Former child star Maisy Stella returns to her 'true love' with 'My Old Ass'

At the age of 20, being a rising star is old hat for Maisy Stella.

Stella first got noticed when she was 8 years old in a viral video singing Robyn’s “Call Your Girlfriend” alongside her older sister Lennon – before social media was even a thing – and the siblings spent six seasons starring on the ABC country music drama “Nashville.” Now she’s back in the spotlight with a breakthrough role in the coming-of-age dramedy “My Old Ass” (in theaters now).

“I have had so many people come up to me and be like, ’It’s so weird. I feel like I've grown up with you,’ ” Stella says. “I always find that to be really beautiful.”

Join our Watch Party! Sign up to receive USA TODAY's movie and TV recommendations right in your inbox.

In “My Old Ass,” Stella stars as Elliott, a teenager celebrating her 18th birthday who trips on mushrooms and meets her 39-year-old self (played by Aubrey Plaza). They help each other work some things out emotionally as young Elliott navigates a summer filled with family, romance and planning for the future.

Need a break? Play the USA TODAY Daily Crossword Puzzle.

Here’s what you need to know about Stella, whether you’re an old or new fan:

‘My Old Ass’ was an acting return right in Maisy Stella’s wheelhouse

Stella considers herself “a clinically nostalgic person” so the premise of “My Old Ass” hit her in the feels. Meanwhile, writer/director Megan Park had been a Maisy fan for a while. Stella auditioned for Park's first directorial effort, 2022’s “The Fallout,” but “wasn't right for anything in that film,” Park says. The director included a song from Stella and her sister in the “Fallout” credits and had her “in the back of my head” when writing “My Old Ass": “She has such a joie de vivre and sparkle in her eye.”

Stella connected with the family aspect of the movie, especially in the way young Elliott at first focuses on her friends rather than her parents and brothers. She also is like older Elliott, though, in that she feels like she could learn a lot from her younger self. “I just never thought about being perceived or what I looked like. That's the most beautiful part of childhood and that's the hard part of being a young girl in the industry,” Stella says. “I think she would remind me of all of those things.”

As a ‘Nashville’ star, Maisy Stella sang for Taylor Swift but acting was her first love

Stella and her sister went on quite a run starring on “Nashville” as Daphne and Maddie Conrad, the talented daughters of country icon Rayna Jaymes (Connie Britton). They had hit singles, wrote a children’s book and even sang Taylor Swift's tune "You Belong With Me" to a beaming Swift at the 2013 CMA Awards. “I was a beautifully unaware child, just enjoying it all,” recalls Stella, who Park reminds was “a very early inspiration for Billie Eilish becoming a musician.”

The siblings’ parents were a popular Canadian duo known as The Stellas, yet Maisy Stella says she was more “obsessed” with being a movie star. “Lennon made a cardboard box TV that I would climb into and she had a fake remote, and that was our game,” she says. “She would flip the channels and I would act out different genres of whatever.”

Her “actual true love” for acting came when she had time away from it, following the end of “Nashville” in 2018. Three years ago, “I was unbearably ready and really felt that I definitely missed it,” she says. Now, she doesn’t do music anymore with her sister, who’s currently working on an album, though “at some point I hope to score film. I would love to do that.”

Is Maisy Stella the next Jenna Ortega? Her director thinks so

Stella has another big project on the calendar already: She stars in the sci-fi movie “Flowervale Street” (in theaters May 16), directed by David Robert Mitchell (“It Follows”) and also featuring Ewan McGregor and Anne Hathaway. “Annie made sure I had electrolytes in my water at all times, and she just was so motherly and warm,” Stella says. “It was such a big leap. And in a lot of ways I was like, ‘Oh, I'm not ready for this.’ ”

Park, however, is pretty sure she is. Stella’s “My Old Ass” director has an eye for talent: “The Fallout” helped launch Jenna Ortega into movie stardom. Both actresses can “do anything,” Park says. “I keep telling Maisy, ‘That's going to be you. As soon as people see this movie, that's you next.’ ”