*Zoë Kravitz may be from a famous family of rock icon and teen TV legend status, but at 26, that doesn’t mean she’s been living a charmed life. At least it doesn’t sound that way from the revelations in her candid interview with Complex magazine.
The actress talks about her insecurities; overcoming two serious eating disorders, what her super cool parents Lenny Kravitz and Lisa Bonet are really like and her relationship with Canadian hip-hop star, Drake.
In the April/May cover of Complex, Kravitz talks about her battle with anorexia and bulimia during her teen years and what it was like growing up with such widely idolized parents.
“I had a really hard time when I was 16, 17, 18. I started with the eating disorder in high school….” She tells Complex, trailing off at this, she then puts her hand to the side of her face, rubbing her right ear, and then dials back to the beginning of that thought: “Just [a hard time] loving myself.”
She was in high school when she became anorexic and bulimic—“awful diseases” she’d battle to various degrees until the last two or so years. For a second she seems to acknowledge the role her pedigree played in it, saying, “I think it was part of being a woman, and being surrounded by [fame],” but the backtracks: “I don’t think it was about the fame, but I think it was definitely about being around that world, seeing that world. I felt pressured.”
Kravitz says her mom, Lisa Bonet, was worried while she shot The Road Within and thought her daughter might slip into old habits because she played a young woman battling anorexia.
“It was f****d up, man,” she sighs. “You could see my rib cage. I was just trying to lose more weight for the film but I couldn’t see: You’re there. Stop. It was scary.” It wasn’t until after filming wrapped that she realized just how sick she was. She didn’t get her period regularly because she was too malnourished. Her immune system shut down, and her thyroid was thrown off.
During her recovery after filming, Zoë couldn’t even accept praise from her friends who were happy she was gaining weight. “I was like, ‘I don’t want to gain weight,’ as opposed to being like, ‘Good, I’m a normal human being.
“My mother’s a…,” she says, hesitating, “…beautiful woman, and I think, in some way, I felt intimidated by that sometimes.” Also: “My dad dated a lot of supermodels,” she laughs.
“Everyone sees themselves in some weird, obscure way.” She says her mom also struggles with her own insecurities. “People meet her and don’t know what to do with themselves, but”—and here, she takes care to emphasize with conviction—“she doesn’t know how f*****g cool she is. Or what she means to the rest of the world.”
Check out the entire Zoë Kravitz in the latest issue of Complex.
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