Julia Roberts Reveals Why She Hasn't Starred In A Rom-Com In Over A Decade

Julia Roberts rose to fame through rom-coms like Mystic Pizza and Pretty Woman, but it's been quite some time since the 54-year-old star played a leading lady in love — but it's not for lack of trying.

"People sometimes misconstrue the amount of time that's gone by that I haven't done a romantic comedy as my not wanting to do one," the Oscar winner told The New York Times Magazine.

"If I had read something that I thought was that Notting Hill level of writing or My Best Friend's Wedding level of madcap fun, I would do it," insisted the actress. "They didn't exist until this movie that I just did that Ol Parker wrote and directed."

The film she's referring to is Ticket to Paradise, where she plays a mom and divorced mother opposite George Clooney, but even in that case, "I thought, 'Well, disaster, because this only works if it's George Clooney,'" she explained. "Lo and behold, George felt it only worked with me. Somehow we were both able to do it, and off we went."

Roberts admitted that her family life — she shares Henry, 14, and 17-year-old twins Phineas and Hazel with husband Danny Moder, 53 — has also made her more selective when it comes to movie roles.

"Here's the thing: If I'd thought something was good enough, I would have done it. But I also had three kids in the last 18 years. That raises the bar even more because then it's not only 'Is this material good?' It's also the math equation of my husband's work schedule and the kids' school schedule and summer vacation," explained the Homecoming alum. "It's not just, 'Oh, I think I want to do this.' I have a sense of great pride in being home with my family and considering myself a homemaker."

However, now that all of her kids are teenagers, she is thinking about amping up her workload again.

"For so much of my children's younger life they would see their dad go off and I would work a little, but they almost didn't notice," Roberts recalled. "It was like I was only gone when they were napping or something. But as they get older, and particularly with my daughter, I do have a sense of responsibility for showing my children that I can be creative and that it's meaningful to me — so meaningful that for periods of time I will choose to focus on that almost more than my family, which has been hard for me to come to terms with."