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've definitely had some tough schoots. I'd say everything that I've done has had some sort of challenge that I've had to overcome. But it's the most satisfying feeling once you have and that's what I love about acting, sort of signing on to it knowing that it's going to be challenging.

My very first audition was on the lot of Paramount, and I was put on tape and it was very nerve-racking. I think it was about 15 pages.

I feel like I've had very few bad experiences but even those I look back on and really feel like if it weren't for them, I wouldn't be where I am. I look back on them all the time and constantly feel like I owe it to the other projects that I've made that have gotten me to where I am.

I do have an incredible relationship with my parents, and my mom, who I go to for absolutely everything, thank the lord. If I didn't, I don't know what I would do. But I guess, I think we all have those moments where we feel like we're so alone and have no one to go to.

The shooting of the guns, that was kind of funny, because rolling a cigarette and shooting a gun aren't like normal things for a 13-year old girl!

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.