I think I always had joie de vivre. But I had pretty bad self-esteem growing up and much of my adult life.

My daughter was a toddler. I had no idea there was anything wrong with kids' media.I started watching little preschool shows with her or G-rated videos or whatever; I couldn't believe what I was seeing, that there seemed to be far more male characters than female characters in what we make for little kids. It was just a shock.

I remember very distinctly being so tall I didn't fit sleeves, so I ended up modeling lingerie and bathing suits, sleeveless stuff, basically. I didn't have a good body, but I believed I knew how to stand or pose to mask it.

All I wanted, to be petite and attractive. I was afraid I'd never stop growing.

[My aunt] took me to my first play, too, which was dinner theater. I don't know if they have that in England, but you eat a dinner while you watch a play. And she ordered a glass of wine. I was like, "Oh my God. This is, like, the most sophisticated thing I have ever done."

I had a deliberate plan to get into movies by becoming a model, so I went to New York and got a job pretending to be a mannequin in store windows.

When I was a model, actually, for a little while, my friend that I worked with a lot, she had horrible self-esteem too. We decided that the exact moment when we actually thought we were attractive, we wouldn't be anymore. We would just, like, miss it.