00:03
So American Pastoral came to me
00:07
My character's name is Merry.
00:09
I definitely did have to go to some really dark places,
00:11
but as an actor, that is what I look forward to
00:16
and love doing the most because makes me feel like
00:21
I've actually done something hard.
00:24
My sister saw the film and had
00:26
a really horrified reaction to it,
00:30
and she got really upset by it.
00:32
I mean I'm happy about that 'cause
00:33
that means that it moved somebody
00:36
and even somebody that knows me as well as my sister.
00:39
I have always had to let go of caring
00:42
what other people expect from me,
00:44
or caring what other people think
00:46
that I can do because inevitably
00:50
there are preconceived notions
00:52
about who I am and what I'm capable of
00:55
because I started out so young,
00:56
which I think is unfair, of course.
00:59
But I've let that go because I think
01:01
that that would just drive me crazy.
01:04
I've always felt like I was expected
01:06
to be mature and wise beyond my years
01:11
and an old soul, which people would say
01:13
about me, which is a compliment.
01:15
Some days I am an old soul and some days I'm not.
01:22
When I'm feeling unsafe, I need
01:24
to watch the movie Almost Famous,
01:27
and it makes me cry and laugh and it's
01:31
the movie that I can't turn off when it comes on, I love it.
01:34
[Woman] I love that.
01:35
And I think when they sing Tiny Dancer
01:37
in the van, and when Kate Hudson,
01:39
when he tells her that she was traded
01:42
for a case of beer, then she says, What kind of beer?
01:45
So Sweet Home Alabama, first scene
01:47
of the movie I play young Reese Witherspoon
01:49
and that was my first kiss.
01:52
I was seven years old, he was 10,
01:54
it was very nerve-racking.
01:57
I say, what do you want to marry me for, anyhow?
01:59
And he says, So I can kiss 'ya anytime I want.
02:02
Hot stuff for a seven and a 10 year old.
02:06
My studio teacher, who was my teacher my whole life
02:09
before I went to high school, she was with me on that movie.
02:12
She told this story all the time.
02:14
In between each take, we would do
02:16
the kiss right, and then I would slowly turn away
02:21
and wipe my mouth off so he couldn't see
02:26
or so no one could see, because I was trying
02:31
to be kind, but it was like too,
02:33
it was like, I wasn't really into it.
02:36
My real first kiss was in my driveway, 14.
02:41
I was walking him out, he had been over
02:44
at my house swimming in my pool,
02:46
and I was walking him out and then I had
02:48
gotten him a gift, and I forgot it.
02:49
So I ran back inside and he was wearing a baseball cap.
02:52
And when I came back out, he had turned
02:55
the baseball cap around, and I remember thinking,
03:00
oh my God, oh God that's what that means.
03:05
And then, and that was it, it was against my
03:08
mom's car in the driveway.
03:10
I remember coming inside and just feeling
03:12
like everybody could see, like everyone could see
03:18
But I felt like his 16-year-old scruff had kind
03:25
of chapped me a little bit, and so I just felt
03:28
like everyone could that I was bright red
03:30
and everyone knew and everyone could tell.
03:32
And I think my mom even said, maybe said something,
03:36
I can't remember, but I just remember being
03:37
like, oh, everyone knows.
03:39
And I knew my sister was probably like
03:40
looking outside like she's such a weirdo like that.
03:44
She totally would do that.
03:46
We've all been chapped by scruff
03:48
at some point on our face.
