Last year, Dakota Johnson dubbed the scrutiny of nepo babies ‘incredibly annoying and boring’ but she’s certainly had a leg up in the acting industry as the daughter of Don Johnson and Melanie Griffith.
The 35-year-old Madame Web action star also grew up with Antonio Banderas as her stepfather and Tippi Hedren as her 95-year-old grandmother.
Don warned all his children they’d be deprived of their allowance if they didn’t attend college, so Dakota auditioned for The Juilliard School with monologues from William Shakespeare and Steve Martin.
‘That f***ing process was so awful and terrifying. When you get accepted for an audition, it’s a two-day long chorus-line thing. You’re supposed to get called back for a second audition, and I didn’t,’ Johnson recalled in her ELLE UK cover story on Wednesday.
‘They were like, “You don’t stand a chance. But thank you, I appreciate it.”‘
Miss Golden Globe 2006 admitted she ‘really didn’t want to go to college’ anyway but was dismayed at the idea of being ‘cut off’ by the 75-year-old Miami Vice alum and admitted ‘it was hard to make money.’
By age 18, Dakota used her famous name to easily sign with IMG for modeling in 2006 and two years later she signed with the William Morris Agency for acting.
‘There were a few times when I’d go to the market and not have money in my bank account or not be able to pay rent, and I’d have to ask my parents for help,’ Johnson lamented.
‘I’m very grateful that I had parents that could help me and did help me. But it certainly was not fun. The auditioning process, as you know, is the f***ing worst.’
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The Independent Spirit Award winner noted that her 67-year-old mother ‘was the nice one’ when it came to hand-outs.
Dakota also has Melanie to thank for her big-screen debut, at age nine, in Antonio’s dismally-reviewed directorial debut Crazy in Alabama in 1999.
Before landing her breakout role in the Fifty Shades trilogy, Johnson first caught the industry’s attention as panty-clad Harvard University student Amelia in David Fincher’s 2010 drama The Social Network.
‘When [the nepo baby scrutiny] first started I found it to be, like, incredibly annoying and boring,’ the Daddio star scoffed on TODAY last year.
‘Like, if you’re a journalist, write about something else. That’s just, like, lame.’
Dakota has been hard at work producing and starring as ghost author Lowen Ashleigh in Michael Showalter’s big-screen adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s 2018 novel Verity.
