Ella Lee aka young Hannah Kahnwald, the rising star from Netflix's Dark gets candid about pursuing an acting career at 14
Ella Lee may just be 14 years old, but she's got a world of opportunities at her feet. While she's juggling Chemistry, History, and Art and isn't caught up with piano and ukulele lessons, she's winning hearts all over the world. You'd recognize this sweet face from the hit Netflix series Dark, where she plays the younger version of Hannah Kahnwald, a widow who has a bitter life and a closet full of secrets.
But as her character comes off, she's still a very normal teenager - she loves spending time with her family, she says, and as would be the case with anyone who's juggling school and a career at such a tender age, she has her difficulties."I still go to school. Every time I shoot a film, I have to take days off. If I miss more than only a few days the production will organize a teacher and a coach for me in order not to miss out on school stuff. I try not to get too stressed about this, but sometimes it is challenging to master everything."
Her love for acting, however, is strong and quite deep-rooted in the family. "I always loved to jump into different roles. Also, a lot of our family’s friends are actors. So it came naturally to me to love the idea of acting."
She cites actress Claudia Neidig as one of her inspirations, the other? Her outlook on life and the fact that she doesn't believe it's a competition. Zen-like state anyone? "My personal inspiration for acting comes from watching people in the everyday life and trying to understand what they feel when they do things."
"Competition does not really play a role for me in my acting career. It is not like in sports where one tries to outdo the other. When it comes to getting a role, it comes down to being the person who fits the character of the role the best."
She also adds, "A good actor is always a well-educated person. You can't play complex characters without some real understanding of the world." Truly, Ella.
She sounds wise for her years, doesn't she? Unlike any other 14-year-old in the world today, she says she finds social media draining. "I believe it gets more important every day because younger people use it so much. The network connects everything and everybody but it also drains a lot of energy and takes a lot of time."
Her gig with Netflix, however, isn't her first time in front of the camera. She's acted in a film called Hanni and Nanni in 2016, but Dark was definitely her breakthrough into stardom and she confesses that she had to go "through a lot of castings and work hard for it." It is difficult for even grown actors to play a dark and twisted character on camera, but Ella seems to enjoy the role. "Hannah is a very complex person with a lot of darkness and twists. I am so curious to see how her character will develop in the next season," she tells us. So are we!