I grew up in Memphis with older parents—my father was born in 1900—and I lived a very sheltered life. And my father asked me, because he was concerned that I wanted to play the guitar and sing and do all these artistic things, “Aren’t you going to make a success of yourself?” I was very young and said, “I just want to make every day a success. That’s as far as I can go.”

I knew I could act when I was in high school. But at Southern Methodist University, I didn’t know what I was doing. At the orientation the speaker for the humanities school said, “You’re in the wrong school. You’re supposed to be in the art school. Go down the hall. Here’s where you’re going to begin your life’s work.”

SMU had just created a proper conservatory, and Bob Hope had given us a theater. So it was a magical time to be there. Then a friend I made there wrote a play, Vanities, which ran off-Broadway and gave me my start in theater. Warren Beatty came to see us and introduced me to Dustin Hoffman. Years later, [screenwriter] William Goldman came to see me in a different play. And they were casting Misery, so he recommended me to the director. But it all began at SMU.

Several years ago, I was diagnosed with diabetes. It scared the crap out of me. I was at 245 pounds. Over six years, I lost 80 pounds. I just started pushing my plate away, then I lost the last 20 pounds with Ozempic. I always joke that I lost a Romanian gymnast.

The confluence of getting the lead in Matlock and this new weight isn’t serendipity. Heavier, I wouldn’t have been able to withstand the long hours and the discipline of learning lines that a series requires. I can tuck in my shirts and close my jackets on set. I know it’s hackneyed, but for the first time in my life, I feel free of the sorrow and burden of being a woman who can’t move and breathe.

Women constantly fight ageism, and I’ve been very aware that the page has turned for many of us older folks. That’s why I was so drawn to this role of Maddie in Matlock: It was written for a woman my age. They created this magnificent character who is a driven, smart, funny, complicated older woman, so I can use all the things I’ve learned over the last 50 years in one character. —As told to Margy Rochlin