Elle Fanning knows style, and at 21, she’s got the red-carpet acumen to prove it. Wearing @LouisVuitton on the cover of our Best-Dressed issue, she talks about her career, being soundly beaten by Angelina Jolie at paintball, and her love of fashion: https://t.co/JUQWFGj3KB pic.twitter.com/OBrVhCJRsw

— InStyle (@InStyle) October 8, 2019

I'm walking behind Elle Fanning into L.A.’s Chateau Marmont — not in a creepy way — and the first thing I notice is how perfectly, well, Elle Fanning she is. She’s wearing a cute plaid pastel minidress and chunky Gucci slides, and her hair is up in a topknot. All of it is polished off by a pair of swinging vintage daisy earrings. She’s also 10 minutes early. What’s so winning about Fanning — apart from daisies and punctuality — is the openness she radiates wherever she goes. An uncynical desire to try things, to perform, to fling herself out into the world. And, of course, her exuberant embrace of fashion is why she’s on the cover of this Best Dressed issue. Fanning has worn princess ball gowns (which she will also sport in Maleficent Mistress of Evil, out this month), sparkly Rodarte, artsy-girl Miu Miu, and the crowning glory that was a reinvigorated Dior New Look at the Cannes Film Festival in May.
On Fanning, though, every look is new.
LAURA BROWN: Everything you do, Elle, you embrace. I remember when you came to the InStyle Awards [in 2017] wearing a full-on Versace dress and giggling like you were 6.
ELLE FANNING: [Laughing] Oh my god, I hated the faux bangs I wore that night so much. But, hey, it was a costume. It was a Warhol print with Marilyn Monroe, and I love her, so, obviously, I wore that dress.

LB: It seems like that “I’m going to experience this” feeling governs you.
EF: Yes, I was always curious and mischievous. Like when I watched Friends, I loved Phoebe. I loved that she was gawky. I had a real awkward phase. I grew 12 inches in a year. I didn’t want to be like everyone else in school. There was a certain confidence that I had, that I was like, “I want you to make fun of me because that makes me feel cool.”
LB: Ah, the old “Awkward and gawky, now I’m a goddess.”
EF: Exactly! There is, like, a fairy-tale aspect to that, so that was always kind of in me. And I was already doing films and stuff.
LB: Did you go to a school that had a lot of performers?
EF: I went to Campbell Hall, which is in the [San Fernando] Valley. But I was home-schooled until the third grade. And then my mom kind of realized, “OK, you need to be around other kids.” [laughs] I went in fourth grade, and I was there until senior year. I went to all of my proms.
LB: What did you wear to your proms?
EF: The first prom was in ninth grade. I wore a white Ralph Lauren dress that we found at the mall. It was long and flowy with a V-neck tank. For the second prom I went to the Paper Bag Princess [in L.A.] and got a vintage bias-cut pink John Galliano dress.

LB: You wore a bias-cut Galliano to your 10th-grade prom! That is very advanced.
EF: Oh, yeah! I haven’t worn it since. I should wear it to a red carpet. You know, I’ve always just been interested in fashion. I love dressing up and playing characters. Growing up, my sister, Dakota, and I would do scenes but just for each other. There was a lot of Miranda Priestly from The Devil Wears Prada and a lot of desk jobs.
LB: Oh, poetry. Was your desk job always in fashion?
EF: From what I remember it was. We would dress a certain way and then put Coca-Cola in wineglasses. It was a lot of Dakota screaming at me.
LB: Well, that’s what it’s like. [laughs] Who were some of your style heroes as a kid?
EF: I loved Samantha from Bewitched. I would put a Brownie uniform on for some reason and make tea. That was me playing Samantha. I also loved Alexa Chung and her ’60s tomboy style. My mom would take me to [the clothing store] Opening Ceremony all the time. That was a big deal.


LB: I remember seeing you really wearing fashion when you were just 16.
EF: Yes, that was for the first Maleficent. That was a very important moment because it involved a huge press tour. That’s when I learned how to express myself through clothes.
LB: Alongside that, when did you first compute that your life was getting bigger, externally?
EF: I saw things happening to my sister, so it wasn’t completely foreign to me. People would confuse me with her all the time. It was a relief when people saw me as myself. Super 8 [written and directed by J.J. Abrams, 2011] was a big film, and we went to a couple of award shows, and experiencing all of that was extremely new. I also love seeing celebrities. I’m not jaded by that at all.

LB: Go on...
EF: I met Beyoncé at the Met Ball the first year that I was there [in 2011, when she was 13]. I totally freaked out over that. Leonardo DiCaprio, I totally freaked out over him too.
LB: You’re about to have a big movie come out. How do you metabolize this shiny world?
EF: You just have to not think about it. I’ve never tried to separate myself or wanted to separate myself. I also feel like to be a good actress, you have to immerse yourself and have experiences in the world.
LB: How do you manage your career, and what sort of things are you looking for?
EF: It’s definitely instinctual, and, of course, there are other factors, like, I really want to work with this director or this actor. Like, with Leo? [laughs] Great! But I’m not a very calculating person. That’s why I’m bad at interviews. I’m obviously not that old, but I am starting to realize that I can get a little more involved [in developing projects]. If I have an idea for a story or if I read a book that I really love, I can start to cultivate that. I can take matters into my own hands. I’m producing a television show in London [The Great] for Hulu about Catherine the Great that I’m about to go do for six months. And it’s with the co-writer of The Favourite, Tony McNamara. We all decided we should make it into a show instead of a movie, so we went around and pitched it. I’ve only done that a couple of times. It’s very weird and unsettling.

LB: Worse than an audition?
EF: Oh, auditions, I can’t [do them]—I mean, obviously, sure, I can, but they make me so nervous. I fainted in an audition once. It was with Jessica Chastain. I didn’t get the part.
LB: You literally just fell down in front of people?
EF: I was young, but, yeah, I fell down in front of people. It was very odd. There were glaring lights, and I felt so hot. I fainted in Cannes this year too. Fainting is something I do. I was on my period. It was such a crazy feeling. It honestly happened at the best moment because I wasn’t on the red carpet. Could you imagine? That would have been kind of epic, though.
LB: She’s so Best Dressed that she fell down. Aside from that, how was being on the grand jury in Cannes? You killed it on the red carpet.
EF: I was there the whole time, two weeks. It was intense. You also have to watch the films and be serious about it. Cannes is the biggest red carpet in the world and is the moment that you can kind of pull out all the stops with the clothes. My stylist [Samantha McMillen] and I didn’t have that much time to plan, probably a month. We went to different designers, and I had the idea about the Dior, complete with the hat.
LB: That was your idea?
EF: Yes! It was one of my favorite things I’ve worn. I love feeling confident in what I’m wearing. You can tell when somebody is forced into something.

LB: What was it like walking in the Miu Miu show last year?
EF: Oh! That was crazy! I was so nervous. It wasn’t a planned thing. I was attending anyway, and then Mrs. Prada had that idea. Her team said, “You’re starting the show, so you have to be very serious.” The whole theme was rockabilly-grunge. I tried to keep a straight face, but that’s not my go-to. I was cracking up.
LB: You’re young and visible, so how do you handle when people ask you to be politically engaged publicly?
EF: Sometimes I feel like I don’t know all the information. Like, am I qualified to speak on this? But I also think it’s OK for people to say that they don’t know or aren’t sure yet. Angelina [Jolie] said that to me after a recent interview we did for Maleficent 2. She said, “You know what? It’s OK not to answer things.” I mean, I’m still learning.
LB: You’re 21 now. What was your first official beverage?
EF: I think it was a martini at Craig’s [in L.A.]. I loved it, except they didn’t give me my olives. I love olives. We had dinner there. Then we went to karaoke in Koreatown, and we drank a lot.

LB: So proud. Who was there, and what did you wear?
EF: I wore a dress from For Love & Lemons. It was long-sleeve and pink with a heart. Dakota was there. [Rodarte designer] Laura Mulleavy was there. [Film director] Gia Coppola was there.
LB: Now that you’re getting older, what are you ambitious for?
EF: Oh, man, I’m ambitious for a lot of things. I love game shows and want to create one. All I watch is Game Show Network. I love America Says, Idiotest, Chain Reaction, Family Feud. I don’t know exactly what my show would be, but I really want to do that. I want to direct something, maybe sing a country album. I love Johnny Cash, so I could possibly do a cover album. And a clothing line.

LB: You also have a very fancy L’Oréal contract. What’s your idea of “worth”?
EF: My mom, my sister, my grandmother, and I, we all live together. So, there is a strong sense of female empowerment that I’ve always had in my life. It’s significant to know that there are so many different types of women. I hate that in order to be strong you have to look like this or to be soft you have to look like this. Those stereotypes are just not true. My worth is knowing I can be anything. In Maleficent I play a princess [Aurora] who is strong in being completely feminine and isn’t afraid of that feeling. It’s a quality I also have. And, obviously, this version is different from the first one. I’m not fighting with a sword just so I can be stronger.
LB: To be worthy.
EF: Yes, exactly.
LB: I read that you’re a cousin of Kate Middleton. Have you interacted or gotten in touch with her?
EF: That came from somebody doing an Ancestry.com [search] on me and my sister, but no. [laughs] I’ve never met any of them. She probably doesn’t even know who I am.

LB: Are you obsessed with the royal family, like everyone else in the world seems to be?
EF: I’m in London a lot, so I feel like I’m in the know, and I do read the Daily Mail. [laughs]
LB: Click bait! Last one. What did you learn from working with Angelina and Michelle [Pfeiffer] on Maleficent 2?
EF: When I heard that Michelle was going to be in the film, I realized that the second movie is going to be about power. It’s about three generations of women in power and how they represent it in different ways. And, with Angelina, I was so young when I did the first film with her. I was very nervous then. My mom was with me. Now that I’m grown up, she sees me in a different way. We talked about different things. We went paintballing.
LB: Are you an aggressive paintballer? Is she?
EF: Oh, she’s aggressive. [laughs] We would do outings because her kids were there, so she was trying to schedule activities on the weekends. I had never gone paintballing before. We were in full-on armor. We were the only people in the place, with all of her kids. She and I were not on the same team. I was so bad. I hit their security guard in the neck, and he was on my team! [laughs] Angelina’s really good.
LB: I mean, I’ve seen Salt. She’s a trained assassin.
EF: Totally. I was good at hiding. I would just hide.

Photographed by Pamela Hanson. Styling: Samantha McMillen. Hair: Jenda Alcorn. Makeup: Erin Ayanian Monroe for Cloutier Remix. Manicure: Mel Shengaris for Forward Artists. Prop styling: Daniel Horowitz for Jones Mgmt. Production: Kelsey Stevens Productions.

In 10 days, the horns come out. See #Maleficent: Mistress of Evil in theaters October 18. Tickets available now: https://t.co/qA0Lh6R32s pic.twitter.com/9j0aZ6r02K

— Walt Disney Studios (@DisneyStudios) October 8, 2019

Tokyo
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InStyle

Angelina Jolie Once Colored Her Hair with a Sharpie

On a chilly January evening, Angelina Jolie nestles into a couch inside the highly fragrant Guerlain boutique on Paris’s Champs-Élysées. We’re meeting to toast the launch of Mon Guerlain Eau de Parfum Florale, for which she is the face. Jolie’s face, apart from softly smoked eyes, looks natural. “We’re all pretty natural,” she says of her family. She takes her time as she discusses her makeup skills (they’re good, but daughter Zahara is more the enthusiast), her skin (cared for by a dermatologist since she was 11), and her views on what it’s like to age when you’re known as one of the world’s most beautiful women.

Angelique Serrano

Mar 15, 2018 @ 9:00 am

How beauty-aware were you growing up? Did you experiment with your hair and makeup?
I’m sure I had my moments when I was little where I would put makeup all over my face, but I was a bit of a tomboy. And then I was a bit of a punk. Nowadays it’s very popular to dye your hair blue, for example. In my day you bleached it and used a Sharpie [for color].

You did that?
Yeah! I suppose my early memories were more as a creative person—and then early on as an actor. It’s a mask; it’s a part of creating a character. I’ve never gone to a girlfriend’s house and played makeup. I’m not one of those women who say, “Hey, let’s have a night and do each other’s hair.” I’ve never been that, but I find that really sweet. I buy a lot, especially for Z [Zahara]. She went through a period of trying different things, but she’s pretty natural. I remember she had a girlfriend over one night, and they said they were going to do dress-up and did I have any makeup?

What did you say?
I gave them my makeup, but I wear one color red, and I have black eyeliner and mascara—I have the most boring makeup kit. And my daughter and I are different shades of brown. I now have a backup kit in case anybody wants to play.

Are you handy with a liquid liner? Can you get yourself event-ready in a pinch?
Oh, yeah, because I don’t want to have to depend on a makeup artist. I’m much more comfortable with just a little concealer for my dark circles. That’s my main thing.

Is there a feature of yours that you like to play up most?
It really depends. I do either dark eyes or red lips. I have very full, big features, so if I did everything, I’d look a bit like a clown. It’d be just… a lot.

How did you first discover Guerlain?
My mother [Marcheline Bertrand] wore very little makeup. But she had a few items for a special event or holiday, and they were always Guerlain. There were little scents and powders, and I would occasionally mess with them. I remember thinking, “That’s not the everyday stuff. That’s from Paris!”

Do you wear fragrance?
[When I’ve tried] on a perfume just for fun, my children have gotten upset. [They’d say,] “It doesn’t smell like you.”

Do you have a signature scent?
I wear Mon Guerlain. Before that I wore a different scent that was very random, but it had similar notes. As I was making this decision [to be the face of Mon Guerlain], I tested it with the kids. They recognized enough of it, and they liked it. I wear it, and Zahara wears it. I’m a terrible liar, so I couldn’t promote something I didn’t actually like.

I know this question will amuse you given your schedule, but how do you like to indulge and pamper yourself when you find the time?
[That’s] pretty funny. I’m that person saying “Can you not all be talking to me while I’m in the shower? Can you just not open the door at least? Let me finish and then I’ll get out. Give me a second.” “Give me a second” is the thing. I think most mothers say that all the time. Which now I can’t because my kids kind of go, “One. I gave you a second.”

OK, you have one minute all your own: How do you take care of yourself?
I’ve had the same dermatologist since I was 11; her name is Rhonda Rand. It’s who my mother brought me to when I was little with my first scar. To have somebody who is very encouraging of being as natural as possible has really helped me, I think. When I got pregnant, I had darker areas [on my face] that got darker. So I do IPL [intense pulsed light] every once in a while.

How do you define beauty?
The people I see as beautiful are those who don’t bend to somebody else’s opinion of what is appropriate or beautiful. I’ve always been drawn to people who are unique, different, and just simply themselves. It makes me a bit sad when I see somebody unable to live in their own skin and not feeling comfortable in it. There are a lot of things in society that make people feel that way.

Social media can make things tougher too.
It’s really hard for young people today, [when] people are constantly judging and critiquing and having opinions. It’s funny—I feel like decades ago, to be different was actually the thing you wanted. Now I think it seems to be more desired to be with the masses, to blend, or be as good as or be similar to. My children don’t really do a lot of social media. I’m hoping they’ll have room to figure out what they like before they’re told by a bunch of other people what they should like or how they’re being perceived. My mom used to say when I was little, “Let me see your soul.” That was her thing. Whenever I’d get upset or something, she’d say, “Let me see your soul.” What it meant was, “Show me you. Are you mad? Let me see.” I’ve never really talked about that. I think, I hope anyway, that’s how I’m raising my children: Put what’s inside you forward and find you, figure out who you are. Beauty—everybody has a different opinion about what that is. Intellect is the most beautiful. When you see somebody who has a mind on fire, that’s sexy. A person who is empathetic and thoughtful and passionate—there’s nothing more attractive than that. There’s nothing you could wear or put on your face to cover up if your mind is blank and your heart is dark.

You’re known as such a beauty—one of the most beautiful women in the world. How do you manage that?
Thank you. I look in the mirror and I see that I look like my mother, and that warms me. I also see myself aging, and I love it because it means I’m alive—I’m living and getting older. Don’t love having a random dark spot from a pregnancy, sure. I see my flaws. But what I see that I like isn’t about a structure or an appearance. It’s more that I see my family in my face. I see my age.


For more stories like this, pick up the April issue of InStyle, available on newsstands and for digital download Mar. 16.


Thanks Pride&Joy