
Both Dakota Fanning and her sister Elle are on the cover of W Magazine‘s December’s issue. They look flawless!
Here are some highlights of Dakota’s interview:
W:Are you living on your own, or do you have roommates?
No roommates. Because I’m only 17, my mom is staying with me in my apartment for a little bit. She’s teaching me how to wash clothes and such. But I’m so excited to be on my own. In my house in L.A., we all feel that everything is everybody’s, and so doors are never really closed. My sister and I share a bathroom, and when you have a sibling, nothing is actually your own. I’ve never really had anything or any place that was just mine.
W:Your first film was I Am Sam, opposite Sean Penn. You were 6. On the first day of work, you had all your lines memorized, and he started to improvise.
And I thought, Okay, that’s what it’s going to be like. There was no other choice. I think he said, “Knock, knock,” which was not in the script. I said, “Uh…who’s there?” [Laughs.] And, yeah, that’s what it was like. It definitely prepared me for the future. At other times, in other movies, actors would go off script and kind of test me like, Ah—maybe she’s not going to be able to reply. And I already knew how to be ready for anything.
W:One of the things that always impresses me about actors is their ability to fake a skill at a high level. An actor won’t be able to boil water, but he can convincingly play a chef.
I’ve had to learn so many different things for movies. When I played a competitive swimmer in Man on Fire, [director] Tony Scott wanted me to do all the swimming myself. I had to race against girls who were competitive swimmers—and he wanted me to actually win the race. There would be some takes where I didn’t win, and we had to do it again. I willed myself to win.
Read the complete interview at the source.
Outtakes:
