I did my famous cabbage soup diet, so I was able to do it.

Burstyn’s remark is a blunt, lightly self-mocking acknowledgment of the physical discipline (and sometimes extreme dieting) expected of actresses to meet a role’s demands or an industry’s beauty standards. By calling it her “famous cabbage soup diet,” she frames the effort as a familiar, almost folkloric tactic—suggesting both its ubiquity and its dubiousness—while the plain conclusion (“so I was able to do it”) emphasizes pragmatism over glamour. The quote can be read as commentary on how professional “ability” in performance is often intertwined with bodily management, and how such behind-the-scenes labor is normalized, even when it borders on unhealthy.