Globe Photos/ZUMAPRESS.comBrooke Shields says her late mother didn't deserve the criticism she received for the controversial career moves Brooke made early in her career, such as playing a child prostitute in Pretty Baby and posing for a suggestive Calvin Klein campaign.
"She protected me from so much of what is devastating about being in the entertainment industry—the rejection, the jealousy, the being screwed-over," Shields told the Hollywood Reporter.
Teri Shields died Oct. 31 of complications from a long battle with dementia.
"The bubble she created around me was the biggest blessing she could have given me," said Shields, who won People's Choice Awards for Favorite Young Motion Picture Performer every year between 1981 and 1984. "The need to attack her is unnecessary."
Shields and her mother parted ways professionally in 1995. But the 47-year-old actress maintains that Teri wasn't a monster manager.
"I had to leave her because of her addiction," she told THR. "If I had a manager now, they wouldn't last five minutes if they were an alcoholic. It was long overdue. I needed to grab the reins and make my own mistakes."