Elisha Cuthbert is pulling back the curtain.
Reflecting on an earlier time in her career, The Cellar actress shared that when it came to posing on the cover of a hyper-sexualized magazine, "There was really no option back then."
"We kinda ended up in a space at the time where that was really happening," she noted during the Aug. 22 episode of the Broad Ideas with Rachel Bilson podcast. "Halle Berry was doing it, for God's sake. Jennifer Aniston was doing it."
Looking back on the photoshoots that "the [film] studio wanted you to do," she added, "We were probably too young to be being subjected to that and feeling pressured to do that."
And while years have passed, Elisha—who is mom to daughter Zaphire, 4, and 6-month-old son Fable—noted that those photos haven't exactly disappeared.
"This is what I have to explain to my kids," Elisha said. "This weird, bizarre outfit and hair extensions. And you know what's so crazy? I don't even know how much of those pictures are even accurate as far as, like, airbrushing."
But her reflection doesn't stop at the front cover. She recalled all the lists inside those publications that so frequently ranked celebrities for their appearance—Elisha included. (For example, Maxim previously shared that the actress was a regular on their Hot 100 list.)
"Even like when someone reads my bio, those things come up where they actually don't mean anything in regards to me as a person or my career," she said. "It's not like I won an Olympic medal. It was just some list some random magazine decided to create."
While the 39-year-old said that she "definitely got caught up in that wanting to live up to what everyone was expecting," she now holds the outlook that it was "kind of ridiculous."
Listen to her full interview here.