Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
Traveling to Russia and Germany and being able to see the world at a young age was really cool for me, and I really liked that.
I read a lot of books. So, usually when I go home I try to re-charge my batteries and absorb new stories to become inspired again.
Dancers are kept in a perpetual state of pre-puberty, and for young girls in particular, that type of pressure breeds insecurities.
When you dance intensely, you are really aware of your physicality, and that's always great to have as a tool, when you're an actress.
I got the first thing I auditioned for - a guest role on two episodes on 'All Saints,' and I don't think I had ever been that excited.
I like to do projects that challenge me, and hopefully in turn challenge the audience, or open your eyes to something you're not aware of.
When you look at magazines, you feel so inadequate and so small and you feel really imperfect, when you're constantly seeing these images.
The wardrobe is always the last piece of the puzzle. When you step into the clothing, that's the final step to figuring out that character.
It's really rare to get a teenage role that resembles something of what it's like to be a young person, that isn't a cliché or a stereotype.
It's always nice to work with someone you have a history with. It just makes it easier to click back into that dynamic and have a lot of fun.
You have an awareness of your body and how to use it and I think that if you can embody a character physically it's another really useful tool.
You definitely put a bit of yourself in every character, and you always have to have an understanding and empathy for the person that you play.
I used to love ballet and I did it really, really intensely. But it came so much about achieving physical perfection, which when I was 14 was a big deal.
I hate the feeling when I'm overseas, away from Australia, that I'm trapped, blocked by an ocean from getting to the people I love. That gives me anxiety.
We have so many American and English films in Australia that we hear those accents often, so they're not too hard to pick up, but it's always a challenge.
I love Portland. I think it's one of the best cities - I obviously haven't been to very many places, but I had one of the best times I've had on a set there.
Feminism is just about equality, really, and there's so much stuff attached to the word, when it's actually so simple. I don't know why it's always so bogged down.
As a teenager I was very anxious. I had a lot of energy and passion that I wanted to channel into creative things, and I always felt like I wasn't achieving enough.
You are relying on a waiting on other people in acting and films, so to be able to have something that I have full creative control over is really very therapeutic.
I always collect a bunch of images for every film that I do, that reminds me of an essence of the character, or the time that they live in, or what they're experiencing.
When I step back and look at all of these really successful people that I've worked with, one thing I do take away from it is how hard they work and how focused they are.
To have a creative outlet that you can control is really important because you do a lot of waiting to be cast, then waiting to go into production, and then waiting on set.
Ultimately, it's a really brave thing to do what makes you happy as opposed to what the norm, or the social norm is, and that's a very important thing for people to remember, especially young women.
I think that dancing has helped or prepared me, in a number of different ways, for the film industry, especially with controlling your nerves when you walk into an audition because you're on stage from a young age.
All the time that I'm acting with an animated character, I'm looking at a tennis ball or sticky tape or an eyeline or a man in a green suit. There's no real environment, just this electric green that's blaring into your brain.
With dance, you learn to channel nerves into energy, excited energy. It's sort of similar when you walk into an audition room, to be able to go takes deep breath and then go in real calm. It was in those ways that it really helped me.
I think it's possible to have the kind of career you really want if you want to. You just don't do the things you don't want to and you just have to be cool with waiting for something to come around that you really feel passionate for.
You never choose the way that you're raised, it's just the way that you were raised, but you do get to a certain age where you're in a position to question the expectations of you and the way that you've been formed by your surroundings.
It's really rare as a teenager to be offered a role that actually resembles what it's like to be a teenager, because there are so many stereotypes that might be attractive to watch, but make you think: 'Who is that? Who has that life at 16?'
I didn't shoot any guns then or when we did the scene with Uncle Charlie [Matthew Goode] and Evie [Nicole Kidman] in the hall. I sort of pressed the button but there were no blanks or anything in there because I think it was always going to cut.
Ballet has really helped me in every acting role. You have to be very disciplined, you have to be able to control your nerves and perform under pressure, and all those things you have to use in acting when you're on film or going for an audition.
There's a whole language to movement and how you embody someone, and how you can use different techniques for different characters. I guess just posture, and the way you walk, and the way you physically are. All of that says a lot about who someone is.
I wanted to be a dancer from when I was about nine or something like that and started ballet. I used to really like it and got into it and did it full time for a couple of years. I did a lot of ballet but I traded that in for acting when I was about 15.
It sounds corny to say, but it was really inspiring seeing kids that were just living and connecting with people. That was something I really understood, the need and want for connection, and fun, and it not needing to be sympathetic, just sort of good fun.
I think that because most films where there's a teenager, it's aimed at a teenage audience. Restless is - I wouldn't classify it as a teen film, strictly, but it's definitely a film that appeals to young people, but also gives them credit for their complexity.
The independent films are really where I kind of come from and where I feel comfortable. It's never been about the blockbusters and making a huge tonne of money. It's always been about wanting to do projects about the things that I think are important to be out there.
I think dancing is contributed hugely to how I am as an actor, just a level of comfort in my body and in movement. Things can become strangely physically technical when you're acting, and often something that just feels so unnatural is actually what you need to do in a certain scene.
Director Park asking that if there was a pocket on one side of the piece of clothing then there should be a pocket on the other side. They were a little uncomfortable to wear, yes, because there were a lot of tight, high-waisted things so it was great at the end of the day to slip into some pajamas!
He [directo Park] gave me a sculpture, a jaguar. It is the animal, obviously, and it is in my bedroom at my parents' place at the moment. But I am just about to move into my own place and I shall put it somewhere there. I shall make sure it has good lighting. This will be my first place of my own and I am so excited.
I always thought the piano scene was kind of unique to shoot because we were actually able to film with the playback of the actual song. And that was quite amazing because it almost made it easier - music is usually something that is added after filming has finished so to be able to shoot a scene with music was really wonderful.
Just wearing the corset means that you can never really relax from the moment that you put it on. So, there's a constant sort of strain and you have to hold yourself in a certain way. It's very uncomfortable. But again you instantly understand the repression that women feel and how much they were captives. It's sort of sad really.
Director Park always talked to me about her in a very innocent way, that the story was of her coming of age and her sexual awakening and her going from girl to woman and that she had the same desires and hopes as other young people in terms of being very infatuated, which comes in the form of her uncle, which is very unconventional.
It was good but it was just a tiny bit uncomfortable because it was a day of lying in the bushes and I think I got a major muscle thing going on there! But it was good. It was fun. That is one of the things you get to do in film that you don't do, or that I don't do, in real life. I can't speak for Dermot [Mulroney]! But it was fun.
I think that I burnt myself out a little bit with my dancing because I did so much of it. I was exhausted so thought that I would try a different kind of performance and expression and acting seemed like a close fit; it was similar in some ways to dancing. My mum showed me some really good films and so I became interested in films and acting.
Yes, a lot of European cinema and a lot of independent films and art-house stuff. She is a photographer. She is a visual artist and photographer and my dad is, too. My mum, I must credit for showing me good films. With my career, my parents were great and though they were a little wary, maybe, of the acting ambitions they have always been supportive.
One of the producers, Wonjo, was an amazing interpreter. I don't think we really knew how it was going to work at the beginning. Yet it was something that a couple of days into it seemed so seamless and it wasn't something that we noticed or thought about. A couple of times I cornered him and forced him to speak English but we didn't speak much English at all. That said, I don't think anything was ever lost in translation. It was all very easy.
I really loved it because it really informed his way of seeing my character and the story. If you look closely he always had this metaphor of an egg, of a little chick pecking her way out of a shell, and in one scene in the kitchen there are all these white plates on a wall and then in the middle there is a yellow plate so even that looks like an egg. And a lot of the furniture was almost sculpted in that way as well. It was really cool to see that.
When I got onto set with him we were given a folder of storyboards. I thought that was pretty incredible because I hadn't worked with anybody who used storyboards before so he obviously had a very precise way as to how he visualized the film from the very beginning. It was every scene, but to his credit he was incredibly collaborative and gave us many opportunities to have our own input and to change things with him, so it was a really great way of working.