There has always been more for Kirsten Dunst

Dunst has an one-on-one connection with the audience that turns out to be just as direct with anyone she speaks to in real life. In conversation, she’s straightforward and factual, like the kind of friend who would be on your level if you wore something awful. It’s been over a year and a half since she last played, and she’s being honest about the appeal of all those downtime: “There’s a part of me that’s like I’ve been doing this for so long. When can I just relax? “

Then again, there isn’t much time to relax when raising two young children. As we were talking, Dunst’s eldest son Ennis, 3, entered the yard. “Hi, Bubba,” Dunst cooed softly. “Oh no, are you crazy? Ennis was sulking: he didn’t want to go to swimming class because the instructor had made him put his head under water. Dunst turned to me, raising an eyebrow. “This is how to do an interview at home,” she said.

By the time she was Ennis’s age, Dunst – born in Point Pleasant, NJ, to a medical services executive and flight attendant – began modeling. And at age 8, she had appeared in “The Bonfire of Vanities” and a short film directed by Woody Allen. “I clearly had something old about me that was a bit more than your average business kid,” she said.

At 10, this old soul helped her land the groundbreaking role of an early bloodsucker in “Interview With the Vampire,” but later, while living in the Oakwood Apartments in Los Angeles – a enclave of furnished units populated mostly with child actors and their stage parents – another little girl confronted her by the pool and announced that her agent said she would be the next Kirsten Dunst.

“I could afford to be like, it’s crazy,” Dunst said. And over the next several years, even as she booked high-profile films like “Little Women,” “Jumanji” and “Bring It On,” Dunst was determined to keep a normal life, a normal school experience, and normal friends. . “I always thought it sucked to be yourself,” she said. “I probably underestimated myself more in high school because I never wanted anyone to come after me.”