Hayden Panettiere is reflecting on the dark side of growing up in Hollywood.
The 36-year-old “Nashville” native spoke candidly about her “brutal” experience as a child actress during a panel discussion for her new memoir, “This Is Me: A Reckoning,” on Tuesday night in West Hollywood, California.
“For the first time, I had an identity crisis,” Panettile said. “When I was 12 years old, I remember exactly where I was, standing in my bedroom.”
The Golden Globe nominee began appearing in commercials as a toddler before appearing in soap operas One Life to Live in 1994 and Guiding Light in 1996, but explained that much of her childhood was spent “playing characters” or sitting in audition rooms.
“It’s the cruellest experience. It’s like sitting in a cold, cold room and only the people in this line are judging you,” she said.
Ms. Panettile recalled how things changed during the making of “Guiding Light” after producers realized she could cry on command.
“I’ll never forget,” she said. “When they realized that, I couldn’t stop crying.”
“Through life experiences and images, you have to go to a place that is very dark and ugly where you were brought to,” she continued. “And you sit there, and then you get praise and love for it. You think, ‘Oh my God, you can get love by feeling pain.'”
Panettiere admitted, “I didn’t check myself. I’m a perfectionist. In the same way, I’ve been groomed. I’m very combative. Because I’ve been groomed from a very young age, so I can’t ask questions.”
“Someone says, ‘You stand on the mark and say your lines correctly. Throw yourself into a building in the middle of the night in the pouring rain,’ over and over again. These crazy stunts. You’re like, ‘Cool, yeah, sure. No problem, no problem.'” Again and again and again and again and again and again and again and again, I was at an age where I was very emotional and upset all the time, so I was trying to figure things out. ”
The “Heroes” alum said she knew from an early age that her emotional burden would eventually “appear on the side” as an adult.
“I’m playing all these characters and they feel real and they’re a part of me. But who am I outside of that?” she recalled wondering at the time. “What is my identity?”
The panel’s moderator, “True Detective” actress Alicia Oxe, later asked Panettiere if she ever learned how to be emotionally resilient after being constantly praised for her quick access to vulnerability as a child actor.
“Well, obviously it wasn’t. It wasn’t good. It wasn’t healthy,” Panettiere replied.
The actress said one of the most difficult realities of working in television at a young age was spending years of her life working on projects she barely understood.
“When you sign on to a project, you’re signing on for six years of your life based on one script,” she said. “So you don’t really know what you want to do.”
“I didn’t realize how much it affected me until I was so angry and ugly and upset. And then when I got home, I couldn’t get out of there, like the corner of my bed, like the bed became my safe place.”
In recent years, Panettiere has spoken candidly about her struggles with addiction, postpartum depression, and growing up in the spotlight as a child actress. Her new memoir, This Is Me: A Reckoning, published May 19, documents many of these experiences in greater detail.
