Sofia Carson had just come back to earth.
On a recent March morning, the actress-singer awoke at 3 to take a sunrise hot-air balloon ride over the rolling hills of Temecula, Calif. The adventure had been arranged by Netflix as a promotional stunt for the streamer’s new film, “The Life List,” in which Carson stars as a languishing teacher who must complete her childhood bucket list before she can receive the inheritance left to her by her mother (played by Connie Britton).
Now back at her hotel, Carson delicately adjusted her black turtleneck as she settled in front of her laptop for our video interview.
“It was really special,” she said of the skyward voyage. “I wasn’t scared at all.”
In fact, Carson seems to belong in another realm entirely.
Unlike many millennial stars, the 31-year-old doesn’t share much about her private life in interviews or get too candid with her nearly 20 million Instagram followers. Her red carpet looks are a parade of opulent gowns and elbow-length gloves. She cites Audrey Hepburn as her “end-all be-all inspiration.” Even her given name, Sofia Lauren — like the actress Sophia Loren — is partly a tribute to Old Hollywood royalty.
It’s an elegant persona for an actress who not long ago was known primarily for her role as Evie, the blue-haired teenage daughter of the Evil Queen in Disney Channel’s “Descendants” TV movies. That wildly popular musical franchise spawned lunchboxes, dolls, throw pillows and endless merchandise featuring Carson’s likeness.
But Carson, whose parents immigrated from Colombia and raised her in Miami, was already an adult when she became a household name to tweens.
“Facing the grandness of all that was coming my way, even though it was, of course, overwhelming, was much easier than if I was a child,” she said.
By the time the third “Descendants” film was released in 2019, Carson, who was then 26, said she decided to be “very intentional” about choosing roles that would help her transition from Disney scripts to young-adult material and then, eventually, to adult parts.
She found a willing partner in Netflix. Over the past five years, Carson has signed on to six Netflix films, beginning with the 2020 dance dramedy “Feel the Beat.”
Notably, she starred as Cassie Salazar, the musician who married a soldier (Nicholas Galitzine) to get health insurance in the 2022 film “Purple Hearts,” a project for which Carson also served as an executive producer and songwriter. And more recently, she played Nora Parisi, the imperiled girlfriend of a T.S.A. agent (Taron Egerton) in the 2024 holiday thriller “Carry-On” — currently Netflix’s second most popular film of all time, according to data released by the streamer. Later this year, she’ll also star in the romance “My Oxford Year.”
“I’m 10 years into my career,” Carson said, “yet, it still feels, and I say this with my heart, that it’s just the beginning.”
Here are edited excerpts from our conversation.
Did you have your own “life list” growing up?
I did. Some of the things I’ve already checked off: My dream was to sing with Andrea Bocelli, and I had the honor of performing with the maestro many times and releasing two songs with him. Being a UNICEF ambassador was on my list, and my work with them is now the most important part of everything I do. Broadway was on there, and that’s something I still would like to do.
What was it like being a college student and a Disney Channel star at the same time?
I’ve always been a proud nerd, and I majored in communications and minored in international relations at U.C.L.A. But I had a very different college experience than most, even from the very beginning, because I would Zipcar to auditions between classes, and then I would write songs on my keyboard with my headphones in so I wouldn’t wake my roommate at night.
When I was auditioning for “Descendants,” it was, I think, my second year of college. It was myself, Zendaya and Bella Thorne who were up for Evie. I thought, never in a million years am I going to get it. I had just finished final exams when I got a call from my agent saying that I got the part.
You released a solo album in 2022 and have collaborated with artists ranging from Bocelli to Jimin. Meanwhile, your former co-stars Sabrina Carpenter and Dove Cameron have pivoted away from acting to focus on their pop star careers. Is that a path you could see for yourself?
It’s not. That’s not what feels like me. I find such joy and fulfillment from storytelling through film. And I also am finding a lot of joy in doing a music career my way.
There have been many men who never quite understood my music choices, to take a lane that wasn’t the pop star lane, that wasn’t the sexy lane. I would be offered songs that, to me, were demeaning toward women, that were derogatory, that were too sexual. Songs that I wasn’t comfortable singing. I was told by one of the most powerful executives in the industry that if I didn’t wear less clothing, sing more about sex or curse more, I would never make it.
Not taking the pop star route has felt natural to me.
“Purple Hearts” faced backlash from some viewers [for its perceived anti-Arab and pro-military slant]. You defended the film at the time. How do you look back on that controversy now?
This movie came out in a time — and we still are in a time — where the world is so divided. Our goal was to show the beauty in being able to lead with love and to see our differences as strengths. I still stand by what we did, and I almost felt that sometimes people didn’t quite get the message. But it’s always important to listen and to learn.
What have your airport experiences been like since “Carry-On”? Are you on high alert?
It’s funny. My sister kept seeing TikToks of people filming luggage belts, and whenever they would see a red ribbon on a suitcase, they were like, “Oh, my God, get me out of here!” My experience has been that I now get recognized a little bit more by T.S.A., and, since “Carry-On” is an action movie, I also get recognized by a lot of dudes, which is awesome.
Where do you ideally see your career going from here?
I long to emulate the careers of Barbra Streisand and Cher — women who redefined what it was to be a woman in this industry — to be a director, a producer, an executive, a musician, a songwriter. I’d love to work with Greta Gerwig, Baz Luhrmann, Christopher Nolan, Sofia Coppola. I’d love to do theater, and I want to keep making movies and music that make me happy.
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