Hollywood Child Stars

Dakota Fanning Biography

Dakota Fanning had only been acting professionally for one year when she landed the role that would catapult her to stardom and forever change her life. In 2001, Dakota starred alongside Sean Penn as the young daughter of a mentally challenged man fighting to win custody of his only child. Critics and audiences alike were amazed by her onscreen talent and Dakota was awarded a surprise Screen Actor’s Guild nomination for best actress for her convincing portrayal. Amazingly, she is the youngest actress ever to be nominated for this award. This was to be the start of a very promising career that shows no sign of slowing down.

Her latest movie Hound Dog which takes place in the South in 1961, Dakota plays a precocious girl who overcomes the negative effects of abuse by singing and dancing like Elvis.

The Complete Dakota Fanning Bio
Hanna Dakota Fanning
Born: February 23, 1994.
Birthplace: Conyers, Georgia. Dakota’s family has since moved to LA in order to accommodate the acting careers of Dakota and Elle.
Family: Parents Steven and Joy Fanning and sister Elle.

Dakota Fanning has always been an expressive and talented young child. She fondly recalls acting out imaginative scenes with her younger sister Elle in their childhood home. In hopes of nurturing her talent, Dakota’s parents enrolled her at the nearby Playhouse acting school.

Almost immediately, Dakota demonstrated her incredible ability to emote and her acting teachers urged her parents to acquire an agent for her. The family was advised that the best way for Dakota to try her hand in the professional acting world was to spend 6 weeks in LA to see if she could land a job.

Sure enough, Dakota was successful, and beating out countless other girls, Dakota made her first foray into acting at the tender age of 5 in a Tide commercial. In that very same year, Dakota was cast alongside the musical legend Ray Charles in a commercial for the Georgia State lottery. A number of other small projects followed, but Dakota had her big break when she was cast as a young girl with Leukemia in the long-running medical drama ER. Proving her talents as an actress, Dakota soon landed roles in other television programs such as CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, Friends, The Practice, Spin City and Malcolm in the Middle. She also played the younger version of two very funny women in Ally McBeal and The Ellen Show.

The Dakota Fanning bio does not end here. Today, Dakota is one of the most respected child actors in Hollywood and she continues to amaze the critics with her outstanding performances. At such a young age, Dakota is already an industry pro and there is no doubt that she has a long and lucrative career ahead of her.

In 2006, Dakota Fanning was the youngest member to ever be included in the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. Regardless of the remarkable honor bestowed on her at such an early age, the beloved actress has remained out of the spotlight and out of trouble during her teen years. She has been able to pursue her acting career while continuing to remain a normal teenager at a public high school north of Los Angeles, where she is a cheerleader and an honor student. Dakota acts during school breaks and rarely misses classes to film movies.

Dakota’s film portrayals include a recurring role on the franchise series Twilight, where she plays Jane in the New Moon and Eclipse movies, which are the second and third movies of the Twilight series. She has also starred in the following movies: The Secret Life of Bees, Cutlass, Push, The Runaways, and Fragments: Winged Creatures.

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