Meryl Streep wasn’t going to let a fallen tree thwart her escape from the California wildfires.
The three-time Oscar winner was among dozens of thousands of residents placed under mandatory evacuation orders in Southern California earlier this month, and apparently proved to be just as capable and resilient offscreen as she is in her biggest movies.
“My aunt Meryl Streep received an order to evacuate on January 8, but when she tried to leave, she discovered that a large tree had fallen over in her driveway, blocking her only exit,” Abe Streep wrote in a New York Magazine article published Tuesday.
“Determined to make it out, she borrowed wire cutters from a neighbor, cut a car-size hole in the fence she shared with the neighbors on the other side, and drove through their yard to escape,” the New Mexico-based writer continued.
The wildfires across the Los Angeles metropolitan area broke out one day before Streep made her escape, and while the Eaton and Palisades fires are now almost fully contained, they’ve become the most destructive in Los Angeles history.
Over 57,000 acres and 16,000 properties have been destroyed since Jan. 7, per CalFire.
Streep was one of many celebrities to flee the area — some of them even helped first responders evacuate effected neighborhoods. Her “Only Murders in the Building” co-star Martin Short was among those who escaped, and he still recalls a harrowing 1993 fire.
Short told Abe Streep that he watched a major wildfire at the time approach his Pacific Palisades home after it had already destroyed hundreds of properties in Malibu. It was eventually contained, however.
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He again spotted flames from his balcony earlier this month. Short ultimately fled after one of his sons told him to, but driving a distance that usually takes five minutes took more than an hour. Short found his home intact when he returned after some of the evacuation orders were lifted, but implied things will never be the same.
“Right away I knew this is where I wanted to live. You’re five minutes from the ocean or five minutes from the greatest hiking in the mountains imaginable,” he told Abe Streep, adding that the Palisades used to feel safe: “There was only one way in and one way out.”
The LA Medical Examiner’s Office said Monday that 29 people have died in the wildfires.