Dunst talks 'child actor transition'

Kirsten Dunst admits the transition from child actor to adult thespian is hard.

She had several smaller roles before playing Claudia in Interview with the Vampire: The Vampire Chronicles in 1994. The childhood actress also starred in Little Women, 1994, and Jumanji, 1995. More recently the 32-year-old has played Mary Jane in the 2002 Spider-Man and its sequels, Marie Antoinette in Sofia Coppola’s eponymous film, and Justine in Melancholia.

“That transition [from a child actor] doesn’t happen to many of us. When it does, I think that you’re really meant to be doing this,” the star said in an interview with Flaunt Magazine. “A lot of people stop or it’s too hard to transition. But people don’t want to see you as an adult.”

Kirsten says that her transition manifested with Sofia Coppola’s The Virgin Suicides, which helped her move from a “little girl” to “growing up”.

The actress admits many women in Hollywood face difficulty, as in many ways the industry still seems like a “boys’ club”.

“And to be a strong female in this industry, you have to be really in touch with your masculine side, too. You have to be a pretty strong lady to survive it. You have to be very confident in yourself,” she explained.

The star won Best Actress at Cannes Film Festival in 2011 for her performance in Lars von Trier’s Melancholia.

“Lars sets it up [so that] you want to make him happy. You’re having a great cathartic experience, and you really want to do your best for Lars,” she explained. “Lars makes movies about complicated and dark women—the more interesting aspects of femininity, and the relationships between women and sexuality.

“He’s the only one giving us an opportunity to be crazy and do things that are real but nobody writes about.”