Shailene Woodley Reveals a 'Big Little Lies' Co-Star Convinced Her to Do the Show After Saying No

Shailene Woodley nearly didn’t star in Big Little Lies!

The 32-year-old actress initially turned it down, but one of her co-stars talked to her and convinced her to join the show, which she is now grateful for.

“I got a call, I’ll never forget it. It was November or October of 2015. I was really sick at the time and I was not at all exhausted by acting or the artistry and the craft of storytelling, but I was really exhausted by the act of Hollywood,” she told Vanity Fair. “And I got a call about Big Little Lies because Jean-Marc Vallée — our beautiful creator, director, who has since passed — had wanted me to play Jane. And I was desperate to work with him, I thought he was such an incredible artist and filmmaker.”

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However, she was “really dead-set on ‘finding myself.”

But, Shailene received a phone call from Laura Dern, who would become her co-star, that changed everything.

“I got a call from Laura the day before I left for India — or maybe I was actually already in India and I hadn’t turned my phone off yet. And she just said, ‘Listen, I know where you’re at in your life. I’ve been there before too. It’s a lot. This world is an illusion, but what isn’t an illusion is what you love to do,’” she recalled.

“‘And what I see in you, Shai, is your purpose — at least in this moment in your life — is to be a storyteller. And I think it’s a massive mistake for you to walk away from this opportunity that you really should lean into,’” she continued.

That call made her “leave India and come back to the United States” to do the show. “It forever changed my life,” she said.

“And so, in so many ways, I’m grateful for Laura, but that was a massive moment of courageous friendship to say, ‘I think that you’re making a mistake and I’m gonna be brave enough to tell you why, cause I really see you and I see something you can’t see in your own life right now.’”

As for season three?

“We have a text chain going and it’s constantly a check-in, every few weeks, ‘Hey, what’s the update?’ ‘It’s still happening,’” Shailene dished. “I keep being told that there’s going to be a season 3, but I haven’t read anything yet.”

Earlier this month, Reese Witherspoon shared that they were still waiting on Leanne Moriarty, who wrote the books and is writing the script, to turn something in.

If you missed it, Shailene is starring on the new Fall/Winter 2024-2025 cover of Only Natural Diamonds!