Pauline Chalamet

“I moved to Paris and I didn't really know what I wanted to do, but I moved in with a friend who had an apartment there and was looking for a roommate. Quickly, I discovered that I didn't know what exactly I wanted to do, but I wanted it to be a little creative.”

“I definitely feel like Paris is my home.”

“I have so many ideas and stories that I want to tell. But sitting down to write is a hard thing to do.”

“I was a copy editor. I loved it. I love grammar. I'm obsessed. I was a bartender. I worked in a cafe. I was a dog walker. I was a babysitter. I was a tutor. Once I was asked to half-babysit, half-bartend.”

“I double-majored in Political Studies and Theatre & Performance.”

“I think college starts too early. You should go straight into the workforce at 18 and start getting the hang of life first.”

“I really have a love-hate relationship with New York. I will talk to New York and be like, 'You are so hard on me. You are so difficult to be around. Why?'”

“American universities are so expensive. My family couldn't afford to send me, so I took out student loans and had to pay my own way.”

“Well, I grew up in Hell's Kitchen, right next to Times Square, in a subsidized arts building.”

“Paris is great and you can live there, but if you're interested in things going faster, you have to come to the U.S.”

“I didn't party in college. I really, really worked.”

“It's after college that I started to tell myself that you have to persevere, and you have to sit in discomfort and let all the doubts and questions you have... they sometimes just have to sit around you, and you can't answer them.”

“I became a really good student at Bard and I fell in love with learning.”

“I came from a very middle-class family and had to take out loans to go to college. I was really shocked when I arrived at school at the difference between those who had money and those who didn't.”

“I grew up in New York. It was anything but sheltered.”

“I feel very much at home in Paris, but I'm attached to New York.”

“My way into everything was through the theater. There are so many plays that I saw growing up that just made me realize that I wanted to be on stage doing that. So it was definitely through ballet, and then stage, and then theater and acting. And then I kind of made my way to film.”

“People who have money to spend are always okay with splitting the bill. People who don't can't think that way - they've consciously ordered less.”

“I enjoy writing and directing a lot. For a long time, I was dabbling in many different things. I've been thinking of an analogy, and I think it works. It's like I had all these different flowers and I was watering them all evenly, so they were growing at the same level.”

“I had a full college experience. I kind of learned how to be a good student at Bard. I had never really cared about academics, but in college I learned the power of - I don't want to say the power of knowledge, but the power of curiosity.”