Kirsten Dunst Once Shared That She Didn’t Want to Have Famous Kids After Being a Child Actor
Actor Kirsten Dunst had two children with her husband and fellow actor Jesse Plemons. And although it might’ve been unavoidable, Dunst hoped that her kids wouldn’t be caught in the spotlight.
Why Kirsten Dunst wasn’t sure she wanted her kids becoming actors
Kirsten Dunst knew what it was like being a child actor. Before she was even a teenager, Dunst had small parts in a few notable television shows and movies. Interview With a Vampire turned out to be one of Dunst’s breakthrough roles, which she won after a lengthy audition process.
“I was with my coach,” she recalled to Variety. “He was outside of the room. He listened on the door to hear, like, what I was doing. And he knows I didn’t nail it. And I walked out, and he was like, ‘No, you go back in there.’ He’s like, ‘Apologize to the casting director.’ He’s like, ‘She didn’t do what she can do.’”
Interview With a Vampire turned Dunst from child actor to child star. And although she enjoyed a successful career because of it, child stardom had its fair share of challenges. And they were challenges she preferred her own children to avoid.
”I would obviously like them to be happy and if being actors makes them happy, great, I wouldn’t stop them. But I wouldn’t push them into it. Especially as young kids. Even though it worked out for me, it’s still very hard,” she once said according to Contact Music. ”I also wouldn’t want to bring my kid up in Los Angeles. If I hadn’t grown up there, I think I would hate that city. I’m filming in New Orleans at the moment and it reminded me how lovely it is to walk around without being followed by a gang of paparazzi.”
Kirsten Dunst once shared the child star who reminded her of herself
Dunst reflected on her career as a child actor in a 2021 interview with Sirius XM. There, she explained how she and her contemporaries might’ve made the transition to successful adult actors. Which was a feat not many other child actors were able to accomplish.
“All of us that survived this child acting, Elijiah Wood, Natalie Portman, all of us, we all made that break at some point when we were younger. And I think certain people develop out of it, and it’s not for them,” Dunst said. “Some people stick with it and can find themselves a new way of approaching it as adults. It’s not for everyone, but the ones that make it, and love it still, I think we’re lucky that we got to start so young. I think we’re less impressed by it all maybe, and more grounded because of it.”
Years earlier, it seemed that the Spider-Man star was also paying attention to other child actors as well. She singled out one child actor at the time as being very much like her.
“Dakota Fanning reminds me a lot of myself, but she’s wiser than I was at her age,” Dunst once told Town and Country.
How Kirsten Dunst’s upbringing helped her deal with early stardom
Dunst considered her very fortunate that she didn’t succumb to some of the pitfalls other child actors do. The Jumanji star felt having a somewhat normal childhood and stable support system might’ve helped ground her.
“It’s hard to be a child actress and make sure it’s balanced with school and friends and all that stuff. And I always had that, so I got lucky with growing up in that way,” she once told Reuters (via HuffPost).
It wasn’t always a smooth ride, however. Dunst confided that kids would mock her and her acting for a commercial she did. But Dunst didn’t let the teasing get to her.
“Heh heh, I made so much money,” she remembered thinking to herself at the time.
