Millie Bobby Brown is ready to say goodbye to Stranger Things.
The British actress gave a wide-ranging interview to Glamour magazine for their Global Women of the Year issue in which she mused on the ending of her hit Netflix series and growing up in the spotlight. The final season of the Duffer Brothers’ sci-fi sensation is set to resume filming as soon as the SAG-AFTRA strike ends and while Brown will miss working with her co-stars, she said she’s more than ready to leave the 80s behind.
“When you’re ready, you’re like, “All right, let’s do this. Let’s tackle this last senior year. Let’s get out of here,’” Brown said. “Stranger Things takes up a lot of time to film and it’s preventing me from creating stories that I’m passionate about. So I’m ready to say, ‘Thank you, and goodbye.’”
According to Brown, the success of Stranger Things, and her breakout performance as Eleven, have afforded her more opportunities and resources to become a better actor. She’s formed her own production company, starring in the Enola Holmes series for Netflix, and taken on blockbuster roles in movies like Godzilla: King of Monsters. Her next project is a post-apocalyptic action film directed by the Russos and starring Chris Pratt. Of the movie, Brown said, “To be able to go toe-to-toe with Chris Pratt! It’s a very exciting opportunity that I never thought I’d be able to have, to be able to be treated the same as him and to be looked at and respected the same as him on the set by the production, by the studio.”
Brown, now 19 and engaged to Jake Bongiovi, admitted it took a long time for her to feel comfortable in the spotlight post-Stranger Things, sharing that the scrutiny she faced as a child actor colored how she viewed herself and what she could contribute. She remembered being criticized for talking over her co-stars during interviews at 13 years old and being sexualized by the media as a teenager, telling the mag her experiences have galvanized her to speak up for other young girls in the business.
“You cannot speak on children that are underage,” Brown said. “I mean, our brains physically have not grown yet. To diminish and practically stunt someone’s growth mentally, strip them down, tell them, ‘Hey, listen, you don’t look that great. Why are you wearing that? How dare you think you can wear that? How dare you say that?’”
(Via Glamour)