I feel so bad sometimes when they're like, “Let’s go to the movies,” and I'm like, “It's Saturday, and it's 7:30pm and there's so many people at the movies right now.” Like going to my favorite restaurant, it can sometimes get hard. I just can't go to the mall. But they're so supportive and they understand.
How do you make yourself unrecognizable if you want to go to a movie?
Basically, you can't. Like, I've tried everything. My hair really gives it away, too. But I'll put it all up in a baseball cap and pull it down low and I try not to wear like sunglasses because if you wear sunglasses, if you see someone who walks into the room with sunglasses, aren't you going to look at them and think, “Who's hiding under there?” So why would you do that?
Can you talk about working with Jennifer Coolidge, who plays your larger-than-life stepmom in this movie?
I think that she's larger than life all of the time. She's so funny and I had a really hard time working with her actually because I couldn't keep a straight face. Everything that she did in this movie wasn't written. She is so creative and such an amazing actress. I was like, “How do you come up with these choices?” I love watching her. She's great.
What about working with Chad Michael Murray?
Chad was great. He's very charming and very nice and a great actor. We've actually remained friends since the movie. He's in Australia right now working on another movie, but he's a great person.
You started performing so young. How did you ever get the idea you wanted to do this?
Well, I think that I did my first commercial when I was about six years old. And I didn't really know if I wanted to do it yet. I have an older sister named Haley and she wanted to be an actress. So I wanted to be an actress. It's really funny the way that some people don't give kids enough credit for like really being driven, and really wanting to do things so badly. When I was six and I filmed that commercial, I just thought that it was fun and then I was kind of like, “Ah, whatever.” I went back to school for a little while and then when I was 10, I met this girl who was our neighbor and she was like, “You could get real movies and stuff like that.” I was like, “What?” Then I just begged my parents to come out here and do it. Then you just get this feeling of wanting to accomplish something, and auditioning and stuff like that. My parents just really supported it and my mom worked her butt off and sacrificed so much and we made it happen.
How often do you get to see your dad?
Oh, I get to see him every three weeks. He'll come out to visit and he's going to come on tour a little bit this summer, but he has his job there. And we go back for all the main holidays. We keep a good, tight knit family even though it's kind of long distance.
How has your life and success been like a Cinderella story?
My life really doesn't relate to the movie too much. I never really struggled at home with a bad family life or nothing too traumatic like that.
But are there similarities?
Definitely, for sure. I'm trying to think of a good answer to that. Definitely before I got my TV show, it was such a struggle. It was going on hundreds and hundreds of auditions and maybe not getting any callbacks. My mom prepared us really well for handling rejection and not taking it too seriously and stuff. But I feel very lucky and I feel very blessed.
When you were in school, did you have a terribly embarrassing moment like Sam does in this movie?
No. I stopped going to school in the middle of fourth grade. Everyone grows up with the peer pressure, and kids being mean to each other in school. I think that's such a horrible thing, but I never really dealt with it in a high school way.
Were you homeschooled?
I had a tutor for four years.
Can you talk about your new single with your sister?
I wanted to do something with my sister and we had a whole list of songs that we could do. Our favorite movie is “Romy & Michelle’s High School Reunion” and that was in that movie. So we were so excited about that. “Oh my God, we can do this song!” So we did it and it's also such a good message, talking about jealousy and how people are very negative and you can rise above it and stuff. We had so much fun shooting the video together, too.
Will you and your sister sing on stage together?
She'll be doing songs to open the show and then I'll do my show, which is an hour and ten minutes. Then we'll come out and do the last song together.
Do you have other movie projects in the works?
Yes. Let’s see: “Raise Your Voice” comes out and then “The Perfect Man” comes out and then the tour. Then there's just a couple of other things going on. “The Perfect Man” is with Heather Locklear.
Would you ever go back to “Lizzie McGuire?”
No.
