Anna Kendrick Says She Struggled to 'Identify' and 'Name’ Her Seven-Year Relationship as ‘Abusive’

Anna Kendrick described finding it “very difficult” to realize she was in an abusive relationship.

The subject came up during the actress’ interview on the Call Her Daddy podcast with Alex Cooper while reflecting on her experience making the 2022 film Alice, Darling, which centers on a woman in an emotionally abusive relationship.

However, around the 42 minute mark linked here, the Oscar nominee said that taking on the role was “really scary and personal” because at the time she had recently exited a similarly abusive, seven-year relationship.

“It didn't follow the traditional pattern, which is kind of yet another reason why I was finding it really difficult to identify it and name it as abusive,” said the 39-year-old actress. “I was reading all the articles and going, like, ‘Some of it looks like how they're describing it, but not completely.’ The relationship was seven years, but it was like an overnight switch and that went on for about a year.”

“I thought it had to be me, like, ‘if one of us is crazy, it must be me.’ So it was very, very difficult to actually go. ‘No, I think, I think this is him. I think this is his stuff,’” she added.

Kendrick shared an incident where her ex-boyfriend, who she didn’t name and believed he was convinced of his own victimhood, accused her of “terrorizing” him simply because she was crying and couldn’t pretend things were fine anymore.

“I just started crying and he screamed in my face, ‘You're terrorizing me,’” she recalled. “But it was truly from the place of a person who believed that they were being terrorized.”

She described turning her life upside down, trying to “fix” herself, while her partner remained calm in couples therapy—a demeanor she says he didn’t have outside of therapy. That was until Kendrick recalled having a breakthrough moment where she lost her temper during a therapy session and realized the manipulative dynamics at play.

“I sent the therapist an email being, like, ‘I'm so embarrassed. I'm so sorry. I need to control myself’ or whatever because I had yelled in this session. He called me, which he hadn't done before, and was like, ‘No, no, I'm so proud of you.’ And that's when I knew, like, ‘Oh, something has shifted, like, something's changed.’ Things ended pretty quickly after that.”

Despite being in a better place now, the Pitch Perfect actress says she continues to grapple with self-doubt and shame. She emphasized that manipulative individuals can genuinely believe they are the victims, and makes it harder for victims to discern reality.

“I wish there was, but there is no way to guarantee protection from someone who is determined to harm you,” she said, noting that someone who is tough, sweet, or behaves differently can protect someone from ending up in an abusive relationship. “That sounds grim, and I guess it is, but surely like the least we can do when someone has harmed us, when we come out of a devastating situation, is take off that top layer of shame.”