Zendaya Says Her Fierce Red Carpet Persona Doesn't Reflect Who She Really Is At Her Core

No doubt about it: Zendaya is a bona fide Star with a capital s. All it takes is one look at her Vogue cover—released yesterday—or one of her many looks from her press tours for Dune: Part Two and, now, Challengers, and it’s easy to see that whatever it is, Zendaya’s got it in spades.

But, she said, the person you see on a magazine cover or on a red carpet isn’t really her. “She’s a different being that comes into me—my own Sasha Fierce,” she told Vogue of her fashion alter ego, emphasizing that she’s a very different person once the cameras and spotlight are off of her. “She takes over and she does the carpet.”

Zendaya added that she approaches a red carpet the same way she’d approach a character she portrays onscreen: “I have to buy her,” she said. “I have to buy that this woman exists, or that this fantasy exists.”

She has a famously tight relationship with stylist and “image architect” Law Roach, who People reports “has been an integral part of her journey from Disney star to fashion icon.” Roach confirmed to Vogue that there is a performance aspect to Zendaya’s red carpet appearances, which he said pose a stark contrast to the woman herself. Getting ready for a red carpet “gave her this real confidence, like, ‘Okay, let me put it all on and go out there and give this to the world, and then let me come home and take it all off and become myself again,’” Roach said.

Roach continued, “It’s so funny. People were like, ‘Oh, she’s so fierce.’ And, yeah, she is, on the inside. But she’d rather be at home, with her hair down and no makeup, with Noon, her dog, watching a movie, probably Harry Potter.”

Elsewhere in the Vogue interview, Zendaya opened up about a wide range of topics, like life as a child star and what she admires about boyfriend Tom Holland.