INTRODUCING Storm Reid

Blockbuster roles, beauty campaigns and her own cooking show – meet the 18-yearold taking Hollywood by, well, storm

VOTE, GET A TATTOO, PLAY THE LOTTERY, have a pint in a pub… That’s what we were excited about when we turned 18. Not Storm Reid. For her, approaching adulthood this July means something very different. ‘I can finally go to the Met Ball!’ she beams from her bedroom in LA. ‘I thought it would be in May, like normal, and I would have had to wait another year. They’re super strict about the age limit.’ Lucky for Reid, the date was pushed to September, so she’ll have her first spin on the Met steps this autumn. ‘Everyone’s going to go extra crazy with the clothes after this year.’

So, no, Storm Reid is not your typical teenager. With an IMDb page that could rival someone three times her age, she’s walked for Miu Miu, has joined Gigi Hadid as a spokesperson for Maybelline, launched a viral Gen-Z cooking show and she even set up her own production company during lockdown.

As if that wasn’t enough, this summer Reid will star in DC blockbuster The Suicide Squad alongside Margot Robbie and Idris Elba. ‘I was so obsessed with the first

Suicide Squad, I went to see it three times at the cinema,’ she says. ‘So when I got the opportunity to be a part of this one, it was a full circle moment.’ And Storm is pleased the film is getting a proper cinema release. ‘Going to the movies is one of my favourite things to do with my friends, so I’m excited to get some mozzarella sticks, throw my feet up and enjoy being there again.’

Reid knew she wanted to act by the age of three. ‘I went up to my mom, who was sitting on our big brown couch – one that we still have to this day – watching television, and I tapped on her shoulder and said, “Mommy, I want to be on TV. I want to be a superstar.”’

There was no arguing with that, so the family moved from Atlanta to LA and she was cast in her first Hollywood film, the Oscar-winning

12 Years A Slave, just a few years later. At 15, she led an all-star cast, including Reese Witherspoon and Oprah Winfrey, in Ava Duvernay’s

A Wrinkle In Time, Disney’s $100mbudget film about a geeky school kid who faces evil forces to save her dad. ‘It changed my life,’ she says. ‘I am forever grateful to Miss Ava for taking a chance and giving me the opportunity to play Meg Murray.’ To this day, Reid and her co-stars remain in a group chat that she turns to for advice.

Today, she is best known as Zendaya’s younger sister Gia in HBO’s hedonistic high-school drama Euphoria, currently prepping for season two. ‘It’s visually stunning, it’s relatable and it tries to bridge the gap between older people and young people,’ she says, when asked why the show has been such a hit. Working alongside Zendaya has been a career high: ‘To have looked up to somebody your entire childhood and to now have them in your corner is such a blessing.

I look at her as my big sister in real life; she supports me, uplifts me, is a shoulder to cry on. I still have to pinch myself about it and mostly try not to be a weird fangirl around her.’

Not letting a pandemic slow down her ascent, she launched cooking chat show Chop It Up on Facebook, in which she delves into what it is to be Gen Z with friends while they prepare food in her own kitchen. And a desire to help others break in the industry led her to launch her own production company, A Seed & Wings, with her mum Robyn and sister Paris earlier this year. ‘I feel it’s got to be, “Don’t just open the elevator door, go up and leave people in the lobby. No! We’re going to get all of us in this elevator and we’re going up together.”’

Having just wrapped the shoot for a new action film

One Way alongside Kevin Bacon, work soon starting on new thriller Searching 2 and a place secured at the University of Southern California, Reid admits that days off don’t come often. ‘I’m still trying to find what self-care means to me,’ she admits. ‘Not picking up my phone or emails is something I’m actively trying to get better at.’ Tied to her phone? Maybe she is a typical teen, after all.

The Suicide Squad is out 30 July

“I look up to Zendaya; having her

in MY CORNER is a blessing ”