Zendaya Says She Doesn't Know If She Can Handle the Pressure of Fame

Zendaya doesn’t know if she can handle the pressures of being famous.

The actress spoke about dealing with fame at a recent screening event for Dune: Part Two in New York City. When someone in the audience asked about the state of celebrity fandom in pop culture, she got honest about her experiences. “I feel like, often, I am not cut out for that part of it,” she said, per Deadline . “I do love my job, I’m so grateful. I love doing the work, I love being on set, I do love moments like this — don’t get me wrong — but I am terrified of that part of it, often.”

Zendaya continued on, revealing that she was an introvert growing up. “I was a shy kid, always have been, and so this part isn’t natural —that is a huge reason why fashion became important to me because it became like armor to pretend to go out and do the job, she said.”

“I would like for a person and for people to see me as that first,” she explained. “I don’t necessarily know if I want or can hale all of that or want [that] — some people that’s part of it, they enjoy the power that comes from it, and I don’t know if that’s for me.”

Zendaya’s dealt with a lot of the problems of becoming famous over the years — most recently, because moviegoers were hyper fixated on her kissing scenes. During a press tour for Challengers, Zendaya had a discussion with an interviewer about why her kissing scenes are constantly overly hyped.

“I don’t know if it’s because they want it to be a viral thing; I don’t know. But I have noticed that, with me specifically, she explained after calling people’s obsession with her scenes “odd.” “I feel like other actors don’t… If you were with somebody else here, you probably wouldn’t be asked that question. But, yeah, it’s a part of my job, and it is a completely normal part of the job, I think, despite other people's perceptions of our job.”

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