Zendaya’s thriving acting career today engulfed most of her childhood. The Emmy-winning actress recently opened up about the downside of achieving success early on in her life. The Euphoria actress got her big break with The Disney Channel’s Shake It Up and had picked up several notable projects on the way.
Ahead of her new movie, Challengers releasing Friday, she shared her unfiltered thoughts about being the “breadwinner” of her family as a child actor and how it has affected her relationship with success in her adult life. Besides that, Zendaya also regretted not going to school and having a normal childhood.
Zenday talked about early introduction to adulthood
In an interview with Vogue for their May cover story issue, the 27-year-old got candid about her atypical childhood and how her acting career had influenced her life throughout. Zendaya told Serena Williams, “I don’t know how much of a choice I had.”
“I felt like I was thrust into a very adult position: I was becoming the breadwinner of my family very early, and there was a lot of role-reversal happening, and just kind of becoming grown, really,” the Shake It Up star recalled. Zendaya landed her Disney role at 14 and has never looked back since. Now at 27, she realized that acting is all that she’s ever known and pondered over the other possibilities had she pursued another profession. 
The Dancing With the Stars alum admitted, “Now, when I have these moments in my career — like, my first time leading a film that’s actually going to be in a theater — I feel like I shrink, and I can’t enjoy all the things that are happening to me…And I wish I went to school.” She explained feeling “tense” that probably transpires from the pressures of being a child star. Zendaya claimed she never got the opportunity to simply let go and “try” new things.
Furthermore, the Dune actress expressed her “complicated feelings” about kids attaining fame and becoming a public focus so early in their lives. She referenced the dark reality behind Kids' TV, as explored in the Max series, Quiet on Set: The Dark Side of Kids TV, and noted that fame has a rather “detrimental” effect on kids.
Zendaya revealed her parents' reaction to steamy Challengers scene
The Spiderman actress also offered an insight into her parents’ reaction to her steamy scenes from Challenges in a conversation with ET’s Denny Directo and her two co-stars Mika Faist and Josh O’Connor. During the premiere, Zendaya got to watch her parents while many of the intimate scenes played on screen. "It was hilarious. Yeah, I thought it was hilarious,” the singer hinted.
"They've all seen Euphoria, you know, so it's not like our first rodeo or anything,” she clarified before noting that it was all “funny” and embarrassing at the same time. Nonetheless, Zendaya pointed out that it seemed like a steamy scene but the room was buzzing with cameramen and crew and it turned out to be more of a “choreography.”
