Dakota Johnson grew up in a Hollywood family, but that did not mean she was guaranteed financial support no matter what she did. Her father, Don Johnson, had a rule for his children: as long as they attended college, they would continue receiving a family allowance. Dakota, however, had other plans.
When she finished high school, she decided that she did not want to continue studying and would try to become an actress. When she told her father, he kept his word. “All right, then—you’re on your own”, Dakota recalled about the response she received. From that moment on, she was no longer part of what Don jokingly called “the payroll”.
The decision had much more real consequences than one might imagine given that she was the daughter of two stars like Don Johnson and Melanie Griffith. Dakota said there were times when she did not have enough money even to buy food and ended up turning to her mother for help. “She was the nice one”, she joked.
Even so, she did not change course. She began going to auditions and gradually built a career of her own, eventually landing the roles that would make her known worldwide.
Her last name could open doors in Hollywood, but at home there was one very clear condition: if she did not want to study and preferred to pursue her dream of acting, she would have to learn to support that decision on her own.