I love cars. And with Laneige, I use all their skin care. Everything’s always a different branch of who I am. Like, I feel like with acting, I’m getting to explore who I’m not and try out all these different lives. But through my brand partnerships, I get to kind of show different sides of who I am personally, and that’s really fun for me.
What kind of fan interaction have you had that signals not only your work is good, but that it really matters to people? I get so happy and excited whenever people come up to me and they share their stories about when they watched either ‘Euphoria’ or ‘White Lotus’ or whatever project it was and what it meant to them. Being able to connect with so many people through my characters is such a beautiful experience, and I have a group of people that I always see in New York or in Italy or Paris.
What is your experience with fans that don’t respect boundaries? It’s a tricky one because I understand that I am playing a character that they feel close to me where I don’t know this person. So they might have a relationship with me that I don’t have with them. And so it’s just something that I have to navigate, and I’m still trying to figure out, but my DMs are not a safe space. There is no respect in those. [laughs]
18
So, Sydney, what is the one thing that makes or breaks a script for you in selecting projects? Oh, it truly is just all over the place. Usually, if I can see the script in my mind play like a movie or a show, then I’m like, ‘Okay. I see how this could be made,’ and I’m excited about it. But it’s usually just if I’m scared of it. If I’m scared of it, then it’s the right one to do.
How do you prepare to play a character? This is probably so controversial, but I don’t like to rehearse. I don’t like to plan things. I don’t like to have anything set. I like to just know what’s my space that I can work in, where’s the cameras - and let’s just see what happens. Sometimes filmmakers don’t like that, and so I have to, like, work with it.
With such a fast-moving industry, how do you stay moving forward in your career? I think that it’s what I was saying about being challenged, making sure that I’m finding characters that challenge me in different ways, different stories to tell. I want to play roles that people won’t expect me to do.
How do you shift the industry’s objectifying gaze into a source of empowerment and leverage? That’s a deep question [laughs]. That is a very deep question. I just keep playing characters that people don’t think that I’d play.
How do you choose your brand endorsements? I always want to make sure that no matter what partnership I’m doing, it’s organic and authentic to who I am. So Miu Miu was actually the first fashion show I ever went to in my entire career. And it’s been just such a beautiful relationship that we’ve built now, and I’ve been working with them for years. And I love all their work, and they create the most beautiful custom dresses for me that fit my body and my body shape. And then, like, Ford, I built my Bronco.
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How can actors/celebrities responsibly leverage their platforms to speak on social justice issues? I think it’s important to speak about the things that you’re passionate about and just use your voice in a good and positive way.
Let’s go back to the beginning, so when you were growing up, at what point did you know you wanted to be an actor? Oh my goodness. You know, growing up, I actually just lived in my imagination. I was always outside, building imaginary worlds. In school, I would randomly write scripts, and I didn’t even really know what scripts were and have my friends play them on the playground. And I think that when I realised what movies and TV shows were and what actors were and that you could play all these pretend worlds and be all these people, that that’s actually what encouraged me.
Do you remember the first thing that happened to you that made you feel like you deserve to be here? I think that didn’t come until a lot later. I always had the motivation that I wasn’t going to accept ‘no’ even from, like, 10 years old. But the feeling of ‘I’m here. I deserve this. I feel confident in the space.’ Didn’t happen until much, much later.
With all the nominations you have received, that must give you a nice backing? It’s incredible. I get to play such diverse, interesting, challenging roles - and that’s what I dream of doing. So whenever I get the opportunity to play a character like Cassie [‘Euphoria’] or Cecilia in ‘Immaculate’, like, that is what makes me feel really good and I’m happy to be able to do.
So you decide you want to become an actor. What did you think was step one to making that dream a reality? I was quite young. So I did not know anything about the industry. I came from a small town, Spokane, Washington, which has nothing to do with this world, and my parents had nothing to do with this world either, and they thought that acting was like
INTERVIEW
SYDNEY SWEENEY
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