The “Fifty Shades of Grey” actress says people took it the wrong way.

Dakota Johnson says she once failed an audition by being polite: ‘I was like: What?’

The "Fifty Shades of Grey" actress says people took it the wrong way.

By Raechal Shewfelt

Raechal Shewfelt

Raechal Shewfelt is a writer at **. She has been working at EW since 2024. Her work has previously appeared on Yahoo and in American *Journalism Review* and *The Shreveport Times*.

EW's editorial guidelines

March 30, 2026 8:46 p.m. ET

Leave a Comment

Dakota Johnson in January. Credit:

Swan Gallet/WWD via Getty

Is Dakota Johnson too friendly to be an actress? She thinks that's true in at least one case.

"I had an audition once, and it was a callback, and I went into the room, and I shook everyone's hand and introduced myself. Then I did the scene, and I left," Johnson told Hits Radio. "The feedback I got was that because I had gone and introduced myself and shook everyone's hand is that I was pompous. That I was schmoozing, and I was full of myself."

***Get your daily dose of entertainment news, celebrity updates, and what to watch with our ******EW Dispatch newsletter******.***

The *Fifty Shades of Grey* actress was perplexed.

"I was like: 'What?’ I didn't get the job because they said that I was being cocky," she recalled. "But I just had manners… It was pretty crazy."

The actress has since enjoyed much more positive developments in her career, including not just playing Anastasia Steele to Jamie Dornan's Christian Grey in *Fifty Shades of Grey*, but movies such as *Materialists*, *Splitsville*, and *How to Be Single*.

Dakota Johnson blasts Hollywood studios who 'keep remaking the same things'

How to watch the 'Fifty Shades of Grey' movies in order

Johnson has noted that she'd like to portray a psychopath and do an action movie in the future.

"I'm open to anything," she told reporters in July at the Karlovy Vary Film Festival in the Czech Republic, per *Variety*. "Certain things [just have] to align."

Dakota Johnson attends the Los Angeles premiere of 'Splitsville'.

Emma McIntyre/Getty

And that goes beyond acting. Johnson, the daughter of Oscar-nominated actress Melanie Griffith and Emmy-nominated actor Don Johnson, is also a producer through her TeaTime Pictures. Her producing credits also include *Am I Okay?* and *Daddio*.

"So much of why I wanted to start a production company and make my own movies is because I want more from this industry," Johnson told Variety. "I want more from my experience as an artist. I felt so thirsty for more conversation and more creativity and more collaboration. I found myself as an actor, a few times, showing up to the premiere of a movie to see it the first time and saying, 'Woah. That is not what I thought we were making.'"

She described that as "such a weird thing to do."

- Celebrities & Creators

- Entertainment Industry Roles

Original Article on Source

Source: “EW Actors”