I really do feel like I'm in a generation where women are empowering and supporting each other. It's so amazing to feel a part of that.

To be recognized for your hard work is a true honor. An Academy Award nomination is one thing that, five years later, I can't form a sentence about. It has not made me feel like I can work any less hard. It makes me feel like I have to work 100 times as hard, to even be as remotely good, to work through an experience that could take me through that again.

I love the film route and I'm gong to try my hardest to stay on it.

Well I was eight years old, and I have an older cousin who is three years older than me and she was doing acting, commercials, and modeling at the time and... to see my cousin doing that was really inspiring and I wanted to do it. So I went to my mom and I asked her if I could do it, and for the acting part of it, she made me study for a year.

I don't know if it has set in or not. Honestly, it's crazy. It's such an amazing honor. I remember thinking back to being in my room waiting for the call to see if I got the part. It's like winning the lottery. I'm proud to be a member of such an amazing cast - that's the best award of all.

I could be inspired by something I see or something I hear and write down or send to a friend or a writer or whether I have instrumental tracks or just a couple chords recorded on my phone. If I have a couple sessions set, I'll go into the studio with the people I'm lucky enough to call my friends because I feel like I can talk to them and then suddenly our conversations turn into these songs you hear on the radio. I still don't understand how it happens but I talk about my experiences and my situations and everything and then they turn into these amazing pop songs.

Child actors come off as work being their life and doing it 24/7, but I still have those days where it's totally, like, whatever: shopping, movies, adventures.