Florence Pugh has admitted the "nasty" comments online trolls make about her appearance can be "really painful".
The Little Women actress hit headlines in July 2022 when she stepped out in a sheer fuchsia gown with a tulle neckline and flowing skirt to the Valentino couture event in Rome, Italy.
Florence later hit back at critics via social media, but in an interview for the October 2022 issue of British Vogue, she conceded that the negative attention really impacted her.
"It's so hard. (The internet's) a very mean place," she sighed. "It's really painful to read people being nasty about my confidence or nasty about my weight. It never feels good. The one thing I always wanted to achieve was to never sell someone else, something that isn't the real me. I don't think it's confidence in hoping people like me. I think it's just, like, I don't want to be anyone else."
Florence went on to note that she isn't particularly confident in modelling for magazine photoshoots but has discovered that it's "a muscle I've learnt to be all right at".
"I'm not a model. It's portraying a completely different version of myself that I don't necessarily believe in. You have to believe that you deserve to be in those pages being beautiful. But now I know what I want to show. I know who I want to show. I know who I want to be and I know what I look like. There's no insecurities about what I am anymore," the 28-year-old continued.
Elsewhere in the conversation, Florence opened up about shaving her head on camera for the role of Almut in upcoming romantic drama We Live in Time.
But while a fan recently asserted online that the star chose to shave her hair off in an attempt to "get my freedom back", she insisted that wasn't the case.
"For any actor taking a role like this, it is completely important that you see her head and we see her shaving it - it was just always a no-brainer. You have the honour of doing something to yourself that is totally in support of the character," she explained. "In many religions, hair is the most precious thing on the body - it's where you store your memories and your dreams and your history. (Shaving) it was really bizarre. My head was so sensitive and so many people were trying to touch it and it was so alive. My body went into a bit of trauma from it. I was cold all the time."
We Live in Time is set to open in theatres on 1 January 2025.
