Elle Fanning mini-bio: Elle Fanning (born Mary Elle Fanning) is an American child actress. Her mother named her Mary and her father named her Elle. Like her older sister, Dakota Fanning, she has always gone by her middle name. Elle began her acting career in several appearances as a "younger Dakota". Later, she auditioned for and won her own film roles.
Anecdotal evidence of her young skill is seen in the decision to cast her (instead of twins) opposite Jeff Bridges and Kim Basinger in The Door in the Floor (2004). (The film's producers had originally planned to hire identical twins for the intense shooting schedule, but were so impressed with Elle that they used only her).
Elle cites Dakota as her favorite actress, and always hoped to act alongside her. At present, their only work together was in voicing the sisters Mei and Satsuki in the English dub of Hayao Miyazaki's 1988 anime feature My Neighbor Totoro, and more recently in Charlotte's Web, but pre-production has begun on Hurricane Mary, a film in which the sisters will appear as twins. Based on the true story of Anastasia and Alba Somoza, the film depicts a mother's struggle to have her gifted daughters enrolled into public school, though both suffer from cerebral palsy and are wheelchair bound.