Since Dakota Johnson first appeared as Anastasia Steele in the infamous, ultra-racy Fifty Shades of
Grey franchise, she's become a bonafide star. Fans may already know a little about her and
her career, but if you’re curious to learn more, this is what you never knew about Dakota Johnson.
These days, most sex scenes are carefully choreographed and overseen by a trained sex
coordinator. However, when the Fifty Shades of Grey series was filmed,
it seems that the actors had a lot of opportunities to give their own input.
As Jamie Dornan, who played Christian Grey, told Conan O'Brien on Conan,
Dakota Johnson actually had quite a few notes on his performance in the raunchier scenes.
"I think Dakota would be quicker to give me a note than the director."
Apparently, she had a lot of tips during filming when it came to how
Dornan was removing her underwear. As he explained,
he had been ripping off her underwear, but Johnson helped him to be a little sexier.
"There is a more delicate and sensual way to do it, which is,
which is, uh thumbs into the side and then, and then you sort of shimmy it down."
Wow, sounds like Johnson had some very detailed tips for Dornan on set.
We think it's fair to say that Fifty Shades of Grey wasn't exactly the most intellectual
movie of all time. Nevertheless, it turns out that Dakota Johnson was an avid reader
while on set. As the director of the movie’s two sequels, James Foley, explained to Vogue,
she had a habit of bringing a copy of The New York Times to set. Apparently, she'd pour over
it while getting her makeup done. By the sound of things, Johnson would get engrossed by the
stories she read, but she never let it distract her from her performance. Foley recalled:
"She would talk about the stuff happening in Crimea and then,
the minute I said 'Action,' do things with her character that I was never expecting,
but with total authority and authenticity."
It sounds like Johnson is a real professional on set who knows how
to turn it on when she needs to — no matter what she's just been reading.
Most of us can remember our first favorite band. For Dakota Johnson, her first big music obsession
was The Spice Girls. As she explained on The Late Late Show with James Corden,
"I listened to a lot of like Nirvana and Pearl Jam and the stuff that teenage boys in the '90s
listened to, but then I was like, 'I gotta stay in my lane,' so I just went full Spice Girls."
Johnson was so obsessed with the girl group that her dad took her and a friend to see
them in concert when she was young. She even got to go backstage to meet them and
get a picture with the group. Unfortunately, when she finally got the picture developed,
all of the Spice Girls' heads were cut off, so she doesn't even have proof of their meeting.
Like most people in the movie business, Dakota Johnson lives in the Los Angeles area.
Unsurprisingly, she has some pretty famous neighbors. You may not have realized, however,
that right next door to Johnson is the house of Jimmy Kimmel.
By the looks of things, the pair love being neighbors. In 2020, Kimmel even invited Johnson
for an "over the fence" interview because of the pandemic. In the hilarious conversation,
the two appeared to be great friends, joking about Kimmel's kids and Johnson's domestic habits.
And when Kimmel asked her if he's the best out of all her previous neighbors, she agreed with him.
In another interview with Kimmel, Johnson went into more detail about her other neighbors.
Apparently, while at a local party, Johnson, Kimmel, and the other neighbors were chatting
when Johnson accused them of towing her grandfather's truck. As Kimmel said,
"Well, first of all, It was very clear that, yes, they did tow your grandfather's truck."
Sounds like Johnson and Kimmel are great
neighbors to each other — unlike Johnson and her other neighbors.
As anyone who has seen Fifty Shades of Grey knows, Dakota Johnson is clearly a very brave actress.
However, while Johnson may not be afraid of filming some pretty intimate sex scenes,
she does get afraid when she has to sing on screen. On The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon,
Johnson explained that while filming Our Friend, she had to sing for one of her scenes. Johnson
went on to call the experience, quote, "so scary," explaining that she got a bit of stage fright.
In one scene, Johnson's character was on stage in a community theater production.
As she recalled, the song had already been recorded,
and she was being filmed while playing her pre-recorded song. Johnson told the host,
"I had a panic attack that manifested in all the ways that it does, that it can,
so, like, I just took off running ... I was running
around and then just started laughing hysterically ... then started crying."
Johnson was so scared that, as she put it, "extreme flight mode" kicked in.
Ever thought that Dakota Johnson looks a little familiar? Well, that may be because
she has some very famous relatives. Johnson's grandmother on her mother's side is Tippi Hedren,
whom you may remember as Melanie in the famous Alfred Hitchcock movie The Birds. In 2020,
Johnson told Graham Norton that she is still very much in touch with her grandmother, who is in her
90s — and she confirmed that her grandmother still lives with dozens of lions and tigers.
Johnson's mother is Melanie Griffith, whom you may remember from the film Working Girl,
and her father is Don Johnson, the actor known for Miami Vice.
Her stepfather is Antonio Banderas, best-known for Philadelphia and The
Mask of Zorro. As Vogue pointed out, with all of these famous relatives,
Johnson definitely comes from one of the most stylish, well-known family trees in Hollywood.
Dakota Johnson tries to be pretty private about her romantic life, but since 2017,
her relationship with Coldplay's Chris Martin has been public information.
The pair have been spotted in public together numerous times, and Johnson has even become
a part of Martin's family, hanging out with his ex-wife, Gwyneth Paltrow, and their kids.
Johnson's mother, Melanie Griffith, spoke publicly about the relationship, telling People in 2019,
"I love my daughter's boyfriend. I think they're an awesome couple."
Paltrow has also voiced her approval, telling Harper's Bazaar,
"I love her. I can see how it would seem weird because it's sort of unconventional."
In 2020, rumors spread online that the couple were engaged when Johnson was seen wearing a massive
ring on her finger. Then, in 2021, more rumors spread that the couple were even living together.
Whatever the truth may be, it sounds like these two are in it for the long haul.
One thing Dakota Johnson really loves is music. She explained to
Mindfood that her love of music began when she was young. As she put it,
"I grew up having kind of a vast knowledge of music and constantly having it affect me."
Being an actress and filmmaker, music is an essential element. Johnson told the outlet,
"When I see films and the music amplifies the story and you
understand more about a character because of a song that is playing, it's all one to me."
Because music and acting go hand-in-hand for Johnson,
she's constantly using music as part of her acting process. As she said on The Tonight
Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, she is always making playlists for her different characters. And,
in an interview with Glamour, Johnson revealed that her playlist for the film The High Note
was filled with Aretha Franklin songs to get her into the right headspace. Johnson said,
"I'm always listening to music when I'm working."
Every actor has to start somewhere, and even though Dakota Johnson comes
from a super famous family of actors, when she started out, it wasn't always
easy for her. In fact, as she explained in an interview with the Associated Press,
her first film audition was a bit of a trainwreck. As she recalled, her first
audition was for the role of "the girl who gets saved" in a superhero movie. Johnson said,
"I didn't get the part. I didn't get a lot of parts."
Apparently, according to Johnson, there was no way that the audition could have
gone well because of how it was set up. As she remembers, the audition took place in a small,
corporate office space, and she had to sit on a chair and act out being scared,
screaming "help." It's pretty easy to see how it would be tough to get into
character in an audition like that — no wonder it didn't go so well.
Anyone who has spent any time on the Internet knows that Dakota Johnson
isn't just an actress — she's also a meme queen. In 2019, Johnson appeared on The
Ellen DeGeneres Show for what ended up being one of the most awkward talk show interviews
ever. In the uncomfortable exchange, DeGeneres asked Johnson how her birthday party had been,
saying, quote, "How was the party, I wasn't invited?" Johnson retorted,
"Actually, no, that's not the truth, Ellen, you were invited."
What followed was a cringeworthy exchange in which Johnson continued to call out DeGeneres' lie.
The unforgettable moment quickly went viral,
with memes popping up all over social media of Johnson's truth-telling moment.
The meme continues to be going strong years later. As one user tweeted in 2020,
"Happy one year anniversary to 'actually, no, that's not the truth, Ellen' Nov. 27,
2019 a national holiday in my humble opinion."
Many fans even marked Johnson's interview as the beginning of the end for DeGeneres, whose show
will be ending after its 19th season. Whatever you believe, this was one undeniable cultural moment.
As if Dakota Johnson's infamous Ellen DeGeneres moment wasn't enough, in 2020,
the actress went viral yet again — this time for a hilarious moment in her Architectural Digest home
tour. In the video, which has over 20 million views, Johnson took viewers into her stunning
green kitchen, which included bowls of limes on the countertop. She looked at the limes and said,
"I love limes — I love them, they're great,
I love them so much, and I like to present them like this in my house."
As Mel Magazine reported, people online were obsessed with what seemed to be a bizarre
lime infatuation. However, the following year, Johnson appeared on The Tonight Show Starring
Jimmy Fallon and set the record straight about the limes. Her home had been staged
by the Architectural Digest team, and the limes were just part of it. Johnson said,
"I actually didn't even know that they were in there."
So, she made the joke about loving limes to poke fun at the set dressing; after all,
the bowls of limes were a little ridiculous. What makes it even funnier? She even admitted to being
allergic to limes. It just goes to show you can't believe everything you see online. That said,
some of Johnson's fans are a little upset with her for leading them to believe she was a lime lover.
The COVID-19 pandemic affected us all in different ways. For Dakota Johnson,
the lockdown set off some of her anxieties. In an interview with Marie Claire, the star spoke about
how 2020 had been tough and that she had found it hard to switch off. Johnson told the outlet,
"I'm constantly thinking about the state of the world right now. It
keeps me up at night, all night, every night."
She went on to explain that her brain is always racing to, quote, "crazy dark places"
and that she had been working on slowing down her thoughts and anxieties by seeking out therapy.
In fact, by the sound of things, therapy has become a crucial part of
Johnson's life since the pandemic. During an appearance on The Drew Barrymore Show,
Johnson revealed that she had been struggling with depression. The actress confessed,
"I'll probably be in therapy for the rest of my life."
For Johnson, therapy isn't just a coping mechanism,
but also a way for her to learn more about how her brain works. She said she even took
some online psychology courses to find out more. We love that she's a lifelong learner.
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