Brave New Gwyneth

Image credit: Sylvia: David Appleby

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Gwyneth Paltrow

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After ''Sylvia'' wrapped in January, Paltrow had to turn around and shoot the already-scheduled sci-fi adventure ''The World of Tomorrow'' with Jude Law. ''I got to a point where I was sobbing every day,'' she says. ''I thought I was going to have a nervous breakdown. I just felt like if I keep going, I'm going to collapse.'' So she dropped out of two comedies, David O. Russell's ''I Love Huckabee's'' and Don Roos' ''Happy Endings,'' and gave herself some space to mourn her father.

''I think handling so much grief has deepened her a lot,'' says her mom, Blythe Danner (who joined Paltrow on the set of ''Sylvia'' and delivers a sharp performance as the poet's hard mother). ''She's lived an intense 10 years in the spotlight, and she's had to find her solace. I think the best thing she's done has been to be a bit enigmatic, to hide and come back, to have found strength from removing herself.''

Now that she's reemerged, things are going to be different. After her gossip-fodder relationships with Brad Pitt and Ben Affleck endured public flameouts, she's learned to keep her personal life private. (Though judging from the buckets of paparazzi shots of her and Coldplay lead singer Chris Martin, she still keeps good company.) She's determined to carve the fat away from her career, and plans to limit herself to one or two films a year. ''I have none of that wide-eyed ‘Where is this going to go!' anymore,'' she explains. ''It's not excitement like that. It's excitement like I know what I'm doing and I know what I want to do.'' She'd love to do a musical. She'd love to shoot a documentary. She'd love to do more theater, like her triumph in London's West End with David Auburn's Pulitzer Prize-winning ''Proof.''

But for now, after she finishes her tea, Paltrow is due on the set of the film adaptation of Proof opposite Anthony Hopkins. With ''Shakespeare in Love'''s director, John Madden, at the helm, she plays a daughter struggling to right herself after her father's death. It's an appropriate role: In the story, her character finds her way back to the light.