Goldie Hawn just worked with three of her grandchildren on a short educational film
She says they all have star power — but one of them is actually getting into acting and just shot a movie
The film teaches children about how the brain works, and is produced by her MindUp mental health awareness foundation
Goldie Hawn has just released a new important project — and it stars three of her grandchildren!
“I wrote and produced it, and three of my grandkids, Wilder, Bodhi and Rio, did the voices,” Hawn, 79, tells PEOPLE about her new animated movie, Brain Buddies, which is a short educational film developed for the actress’ MindUp foundation.
The project was released on Thursday, May 1 — just in time for National Mental Health Awareness Month.
“It’s for teachers and children to see how simple it is to actually understand parts of the brain and how it works,” explains Hawn, who is the founder of the MindUp foundation, a mental health advocacy organization that she’s run for 20 years.
Amy Sussman/Getty
From Left: Erinn Hudson, Oliver Hudson, Rio Hudson, Wilder Hudson and Goldie Hawn in Beverly Hills, Calif. on Sept. 27, 2024
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Hawn says working with grandsons Wilder, 17, Bodhi, 14, and Rio, 11, who are the children of Oliver Hudson and his wife, Erinn, was a total delight.
“What I loved is how well they followed the direction that I was giving them, and they were great at intonation and how they delivered the lines and what their characters are and all of it,” she says, adding that she also voiced the prefrontal cortex.
“So for me, it was a memorable joy that I will have for the rest of my life, and the children will never forget it,” Hawn continues.
Goldie Hawn
Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell (center) with son Oliver and his wife, Erinn Hudson, and grandkids Wilder, Bodhi and Rio
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So does she have any younger generation stars on her hands?
“Yes!” she says. “Wilder just got an audition for a Netflix film and got the part, so he went up to Toronto with his father and shot a Christmas film. He’s the one everyone said had such a great voice when we were doing Brain Buddies. But all of our grandchildren are entertainers. There is no doubt about it. We’ve got amazing grandchildren.”
The script of Brain Buddies, which Hawn wrote, is rooted in research, she says. Knowing how the brain works goes hand-in-hand with “brain breaks,” something Hawn’s MindUp foundation promotes in classrooms.
Courtesy of MindUP
Goldie Hawn’s short film Brain Buddies, where she and her grandchildren plays parts of the brain
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“The brain break is one of the things they do in the classroom three times a day, because it calms them. It gets them ready for learning,” she says of the kids who follow the program, adding that it also helps with “self regulation.”
“And then what’s great is that they get to know all these parts of their brain. They know what the hippocampus does, they know what the amygdala does, and they know what the prefrontal cortex does. So they know that when you calm down the amygdala, the prefrontal cortex comes back online, and that’s the thinking brain,” she says.
Hawn laughs, recalling a story, “We had this kid at one of our schools in Colorado who was being naughty on the playground, and he got sent to the principal’s office and said, ‘My amygdala was being overactive!’ “
Courtesy of MindUP
Goldie Hawn (center) with children involved in MindUP, a public charity with a mission to equip children with the mental fitness they need to lead smarter, healthier, happier and ultimately more productive lives
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Hawn says she’s absorbed everything she’s learned about the mind in her 20 years of running MindUp.
“One thing I’ve learned that really helps get you out of a funk is gratitude,” she says. “Which sounds so simple, but gratitude is really powerful because when you start thinking of the things that you’re grateful for, and you either write them down or just remember even one thing that you’re grateful for during the day, it has the greatest power on your brain, because it helps your brain settle down into a more optimistic place, and you have dopamine emission and your neurotransmitters behave differently.”
Hawn adds, “It really will bring you back to the now. It’s such a powerful thing.”
Read the original article on People
