Julia Stiles is making it clear that Save the Last Dance did not give her a leg up on Dancing With the Stars.
“It did not prepare me for Dancing With the Stars,” the actress exclusively told Us of her role in the 2001 romance film after it was announced that she is one of the competitors on season 35 of DWTS on Wednesday, September 2.
Ezra Sosa, who is Stiles’ partner, jokingly asked, “It didn’t?”
Stiles reiterated that the movie, which was released more than two decades ago, wasn’t exactly a training ground for DWTS.
“First of all, I have not gone to a dance class. I stopped taking dance classes after that movie because I was so self conscious,” she explained. “I can see how tense I was in that movie.”
Stiles starred in Save the Last Dance as Sara, a ballet dancer whose dream is to go to Juilliard. However, Sara’s audition doesn’t go as planned and she learns her mom died while en route to the audition. Amid her grief, Sarah gives up ballet and moves in with her estranged father, Roy, played by Terry Kinney.
At her new school, Sara is invited to join the dance club called Stepps, where they perform hip hop. Sara’s passion for dance is reignited and she decides to give her Juilliard dreams another go but wants to add elements of hip hop into her audition.
Stiles added that she knows her dance performance in Save the Last Dance wasn’t perfect, but she’s looking forward to redeeming herself in the ballroom.
“This is my chance to free myself from all that and just enjoy the experience and learn something new with an amazing partner at the top of his game,” she told Us. “It’s a dream, a total dream.”
Stiles also shared that she was beyond appreciative of what good came in her career after Save the Last Dance.
“I’m so grateful for all the opportunities that came from that movie but I am not a professional dancer,” she said. “I just played pretend.”
Sosa jumped in to say that she and Stiles want to emphasize that she is not actually a Juilliard trained dancer.
“We are emphasizing that she did not actually get into Juilliard, people. That did not actually happen,” the dancer quipped. “She is an actress, it is a movie.”
Stiles and Sosa also revealed their team name to Us: SoStilez.
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“So Stiles and Ez at the end,” Sosa explained of how they combined their names.
Stiles is one of 16 stars competing for the Len Goodman mirrorball trophy.
Dancing With the Stars season 35 kicks off with a two-night premiere on ABC and Disney+ Tuesday, September 15, and Wednesday, September 16, at 8 p.m. ET.
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