Actor Shailene Woodley Interview, 'Authenticity Is My Love Language'

- The Guardian, Aug. 1, 2021. - Despite being only 29, Shailene Woodley already has 25 years’ acting experience under her belt. Here, the star of Big Little Lies & Divergent talks about being free-willed, her hippy passions & late-night calls with Kate Winslet. -

The one and only time Shailene Woodley beams during our time together – a long conversation over Zoom, on a bright weekday morning – is when my young son sneaks into the room in which I’m bent over a laptop, points at the stranger appearing on-screen, and asks, not quietly, “Who’s that?”

There is nothing to do but introduce them. “Nicholas,” I say. “This is Shailene.” “Shailene,” I say. “This is my son, Nicholas.” Remarkably, my son, understanding these formalities, offers a decent “Hello.” And Woodley, grinning, says “Hiiiiii!” in reply, pulling that vowel along sweetly, before adding, more graciously than is necessary: “So cute!”

My son is five years old. He is an expressive talker, and mostly he listens to adult direction, though his mum and I are yet to find out how he might act under pressure, and there are times when he will say “no” at the hint of an activity he doesn’t want to do – will “never” do – and then, you understand, a battle begins.

I mention this because Woodley was five years old, too, when she began acting, mostly in commercials in the early years. And when I imagine my son in those kinds of situations, surrounded by adults he doesn’t know – adults who might ask him to stand a certain way, or speak a certain way, perhaps kindly at first, but then, if things don’t go so well in the beginning, perhaps less kindly – I wonder: how? How did Woodley do it? ...

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https://www.theguardian.com/film/2021/aug/01/shailene-woodley-interview-authenticity-is-my-love-language