Millie Bobby Brown is one of the stars of the Godzilla vs. Kong movie that opened over the weekend. She and her Madison Russell character repped Team Godzilla, having survived the earlier film, Godzilla: King of Monsters with her dad, Dr. Mark Russell (Kyle Chandler). Millie is arguably best known to everyone as Eleven on Stranger Things, a role in which she has grown up on our TV screens. Now that she is almost a legal adult, Millie admits her transition from childhood to young adult hasn’t been that easy. Not so much for her, but for us, because we aren’t ready to accept Eleven is now 17.
Millie Bobby Brown has done a lot of growing up in the public eye, and there’re some people out there who still aren’t ready to accept that she’s almost an adult.
The actor opened up about how her fans have been having a hard time seeing her grow up in the wake of playing Jane “Eleven” Ives on Stranger Things since she was a preteen.
“I’m only 17, but at the end of the day, I’m learning to be a woman. I’m learning to be a young woman,” she told MTV News. “So being a young girl, people watch you grow up, right? And they’ve almost become invested in your growth and your journey. But they aren’t ready to accept the fact that you’re growing up.”
Brown wishes that her fans would accept the person she’s becoming because she won’t be a kid forever.
“They’re not accepting it and I’ve completely accepted it,” she said. “You know, I’m ready. I’m like, ‘It’s been a while. Let me wear a high heel!’”
You can watch her full interview with Josh Horowitz here. I love Josh’s interviews because he either knows the person or does his research so they feel more like conversations at a cocktail party. Plus he can be familiar without getting creepy. Millie is quite fun and relaxed in this interview, very well composed for a 17-year-old. I understand where she’s coming from on public perception. There’s a difference between a child actor who makes one film and reappears years later grown vs. an actor who grows up in front of the audience. It’s harder to accept the latter. It’s like your own kids or nieces/nephews – because you spend more time with them, you are more attached to them. Remembering them as little kids is so easily accessible and in some ways, becomes our default. Plus, CB put it so well when she wrote of Millie, “she’s always been so self-possessed and confident in interviews and on the red carpet,” she comes across mature, regardless of what she’s wearing. I’m fine letting Millie grow up and wear what she wants. She’s earned the right to grow into her next stage in life, regardless if we’re prepared for it. I do, however hope she’s been able to get out of her “friendship” with Drake.
SPOILERS FOR GODZILLA VS KONG: Millie and Kyle lived to cheer Team Zilla for Round Two. I have no idea if there will be a round two. I was hoping for a post credit seen with Mothra chewing on a Swisher Sweet in a leather jacket and Doc Martens sloshing through a swamp. I guess Millie was good? I didn’t see Godzilla: KoftM and while I liked her trio of conspiracists that made up Team Zilla, their story was lost on me.
Photo credit: Instagram
Except for Drake
*THIS*.
I worry about her not just re: the scary Stranger Things fanboys, but give her pushy stage parents I fear that there is still a chance she could go down the well trodden path of other child stars who have parents who manage their careers. I hope that I am proved wrong but she has already grown up faster than she should have – a child should never be the main money maker.
At some point she will want to branch out of their control and do things her own way.
This exactly. I’m not worried about Millie growing up. I’m worried about the obvious over sexualization of her online. She was doing photoshoots that made her look 30 at 14. I always wonder how to walk the line with young women – if you’re trying to support them and caution them about other gross adults they can sometimes take it as infantilization. Especially if she’s trying to break away from her messy stage parents.
She should and is inevitably going to grow up and take on adult roles but girl you’re currently 17 and Drake’s been texting you since 14….come on….
The child stars who seemed to keep in on the rails almost all had very stable, involved, protective parents who didn’t center the family around the child’s fame and income. Millie’s parents do not seem to be that.
And by people she means Drake. Drake’s calling less and less now that she’s growing up. #grooming #drakeisapoedophile
I absolutely adored her in Enola Holmes. She has so much charisma on screen
Yes! Loved her in Enola Holmes!
Drake being a grooming pedo aside, I think 17 year olds often do not recognize that adults don’t think of teenagers as peers. This is something that pedos, like, for instance, Drake, will take advantage of, telling the child “you’re so mature” etc.
Worth repeating. For both healthy and unhealthy reasons
“ADULTS DON’T THINK OF TEENAGERS AS PEERS”
Yeah. It’s not that people aren’t accepting that she’s growing up, it’s that they don’t accept that she’s GROWN up.
People should give her the space to grow up, make whatever mistakes she will make and not place unfair expectations on her. I felt really bad for the girl in Modern Family because people were really critical of her, her body and her wardrobe. Sometimes we have to give young girls the space to find themselves.
Agreed. A lot of times the emphasis put on these girls needing to be modest leads to trauma rather than protection, because men and women both think that ideal gives them the right to be abusive and misogynistic.
Ariel Winter (the girl from modern family you mentioned) seems to have turned out fine, especially considering the hand she was dealt. Her good behavior never actually changed, just the way she dressed. That’s one of the reasons why I LOVE how unproblematic she’s been. She hasn’t given the slut-shamers and victim-blamers any asshole behavior to use as a shield. That’s important, because people really will use anything to not treat females equally in that area.
I love Josh Horowitz — he seems like such a sweet guy and really does conduct such personable interviews.
Though she’s still very young (I can’t help but think of that line from The Little Mermaid — “I’m sixteen years old, I’m not a child anymore!”), I do understand where she’s coming from. It always seems to be a struggle for child stars, particularly girls, to transition into being a young adults in the public eye. There’s so much scrutiny whether they’re mature and responsible or out of control partying. They can’t win. So far, I’d say Millie is doing a pretty good job navigating things, though, which is impressive given her stage parents.
I still don’t think Millie’s photoshoots or clothing are anything scandalous or outside the norm for her age and the century she was born in. It seems like any time a girl under 18 wants to dress in something more feminine than and less modest than jeans and a cardigan, or jeans and a t-shirt, it gets the ‘hypersexual’ label and the conversation gets made about predators. Plus, she just looks older than she is, so there will be more scrutiny. People even freak out about her wearing eyeshadow while having her hair down in waves.
Happy for her to become an adult and become independent from her crazy stage parents.
Usually I can see this but I don’t think her perception is actually the reality here. MBB has been living and presenting much older than she is for years now to the point where I didn’t realize she was still only 17.
I also think most of her fans are adult creepers from Stranger Things who are doing their predatory creeper count down thing.
I think most of what we hear from MBB’s mouth is a direct result of what her parents have been feeding her to keep her dependent and working so they can keep living off of her.
In a world where we like to put adult clothing on girls as soon as possible it strikes me as weird for a 17 year old to claim anyone has a problem with her wearing heels. We put 14 year old actresses/models in them all the time and portray them in grown situations to sell shit all of the time
Said every teenager ever.
Pretty much every child star has said this exact thing – and I always want to sigh and hug them. I don’t want to protect MBB from growing up. I want to protect her from Hollywood.
I know it’s hard to lie about your age in this day and age, but this woman has never seemed like her purported age to me. I think her stage parents lied about her age during stranger things and now she’s stuck with it. It’s upsetting to be treated like you’re 17 when you’re really 25.
Lol yeah nah, she was a tiny little girl in S01 of Stranger Things.