This year has been quite the revival for actress Michelle Pfeiffer, who hasn't had a starring role in four years but this year appears in a number of projects including the hugely anticipated 'Murder on the Orient Express'. She thinks she became 'unhireable' after a certain amount of time.

Michelle Pfeiffer at 'Murder on the Orient Express' premiereMichelle Pfeiffer at 'Murder on the Orient Express' premiere

Like a lot of Hollywood stars, 59-year-old Michelle decided to put her career on the back-burner while she took the time to raise her children with husband David E. Kelley. It got to the point where she refused to inconvenience her family life for her work.

'I guess my priorities maybe shifted. We moved out of Los Angeles. The older the kids got, it became more and more difficult to say 'yes'', she told E! News. 'I became pickier and pickier: 'Well, where does it shoot? When does it shoot? How long will I be away?' And at some point, I became unhireable. That was really the real reason why I hadn't worked.'

Her last movie before 2017 was 2013's 'The Family', and that's when her children - 24-year-old adopted daughter Claudia Rose and 23-year-old son John Henry - started to quiz her about her future career prospects.

'It was actually one of my children who said to me one day, 'Mom, are you ever going to go back to work?' which kind of hurt my feelings', she said. ''What do you mean? Isn't it great I'm home?' And then when they started applying for colleges, I thought, 'OK, it is time.''

She's certainly dived right back into it to; not only does she star as Caroline Hubbard in the forthcoming adaptation of Agatha Christie's 'Murder on the Orient Express', she also had a lead role in Andrew Dosunmu's 'Where Is Kyra?', the Emmy-nominated TV movie 'The Wizard of Lies', and appeared in Darren Aronofsky horror 'Mother!' with Jennifer Lawrence. She is currently filming Marvel's 'Ant-Man and the Wasp'

'It feels really good [to be working], because I don't feel that guilt anymore, [that] working moms feel', she continued. 'No matter what profession you're in there's that tug. It doesn't even matter if you're not a working mom - if you're out doing something with your friends, you sort of feel this guilt that you should always be with them.'

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'Murder on the Orient Express' hits theatres tomorrow (November 10th 2017).