Joey King Shares Her Upcoming Projects and Dream Role Following ‘The Kissing Booth’
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“Hold on,” can just barely be heard through muffled noise, “I have my dog in one hand and coffee in the other and I am not quite sure where to put the phone!” From the moment she started talking, it was obvious that Joey King’s goofy personality is not just reserved for the screen. King burst into the acting world at ten years old, starring in Ramona and Beezus alongside Selena Gomez, and hasn’t lost any steam since. She has continued her acting career and become one of the most sought after young actresses in Hollywood. In her most recent roles in The Kissing Booth and Slenderman, King has wowed audiences and proved herself to be a talent to be reckoned with. Her success, however, is just one aspect of what makes Joey King such an incredible young person. We got the chance to talk with King as she told us with her infectious laugh and quick wit about her love of acting, life in the film industry, her fans, disappointments, and what her future has in store.
“I’ve been honestly having the time of my life.”
For King, what she wanted to do with her life was never really a question. Her two older sisters had already caught the acting bug and she decided to follow suit. “I wanted to be exactly like my big sisters,” King says. “It started out more like a fun, bonding sister experience.” But for King, it became so much more than that. She started auditioning for commercials and TV work at just four years old, and by the time she turned eight she knew that acting was the only thing she wanted to do. She remembers thinking, “Oh man, this is the funnest thing in the whole world. I’m only eight years old but what else would I ever want to do with my life?” Lucky for her, she hasn’t had to figure that out.
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Although King’s love of acting came easily, understanding show business didn’t necessarily come as quickly. King didn’t remember her first audition, but she certainly couldn’t forget her second. “It was for a fruit cup type of thing, and they were like, ‘Okay, we’re going to give her one to eat and see if she likes it.’ Then I started eating this thing and it was so freaking good. They asked if I could look at the camera and I was like, ‘No.’ And they asked why not and I told them, ‘Because I’m eating,’” she says, laughing at herself. “I didn’t get the role. No surprise there.”
While fruit cup advertisements were not for Joey King, that did not stop her from continuing her acting career, growing into a guest starring role on her favorite show as a kid, The Suite Life of Zack and Cody, and later landing her first big role in Ramona and Beezus. “Everything was so much fun and just amazing,” King says of her early days in acting, “and honestly I still have the same feelings about everything as when I was a little kid.” Now that King has some solid material under her belt, she gets to be a bit more choosy about the kinds of projects she takes on. “When I read a script, I really look for something that’s unique in a character, something that I haven’t done before, something that makes me excited.” King found that something in her most recent role playing the character of “Elle” in Netflix’s The Kissing Booth. “I knew there was something super special about it,” she continues. “Something about it made me feel so happy when I was reading it, and I was just incredibly drawn to it. I remember telling my agent and my manager, ‘This is going to be amazing,’ and I’m so happy I felt that way because it really turned out to be something so special.”
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No one anticipated the kind of success The Kissing Booth had but King had no doubts. The movie became one of Netflix’s most watched, and more so most re-watched, movies.of all time. King’s character, Elle, is a quirky, awkward teenage girl and is totally relatable. Although the character was a huge draw to the movie itself, King believes the success of the movie can be attributed to the chemistry between herself and her costars, Jacob Elordi and Joel Courtney. “We were so, so close. We spent every waking moment together. I think our chemistry really showed onscreen and that really helped. The fans responded to all of our relationships with each other and that life.”
The relatability of the characters in The Kissing Booth has been one of the biggest draws of the movie and is likewise one of the biggest draws to Joey King herself, as an actress and as a person. “This is the first kind of thing I’ve done that is targeted at my age group,” King shares. “It just feels really good to get on a personal level with people who are my age.” That closeness, however, is not limited to the characters she plays. Over the past few months, King’s Instagram followers have skyrocketed to over seven million and her fans admire her for her authenticity at all times.
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“They just love the way that I am super myself,” King notes. “It feels so good because I feel like I’m getting through to people who are my age who need to see that you can just be yourself.” King is hugely admired by her fans, many of whom look to her as a role model. “There’s no greater compliment than having someone tell you that,” King says of her fans’ reactions to her. Though this may seem like a scary role to play for some, King takes it in stride and embraces the impact she has had on the lives of those who follow her. “I feel really lucky that people feel that way about me. I do a lot, and I’m very motivated, and I have a lot of drive, but I’m a simple gal. It makes me feel good that people admire that.”
One of the hardest things for a Hollywood starlet in the age of social media is finding the balance between what to share and what to keep to yourself. For King, that is something that she does her best not to think too far into. “I just want to make sure I’m being my most authentic self. Sometimes I think maybe I shouldn’t post that, maybe I should just keep that to myself. It’s been an internal battle, but I try not to think about it too much because I want to be as level-headed as possible. I don’t want to overthink it.”
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“I just want to make sure I’m being my most authentic self.”
In the entertainment world, comments, negative feedback, and rejection all come as a part of the package. King tries to maintain the same level-headedness when it comes to these things as she does with her social media. “It’s really, really easy to just let the type of rejection you go through make you want to just stop and give up,” she shares. “I’ve received feedback telling me I’m not pretty enough, and you know, that stuff really hurts. Stuff like that can make you feel like ‘oh my god I can’t do this anymore,’ but looking past that and looking at yourself and trying to remain confident in your abilities and knowing that if you work hard enough and it’s something that you love enough, things will work out.”
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Whoever gave her that feedback is surely kicking themselves now because for King, things couldn’t be working out any better. Following the success of The Kissing Booth, King was seen in Slenderman, which hit theaters in August, and The Lie, which recently premiered at the Toronto Film Festival. She can next be seen in Summer ‘03, which is set to hit theaters in late September. To add to the busy year, King is about to start filming Hulu’s The Act opposite Patricia Arquette. With all of these projects, King has really gotten the opportunity to flex her acting muscles and put herself into many different roles. “I’m just so happy that everything that I’ve been doing lately has been so versatile,” King says. “There’s no greater joy for me than to mix it up, and I’ve really gotten to mix it up in the past year and a half, two years. I’ve been honestly having the time of my life.”
STORY GINA DECICCO
PHOTOS RAUL ROMO
MAKEUP ALLAN AVENDANO
HAIR AVIVA PEREA
STYLIST KATIE QIAN
CREATIVE DIRECTION ANNA ZHANG