I don't have any insider knowledge, but I think she got there by meritocratic means. She's a very good actor when she wants to be, plus she's attractive and personable. She created a genuine buzz when she first appeared.
Still, after being the top-grossing actor of 2014, she's pretty much disappeared. I suspect there are multiple causes. For a while, she was ubiquitous and I suspect people got tired of her. She seemed to be everywhere and the constant self-conscious "I'm a normal person" shtick became annoying and unbelievable to many people. Second, she was a child actor and by 2014 she'd already been in the industry for 10 years. She started to accept fewer and fewer roles, even before having a kid in 2022. She used to make two films a year, but in the past six years she's only made four. It's possible that she's burned out or feels she's achieved all she needs to. Third, a lot of her more recent films have been critical and commercial failures. She (or her agent) makes bad choices. It's strange, because she doesn't generally go for arthouse or niche roles (aside from Mother! and Causeway). It's mostly crowd-pleasing fare that simply fails to succeed. It's possible that she's difficult to work with, but I've never heard anything to that effect.
I don't think anyone in particular made her career happen. Her parents aren't well connected, even if (as with all child actors) they were pushy. I think her success was as organic as it could be in Hollywood, with no one in particular pulling the strings. That could also explain why her career has stalled.
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