Started as her sister's body double at 3, then spent two decades proving she wasn't anybody's understudy.
At a glance
- Known for
- The Great · Maleficent · A Complete Unknown · Sentimental Value
- Before fame
- Debuted at age 3 playing the younger version of Dakota Fanning's character in I Am Sam
- Off-screen
- Co-founded Lewellen Pictures production company with sister Dakota in 2021
Timeline
Child extra turned Oscar contender, one uncompromising role at a time.
The awards finally catch up
A Complete Unknown landed her the National Board of Review's Best Supporting Actress for 2024, playing the stand-in for Bob Dylan's girlfriend Suze Rotolo opposite Timothee Chalamet as Dylan. That was the warmup. Joachim Trier's Sentimental Value pushed further, earning her a first Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress at the 98th Academy Awards, with the film pulling nine nominations total. The Predator: Badlands dual-android role the same year proved she wasn't going prestige-only. At 27, she's collecting serious nominations while simultaneously playing synthetic villains in franchise sci-fi, which is a harder trick than it looks.
Going long on television
Hulu's The Great gave her something films hadn't: three full seasons to build a character from naive idealist to calculating ruler. She didn't just star in it, she executive produced it. Three Golden Globe nominations and a Primetime Emmy nod for Best Comedy Actress followed. The show got canceled after season 3, which is the only disappointing part of the run.
The Girl from Plainville (2022) cast her as Michelle Carter, the teenager convicted for texting her boyfriend into suicide. She produced that one too. A 93% Rotten Tomatoes rating suggests people didn't mind her playing one of the most reviled figures in true-crime history. Her Broadway debut in Branden Jacobs-Jenkins' Appropriate (2023-2024), opposite Sarah Paulson and Corey Stoll, completed the argument: she wasn't going to stay in one lane.
Disney princess by day, Cannes provocation by night
Maleficent (2014) paired her with Angelina Jolie as Princess Aurora, a Disney tentpole that made a billion dollars globally. Two years later she was at Cannes in Nicolas Winding Refn's The Neon Demon, playing an aspiring model in a film so violent and polarizing it got booed at its premiere. She was 16 when they shot it, legally too young to buy a ticket to see it. The contrast wasn't accidental; she was clearly stress-testing her range against the Disney brand she'd just built.
Mary Shelley (2017), Teen Spirit (2018), and a Maleficent sequel in 2019 filled out the decade without doing anything especially surprising. But the Cannes gamble signaled she wasn't going to coast on princess money.
Stepping out from under the family name
Sofia Coppola's Somewhere (2010) put her in a lead role at 12, carrying scenes opposite Stephen Dorff. Super 8 (2011), J.J. Abrams' Spielberg-era nostalgia piece, was the louder arrival, grossing over $260 million worldwide and earning her a Spotlight Award at the Hollywood Film Festival. She wasn't playing a precocious kid anymore; she was the emotional center of a major blockbuster. Sally Potter's Ginger & Rosa (2012) kept the arthouse credibility intact. By 14, she'd made it clear she wasn't just Dakota Fanning's younger sister.
The family business
Her debut came at 3, playing the younger version of Dakota Fanning's character in I Am Sam (2001). By 6, she was voicing Mei in the English dub of Miyazaki's My Neighbor Totoro alongside Dakota, and impressing enough in The Door in the Floor (2004) that producers scrapped their plan to hire twins and just used her. The Fanning sisters were practically a studio cottage industry before either of them was in middle school.
Rise to Fame
At three years old, she was already on a film set, playing the younger version of her sister Dakota in I Am Sam. By five, producers on The Door in the Floor scrapped their plan to hire identical twins because she was good enough alone. Sofia Coppola cast her in Somewhere at 11, a film that won the Golden Lion at Venice. That's not a background role. The Maleficent call came at 14, putting her in a $750 million franchise opposite Angelina Jolie. There wasn't a single breakthrough moment. Directors just kept picking her over everybody else.
In the Spotlight
Three Golden Globe nods for The Great were momentum. The Oscar nomination for Sentimental Value made it official. She ran that Hulu show for three seasons as lead and executive producer, pulled a 96% on Rotten Tomatoes, and Hulu cancelled it during the SAG-AFTRA strike without telling the cast.
She researched a role as an OnlyFans creator by making an actual account. Franchise blockbusters sit alongside streaming dramedies in the same year. The range isn't a pivot, it's the whole strategy.
Side Notes
Cannes is basically her living room. She first showed up in 2016 and became the youngest jury member in the festival's history at 21, sitting on the panel that handed Parasite the Palme d'Or. That same trip, she fainted at a Chopard dinner because her Prada dress was too tight. Colin Firth rushed to her side.
Her 2017 Vivienne Westwood gown took 10 people and over 300 hours to make. She grew seven inches in a year and a half as a kid, something she calls "altitude sickness." The girl who started as her sister's body double now wears 1903 Cartier necklaces to the Oscars.