Patrick Harbron/Disney
Selena Gomez has been acting since she was a child and is one of the most recognizable stars to break out of Disney Channel into mainstream success — but she still has to fight to get into audition rooms and prove herself.
"If they think I'm too young for a part, or whatever the case may be, we use a tactic where we don't tell them it's me auditioning so that they just have to accept me auditioning," Gomez said in a new interview with The Hollywood Reporter, released Wednesday.
Gomez said that sometimes when casting directors learn that she wants to audition, they tell her that she's not fit for the project before she's even read for the part. In other instances, she's told that they're interested in hiring a lesser-known actor — but end up casting someone notable.
"But I'm not angry, it's the position I have and it's OK," Gomez said. "It just means I'm going to continue to do things that are hopefully compelling and different."
Gomez said this has been "the biggest challenge that I've faced as an actor," but she's found other workarounds for getting into auditions.
"I'll sometimes send in a tape when they don't know it's me, or if it's in person, my managers will just say, 'Oh, we have a client that'll have a read," she said. "And most of the time, they'll go, 'OK."
The actor said this trick worked for the 2016 movie "The Fundamentals of Caring," which starred Paul Rudd. Gomez said that she thought she lost out on the role immediately upon walking into the audition, but asked if she could read the lines anyway. Gomez ended up landing the role of Dot, a hitchhiker.
"You kind of have to do the dance," she said.
Annette Brown/Netflix
Gomez got her start in acting on "Barney & Friends" before her breakout role as a teen wizard-in-training named Alex Russo on Disney Channel's "Wizards of Waverly Place," which lasted for four seasons and included a 2009 TV movie.
She simultaneously began her music career while on the children's TV network. After "Wizards" ended, Gomez took on edgier roles in films like the A24 movie "Spring Breakers."
Gomez, now 32, said she's still typecast and perceived to be a fit only for certain kinds of roles that are in line with her past work, characters that are "more soft-spoken and the underdog."
"I love those movies, but I have goals of wanting to work with specific people, people on my dream board, and so whenever those opportunities arise, I'll put myself in that room, no matter what it takes," she told THR. "And I'll say, 'Let me show you that I can do it.'"
Patrick Harbron/Hulu
Recently, the actor earned an Emmy nomination for her performance as a true-crime podcast host and mystery solver on Hulu's "Only Murders in the Building." She also plays the wife of a cartel leader in the film "Emilia Pérez," which has been gaining awards season buzz.
"I've been very strategic and trying my hardest to pick projects that are going to be compelling and not necessarily what people would envision me doing," she said. "That's something I get a high off of."
