Rachel Ward always sensed she'd leave acting. She just never guessed her new life would look like this.

Rachel Ward grew up straddling two lives. Her glamorous life on screen as a beloved actress, and the quiet family life she longed for away from the spotlight.

The English-born Australian actress, director and screenwriter became a household name during the 1980s.

Born in Cornwell, Oxfordshire, she began her career as a model in New York before transitioning to acting in Hollywood.

Ward is most famous for her portrayal of Meggie Cleary in the landmark 1983 miniseries The Thorn Birds, before her turn in the neo-noir thriller Against All Odds, the detective comedy Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid, and the crime drama Sharky's Machine.

While filming The Thorn Birds, she met her future husband, acclaimed Australian actor Bryan Brown. Ward and Brown moved to Australia and married in 1983 and have three children together: Rosie, Matilda and Joe.

But in recent years, Ward has embraced a radical shift in lifestyle. In her third act, she has become a farmer.

In Ward's 2023 documentary, Rachel's Farm, she first chronicled her personal transformation from actress to regenerative farmer on her property in New South Wales.

The 68-year-old spoke on Mamamia's podcast MID in 2025 about the decision, which first began decades earlier when the couple bought her future farm in the Nambucca Valley as a holiday home for the family.

Listen to the full interview on MID. Post continues after podcast.

"We bought it as a sort of lifestyle retreat, and we bought one hundred acres and we had about thirty cars on there. There was the guy that we bought it from, and he continued to manage it," she told host Holly Wainwright.

At first, this rural home provided the family with the perfect vacation destination.

"We didn't travel much. We didn't go overseas much. I've never been to Bali or places like that, so [instead] we'd get in the car and go up to the farm — the kids are very much country kids," she said.

"They went to school in Sydney, but every holiday we went up there and they had their life up there… but I was incredibly sort of hands off and thought that I had really nothing to contribute as far as the farm went. It seemed very much a man's domain."

As Ward was splitting her time between country and city living, her acting career was slowing down.

"I knew that as an actress I had a certain amount of time," she said. "As an actress, I had my life and then I had kids, and then when my kids went to school… I was quite good at recognising that my use-by dates were coming up."

As someone always ready to tackle a new challenge, Ward felt energised to explore her next phase of life.

"My career was basically winding up, the kids had gone, and I still felt incredibly energetic — I had something to offer."

Watch Ward in the trailer for Rachel's Farm. Post continues after video.

Then, in 2019, the Black Summer bushfires provided a profound catalyst for Ward's transition into regenerative farming. The fires destroyed all their boundary fences and came within hundreds of metres of Ward's country home.

The devastation forced her to confront the reality of climate change and the ecological impact of traditional farming practices, such as chemical use and heavy tilling, which had left her soil dry and degraded.

Seeking answers, Ward said she was inspired by Charles Massy's book, Call of the Reed Warbler, which outlines the principles of regenerative agriculture.

"I did grow up in the country. I didn't want to move full-time to the country, as I was very wedded to my career in entertainment, so I didn't see myself being a farmer at that stage," she said.

"It was really not until the bushfires that I had the big switch. And it was really not until I read Charles Massey's book… that I went, 'Oh, maybe I can do that too."

The fires served as the ultimate wake-up call, leading her to partner with her neighbour, Mick Green, to transform their combined land into a living experiment in soil restoration and biodiversity.

Image: Madman Entertainment.

The fires happened at the same time as the birth of her first grandchild, which triggered what she describes as an existential crisis.

"That was all part of adding to my fear load of the future of my grandchildren. I felt that I was okay. I'm not going to be around when everything comes home to roost. But I obviously have grandchildren. It brings that into focus, the fact that your grandchildren are going to be here after they have prophetically said that the world is nigh."

With this in mind, Ward bid goodbye to her career in entertainment.

"It sort of trivialises a lot of the things that you're doing. It feels very trivial, like making films and making TV shows. And I just felt I needed to push my energies in a different direction," she said.

For her husband of over 40 years, he has continued his career working in TV and film.

"Men don't necessarily have to change their careers," she said.

"He stayed as an actor, he's produced and now he's writing books and stuff. But he wasn't forced to move on. For women, our use-by dates come much sooner and then we have families."

As Ward focuses on farmwork, her husband still splits his time between country and city living.

"Brian is much more rooted in Sydney and he comes from the Western Suburbs. His comfort zone is the city. I think being an expert to someone who's not from here, I'm not so tied to places — I don't have that investment from those early years."

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Ward herself was born into an aristocratic family in Cornwell, Oxfordshire, where she was raised at Cornwell Manor, a grand estate in the Cotswolds.

In interviews, Ward has described her repressive childhood home as operating under a Victorian philosophy where children were seen and not heard.

For this reason, she has always wanted to bring up her three kids in a markedly different environment.

"It was a strange childhood that I had — it was very separated from my parents. I was brought up with paid care, paid help. I didn't live with my mother and father, I went to boarding school and was completely looked after by nannies and whatever. I didn't see my mother during the week at all. She would come down on the weekend. It was a very Victorian… and it was not good for self-confidence," she said.

"I look at Brian's life beside mine, and he had a mother only but who was completely devoted to him, and everything in her life was about her two children. She didn't really have any life other than her two children. And I've never known anybody more confident than Brian and his sister. And I think that comes from the commitment of parents. And I think if parents aren't there, the commitment isn't there," she continued.

"I definitely grew up in a very patriarchal society, and that was one of the things I wanted to get away from."

These days, her farm life in rural NSW is a far cry from the high society of Oxfordshire.

"I love a rural lifestyle, and I didn't realise how much I would enjoy it, and I think maybe it was that time of life. I was not really interested in a social life anymore, the entertainment industry was getting harder and harder, and obviously, the gender and age issues come into that," she said.

"There are a lot of brick walls in the entertainment industry and there's a lot of frustration — as there is in farming." Feature image: Stan/Madman Entertainment.