Charlize Theron has spoken about the night her father died after being shot by her mother while the family lived in South Africa.
The Mighty Joe Young star has been a familiar face in Hollywood for decades, having launched her screen career in the 1990s.
Because she has spent so many years living in Los Angeles, it’s easy to assume she’s always been based in the US. In reality, Theron was born and raised in South Africa.
And while her life today is defined by global fame, she has said her early home environment was marked by instability and fear—more reminiscent of a thriller than a glamorous Hollywood origin story.
Theron grew up with her parents, Charles Jacobus Theron and Gerda Jacoba Aletta Maritz, and has previously indicated that conflict at home was not unusual.
But one date in particular, June 21, 1991, became a turning point that would stay with her.
Speaking in a video podcast with The New York Times, released Saturday, April 18, Theron described the events that led to her mother killing her father.
Theron said she was 15 at the time, and explained that the situation escalated after her father became furious over a minor mistake she had made.
“I just knew…that was kind of the straw that broke the camel’s back for him. I felt it, I felt something was different,” she said, adding that he was intoxicated when her mother shot him.
She also recalled speaking privately with her mother earlier, urging her to leave the relationship.
“I sat down with my mom and said, ‘I think you should separate from him.’ I never imagined that those words would come out of my mouth,” she went on to share of her conversation with her mom. “I knew he was mad at me. So eventually, when he decided to come home, I said to her, ‘Please tell him I’m asleep.'”
Theron then described what happened later that same night, saying her father broke into the house and fired through the steel doors while trying to get inside.
She said it quickly became clear to them that they were in immediate danger.
“The messaging was very clear: ‘I’m going to kill you tonight. You think I can’t come into this door? Watch me. I’m going to go to the safe. I’m going to get the shotgun,’” the actress recalled.
According to Theron, her mother managed to reach the safe and retrieve her gun as he forced his way through the first gate.
Theron said she and her mother then pressed their bodies against her bedroom door to keep it shut, while her father stepped back and fired through it, missing them.
She explained that her mother ultimately acted to protect them when her father moved toward the safe to access additional weapons.
“My mom followed my father, who was, by then, opening the safe to get more weapons out, and she shot him. Unfortunately not an isolated story. These things are prevalent in a lot of families’ homes.”
Theron said her mother’s actions were viewed as self-defense, and as a result, no charges were brought.
In the years that followed, Theron left South Africa to pursue acting. Three years later, in 1994, she bought a one-way ticket to Los Angeles, and within a year landed an extra role in Children of the Corn III: Urban Harvest—the first step in a career that would soon take off.