HOLLYWOOD, Calif. — Blake Lively admits her acting career is still a work in progress despite growing up in a showbiz family.
"I never really thought about acting as a child," the 23-year-old Gossip Girl star reveals reveals during a chat with Ben Affleck in September's Interview magazine. "It wasn't like, 'This is the career that I want to pursue.' So when I first started acting, I was more concerned with just being on a set and all of the woes of that, and I didn't really know it or understand it as a craft yet."
Lively's first acting gig came at age 16 when she landed a role in The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants. Looking back, she says the experience pushed her to work harder at her craft.
"When I saw my first movie, I was fine, but I thought, 'Oh, my heavens. It's not about just standing there on my mark and saying these lines. I need to actually act," she shares. "It was great to have my first opportunity be such a big role, but also not great because all of the mistakes I made – the entire learning process was on the big screen for everyone to see. That's been something, movie by movie, that I've been able to grow and learn from – that I always need to work harder to be better because it's still a new craft for me."
In fact, Lively credits acting for bringing her out of her shell.
"I'm actually a very shy person – that's a big secret, so don't tell," she tells Affleck. "Being in those classes pushed me to break out of that a little bit. It's like nature versus nurture: I'm naturally very shy, but I was brought up in a way where I had to get up and get out of that.
Affleck directed and stars with Lively in The Town, an upcoming thriller that required them to shoot a sex scene on the very first day of filming. He says his costar was "very poised and comfortable about it."
"Well, I have a big family and no one ever treated me like a child," replies Lively. "They always treated me like an adult, like an equal. But with acting, I think half of it is just acting confident. We stand on these red carpets and pose in these dresses, but we're all only so confident. It doesn't mean we think we're great looking or anything. It's all a façade. But the sex scene was really awkward. It was my first day, so thank you for that.
Also see: Blake Lively Pictures
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