8 Wild Zendaya Career Facts You Forgot Before Euphoria Made Her A Household Name

She Beat Out 200 Girls To Land Her Disney Channel Breakout

Zendaya auditioned for Disney Channel's Shake It Up in November 2009, originally reading for the lead role of CeCe Jones before landing the part of Rocky Blue instead. The show premiered on November 7, 2010 and pulled in a massive audience right out of the gate.

Long Before Hollywood, She Was A Child Model And Backup Dancer

Zendaya's professional career actually started as a fashion model for brands like Macy's, Mervyn's, and Old Navy. She also spent years as a hip-hop dancer with the Oakland group Future Shock and studied hula at the Academy of Hawaiian Arts, even appearing as a backup dancer in a Sears commercial alongside Selena Gomez.

Her Actual Film Debut Was A Disney Channel Original Movie

In 2012, Zendaya made her first film appearance in Frenemies, a Disney Channel Original Movie where she played an aspiring magazine editor alongside her Shake It Up co-star Bella Thorne. It was a small-screen start, but it planted the seed for the blockbuster career that followed.

She Was The Youngest-Ever Dancing With The Stars Contestant

In 2013, at just 16 years old, Zendaya competed on season 16 of Dancing with the Stars with professional partner Valentin Chmerkovskiy, making her the youngest contestant in the show's history at the time. Despite her strong hip-hop background needing a total reset for ballroom, the pair finished the season as runners-up.

She Used Her Star Power To Push For More Diversity On Disney

When Zendaya returned to Disney Channel for K.C. Undercover in 2015, she came back as a producer and reportedly requested the show feature a Black family, breaking from the network's typical formula. She has said representation was the whole reason she agreed to come back to the channel at all.

Spider-Man: Homecoming Was Her First Real Feature Film Breakthrough

In 2017, Zendaya made her big-screen breakthrough playing Michelle Jones, later known as MJ, in Marvel's Spider-Man: Homecoming opposite Tom Holland. It was the role that officially launched her out of Disney Channel territory and into blockbuster movie stardom.

A Red Carpet Moment Turned Into A Defining Press Story

At the 2015 Academy Awards, Zendaya wore her hair in locs and faced a racially charged comment from a TV commentator, which she publicly addressed the next day on Instagram. The moment became one of her earliest major press stories and cemented her as an outspoken young voice in Hollywood, eventually inspiring a Mattel Barbie doll modeled after the look.

Then Euphoria Made Her Emmy History — And A Household Name

In 2020, Zendaya won the Primetime Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series for Euphoria, becoming the youngest actress ever to win in that category. She won again in 2022, making her the first Black woman to win the award twice and the youngest person ever to win two Emmys.