all this affection sits curled up in a comfy chair in her sewing room,upstairs in her sprawling but unpretentious,family-friendly house in Malibu. Her latest sewing project is whipping up personalised,oversize pillows for her three young children to loll upon while reading. She is relishing marriage and motherhood—”We are happy as clams,” she said—and works only when she wants to. “I am fulfilled by my own life on an hourly basis. Every little moment is amazing if you let yourself access it. I learn that all the time from my kids; children are so filled with wonder. My youngest son”—Henry,almost 3—“woke up at 5 a.m. the other morning and said to me,‘It’s a beautiful day,Mama!’ What’s more precious than that?”

Roberts has been a major movie star—the biggest female box office draw—for 20 years,ever since she fetchingly guffawed her way through the romantic comedy Pretty Woman in 1990. She was 22 at the time,a slip of a girl with a gigantic smile and a boisterous laugh. “She was young,but just fearless,and she was obviously popping off the screen,” recalled Garry Marshall,who directed her in Pretty Woman,Runaway Bride (1999) and this year’s Valentine’s Day. “Watching her grow up has been one of my pleasures.”

Now 42,Roberts still has a smile as wide and a laugh as infectious,but a lot has happened in her life since Pretty Woman: two marriages (the first to the singer Lyle Lovett,the second to cinematographer Daniel Moder in 2002); motherhood to her brood of three; winning an Oscar as best actress for Erin Brockovich (2000); and roles in more than 30 movies,including crowd-pleasers like My Best Friend’s Wedding (1997),Notting Hill (1999) and Ocean’s Eleven (2001).

Along the way,she learned to handle fame and blossomed as an actress. In Eat Pray Love,which also stars Javier Bardem,James Franco,Viola Davis and Richard Jenkins,Roberts gets to display bushels of emotion as a woman seeking answers to life’s big questions. The role was the most taxing she has taken on—she’s in every scene and travelled the globe during the nearly four-month shoot—since she had her children.

Roberts said the emotional and spiritual journey depicted in the book resonated with her. “We all kind of have that moment in our lives,” she said,“sometimes it’s just for a weekend,or a month,or even a year,when you think,‘There’s no way out.’ You have to learn to find peace within yourself,to exorcise that restlessness and judgement. You have to learn,‘Why can’t I just be happy with my life?’”

Among the things that make Roberts happy now is having her family with her when she’s working. The Roberts-Moder clan moved en masse for Eat Pray Love,spending time on location in New York City (where Roberts maintains an apartment),Rome,India and Bali.

With Eat Pray Love now behind her,Roberts,next up,has a small but significant role in Larry Crowne,a comic drama in which Hanks,who co-wrote and is directing,plays a member of the nouveau unemployed who enrolls in a junior college. After that,there are films she is considering,and she’d like to give Broadway a go again,maybe improving next time upon the decidedly mixed reviews she received for her debut effort,Three Days of Rain,in 2006.