Zendaya on Acting With Tom Holland: “It’s Actually Strangely Comfortable”

Zendaya’s trip to Paris Fashion Week was so quick it felt like a dream. “I don’t think I was there long enough to get jet lag,” she tells Vanity Fair. But still, Zendaya made quite the impression sitting front row at the Louis Vuitton show, setting the internet ablaze with her bubble skirt and structured blazer—although she’d be the last to know it. “I kind of stay away from it,” she says of the online fashion discourse. “I get things through secondhand information. My mom will be like, ‘Oh my God, I loved your outfit.’ I was like, ‘Oh, you saw it?’ And she’d be like, ‘Yeah, girl. What?’” Filling in Zendaya is a trait that runs in the family. “My grandma notoriously knows my schedule better than I do, because she follows everything about me online,” she says. “I’ll call her and she’ll be like, ‘Well, you actually can’t come to this thing because you’re shooting this on then.’ I’m like, ‘How do you know that?’”

Grandma certainly had her hands full keeping up with Zendaya this year. Long after establishing herself as a TV darling and taking home two leading-actress Emmys for her role as Rue in Euphoria, Zendaya proved she’s a bona fide movie star. In March, she reprised her role as Chani, the rebellious love interest to Timothée Chalamet’s messianic Paul for part two of Denis Villeneuve’s Oscar-winning sci-fi franchise, Dune. Just two months later, she served, both physically and metaphorically, in Luca Guadagnino’s Challengers. That movie was a grand slam—the uncommon critical and commercial success that exceeded expectations at the box office (to date, it’s made almost $100 million worldwide on a $55 million budget). As teen tennis star turned messy professional coach Tashi Duncan, Zendaya commanded both the screen and her sparring partners, Art Donaldson (Mike Faist) and Patrick Zweig (Josh O’Connor), as the focal point of the summer’s hottest love triangle.

“What I’ve been really lucky with is working with great filmmakers and great collaborators, people who really support your ideas, and help guide you as well in the process,” she says. We’re thrilled to have Zendaya as part of our 2025 Hollywood Issue. Here’s more from her conversation with VF.

Vanity Fair: You’re a fashion icon. You take gigantic swings. Do you ever feel any anxiety about your outfits?

Zendaya: Sometimes, for sure. I also think that fashion, in many ways, is a tool for me. I consider myself a shyer person, which I guess you wouldn’t quite realize from the crazy, sometimes ridiculous things that I wear. But it’s my armor. I can fall into these characters. Law [Roach] and I like to create these other people. Sometimes we name them—no, I’m kidding…well, sometimes we do. [Laughs.] We give them little backstories. But it’s true, it does support to create this little persona every time you come out. I just embody this girl—whoever this woman is tonight. It makes the whole process easier because it’s not yourself; it’s a version of yourself. It feels less like “What am I doing?,” and more, “This is really cool and fun.” It’s almost like a little acting exercise.

I have to say this before we go on: We have the same birthday, September 1.

September 1, let’s go! Great day.

Do you have any Virgo traits?

Very much so. I deeply relate. Do you?

Oh yeah. Wanting to be in control.

Oh my God, yeah. But I’m learning how to deal with that. I think why I enjoy my job so much is because there’s a certain level of release of control you can have when you’re playing someone that’s not yourself. You can be like, “Actually, I wouldn’t make this decision. I wouldn’t make this choice, so whatever.” I can get lost in somebody else’s decisions and choices and not be so critical of myself because it’s not me.