One to watch: Ariana Greenblatt is Hollywood's otherworldly sweetheart

Ariana Greenblatt played a green-skinned humanoid from the fictional planet Zen-Whoberi (Avengers: Infinity War), a badass survivalist in a monstrous apocalypse ( Love and Monsters), and the key to a global catastrophe that robs humanity of its ability to sleep (Awake), and this month, she'll be featured as a young girl who finds herself stranded on Earth 65 million years ago, battling dangerous prehistoric creatures (65). With a resume filled with great sci-fi adventures, you could argue the actress is more at home in larger-than-life worlds than she is as the average teenager. At just 15, Greenblatt is a promising tour de force in Hollywood working with some of the biggest names in the industry, but she also enjoys crocheting, drinking boba and partaking in an extensive skincare routine.

65, the action movie that sees Greenblatt opposite Adam Driver, is just the first in an exciting series of projects in its pipeline. Later this summer, she'll star in Greta Gerwig's long-awaited Barbie, which she says is beyond anything you can imagine. She has also completed filming Borderlands, an adaptation of the popular video game franchise, in which she plays Tiny Tina alongside Cate Blanchett, Kevin Hart, Jamie Lee Curtis and Jack Black. Simply put, if you didn't have Greenblatt on your radar before, this is your sign to start paying attention.

Ahead, we chat with the rising actress about everything from working one-on-one with Driver to her industry heroes and TikTok's slugging trend.< /p>

First, what got you excited about the story of 65?

The most exciting thing for me was being able to work with Adam Driver. Just seeing it attached made me extremely excited, especially knowing that Sam Raimi was producing and the writers and director also wrote [A] Quiet Place, which I think is a very brilliant film. So everyone who was already involved, it was a really cool thing for me to be a part of.

The film is truly a one-on-one with Adam Driver. What was it like having her as a stage partner?

It's the first film I've done one-on-one for myself. I've never made a film where there were only two people on set each day. It was just the two of us and the crazy weather and the situations we were put in. It was a really cool dynamic to build with Adam. We talked about it a lot, especially in the beginning when we were watching movies for inspiration and going through scripts and scenes to figure out what dynamic we wanted to portray. We had a lot of fun showing the characters' personalities together and how we interact because we couldn't be more opposite as characters. An older guy and this young girl, they're not related in any way – finding those lines and those little personality moments, and then how we grow as people and end up really caring about each other. So it was nice to see that.

What are some of those inspiring movies you've watched together?

We watched Alien. It was the main thing. Literally genius! And then we watched True Grit with Hailee Steinfeld. It was the first time I watched the movie. It was in the middle of the pandemic, and it was winter, so my mom and I went to Walmart, I think, and we got all these really ugly Christmas sweaters, but they all had this T.rex above. We were really lucky. We were like, 'Okay, we're all going to watch this movie in this theater, and it's cold, and we haven't filmed anything yet.' It was a really cute idea, and we gave everyone little sweaters for Christmas. It's definitely something I remember when we watched those movies.

What stood out to you about your Koa character, and how did you relate to her?

When I first heard about Koa, I was immediately drawn to the challenge of playing her. She's incredibly complex and she goes through a lot in a very short time. And I think what appealed to me the most was seeing how we watch her deal with everything that's going on around her because she's got a lot to process, and she does a lot on her own and internally, and I wanted it to read [on screen]. I also just wanted to build this really quirky personality. She has those moments in the movie where she's really frustrated...