Dakota Fanning

“I played the young Reese Witherspoon in 'Sweet Home Alabama' when I was 7, and the boy who played the young Josh Lucas was 10.”

“I don't know whether it's audiences or filmmakers who want characters to be likable today, but I don't think actors are afraid of their characters being unlikable.”

“My dad named me Dakota and my mom came up with my first name Hannah. So it's Hannah Dakota Fanning.”

“Courtney Love is really cool and funny. I would like to meet Julia Roberts and Cameron Diaz. I think I could play their daughters.”

“In the happy scenes there were really fun times. Sean would say really funny stuff because he likes to improv. I would want to laugh, but you are not allowed to do that during the take.”

“I love the feeling I get when I'm on a set; I love reading the scripts, playing the characters, getting to be someone else.”

“I think my generation is obsessed with instant gratification. We want everything now, now, now.”

“I always talk about my characters like they're real people.”

“I was always into fashion because my mom has always been interested in fashion. She majored in fashion merchandising in college, and it's always been something we have in common.”

“Each role that I've played has had a piece of a dream role in it.”

“I find dates, in general, horrific. We have to sit there and ask these questions and pretend to eat a meal, and it just feels so stiff.”

“I would love to direct one day. I value the relationship that I have with a director so much, and I would be really excited to be on the other end of that relationship.”

“I think you learn something from everybody that you've worked with. I really learned how to behave on set through the people that I worked with, like the importance of being on time and the importance of being professional. I don't bring my cell phone on set; I leave it in my trailer.”

“The hardest thing is at the end you have to say bye to all these people who you have worked with for so many months. It was really sad not to see them anymore. But you have the parties that you go to and you get to see them, like the premieres and the screenings.”

“I'm the girl that's on the beach with a hat on, under an umbrella. Like, very shaded. But my weird thing is, I only tan my legs. My whole body's covered in the shade, and I tan my legs.”

“I know how to hit a mark without looking. I instinctively know where my eye line should be. That's all 100%. But your character and the story are always different, so the emotional part is not muscle memory. You're still surprised by stuff and get the adrenaline.”

“I think what has helped me is that I've never thought of myself as a child star. If you think of yourself like that, you might have problems!”

“It's hard to remember, when you look at a magazine or when you look at pictures of people, and you forget that those people are people like you. They have flaws and insecurities. That's so easy to forget, even for me, as somebody who's sometimes in those magazines.”

“My parents never talked to me like I was a kid. Maybe that's why I've been seen as mature.”

“We can't continue to take from our planet the way we do and not give anything back, and the idea of, 'Oh, but it's fine, I won't have to deal with it in my lifetime,' well, you need to think about the future generations who will have to deal with it.”