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Emma Stone Remembers Her Early Hollywood Rejection: "Nobody Wanted Me to Come In"

The actress is nominated for a SAG Award for her performance in La La Land

By Samantha Schnurr Jan 30, 2017 12:58 AMTags
Watch: Emma Stone's Craziest Audition Stories

Emma Stone is one of the most famous actresses in Hollywood, but there was a time when casting agents didn't even want to see her a second time. 

Much like her character in La La Land, the 28-year-old star faced rejection in every direction when she first made the big move to Los Angeles to work in Tinseltown. Her character, aspiring actress Mia Dolan, experiences similar setback throughout Damien Chazelle's movie musical. 

"I relate to pretty much every audition in the movie," she told E!'s Giuliana Rancic on the red carpet alongside her brother Spencer at the 2017 SAG Awards.

"I've had a version of those many many times. I think the hardest part was, for awhile, I auditioned for a lot of things, which is great when you're an actor and you're getting a lot of auditions."

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2017 SAG Awards: Red Carpet Arrivals

However, that plan initially did not work in her favor. 

"I wasn't getting called back for anything when I first moved to LA and so, they just stopped sending me out," she recalled. "There was a large swath of time where nobody wanted me to come in and that feeling was actually worse than any of the, you know, the initial auditions and being kind of rejected." 

On the heels of a Golden Globe win and her second Oscar nomination, all of Hollywood is calling Stone now. Fortunately, as she explained to Rancic, there are more opportunities for aspiring stars to break into the industry unlike she had more than a decade ago. 

"You can create your own content now and you can put things out into the world that you've written or you've directed and they're able to be seen online," she said. "I think that's an amazing opportunity. You can do it yourself."

For complete SAG Awards coverage, watch E! News Monday, Jan. 30, at 7 p.m. and 11 p.m. And don't miss the Fashion Police 2017 SAG Awards special Monday, Jan. 30 at 8 p.m., only on E!