Scarlett Johansson Felt Her Career Was Over After Being 'Hypersexualized' and 'Pigeonholed' at a Young Age

etonline.com:

Scarlett Johansson is opening up about her career in Hollywood and how she feels being «hypersexualized» from a young age threatened her success.

On the 500th episode of Dax Shepard's  podcast, the  actress got candid about being a woman in the spotlight. «I kind of became objectified and pigeonholed in this way where I felt like I wasn't getting offers for work for things that I wanted to do,» Johansson explained. «I remember thinking to myself, 'I think people think I'm 40 years old.' It somehow stopped being something that was desirable and something that I was fighting against.»Johansson made her screen debut in 1994 at nine years old in the film .

She went on to reach critical success when she was cast in Sofia Coppola's  alongside Bill Murray in 2003. At the time, she was just 17 years old, and played a character five years her senior. «Because I think everybody thought I was older and that I'd been [acting] for a long time, I got kind of pigeonholed into this weird hypersexualized thing.

I felt like [my career] was over,» Johansson told Shepard. «It was like, 'That's the kind of career you have, these are the roles you've played.' And I was like, 'This is it?'»«The runway is not long on that,» she continued. «So it was scary at that time.